Illustrated by: Ethan
Written by: Day
It’s not that I don’t wanna tell you how I feel, it’s just that I can’t…I’m at a loss of words, the pain I’m in, you can’t describe it. I can tell you what’s going on all day and all night but you still won’t get it. I can explain to you in exact details all the things I’ve been through, but you’ll never go through what I have to go through every single day.
It’s not a game anymore, being sad all the time is dead, drowning in your own thoughts isn’t okay anymore. Telling people you’re fine when you know you need help is not okay anymore. Being able to tell the people you love most what’s wrong with you…and them actually getting it IS RARE …so you can’t get mad at me when I say “I’m fine” or “I don’t wanna talk about it” because you’ll never get it, and it’s impossible for you to understand it….I’ve been waiting 9 years for someone to get it, 9 years for everyone to apologize, 9 years to get revenge for him raping, 9 years for my dad to stop lying, 9 years to understand why everything played out the way it did, 9 years waiting on my family to be there for me, 9 years to actually be a kid again, 9 freaking years to depend on anybody else besides myself, 13 years to meet my siblings, and 14 years to figure out I’m here for a reason.
But to be honest, I’m losing grip of what I’ve already seen, I’m losing hope and I’m barely 14.
This story originally appeared in Facing Childhood and Adolescence in Iowa’s Cedar Valley, a publication of The Facing Project that was organized by the University of Northern Iowa in Waterloo, Iowa.