I'm Barely in My Twenties

I still live in 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, and sometimes I revisit the worst years of my life... or the years I thought were going to be the worst. Needless to say, some of worst years have been my best. Which may sound ironic to a vast majority of people out there, which is understandable. After all, I don't believe that most people can say they were unloved as a child. At least, I hope that the vast majority of people can't say that. That's what I'd like to believe. Sometimes, beliefs are incorrect.

I'm a lot younger than I was four years ago, when I graduated, when I had a job, when I could walk outside without breaking down, when I didn't binge eat every time I felt the monstrous hands of depression tugging on my veins. I'm a lot younger, but not in a way that seems blissful or euphoric, not at all.

I'm still a child. Maybe around 12 or 14 years old. I'm not ready for reality, but reality will sprint all the same, and it will either drag me along with it, or down beneath it. I know that much. Still, it's hard for me to believe that the world could be so calloused. I'm 12 or 14 years old now... stuck inside the body of a 22 year old woman. One who's meant to be grown, but her head spins too fast, and she loses her footing, and her balance is vanishing, and her bones are fragile.

I have a difficult time admitting that I was abused as a child. Partly because I feel like I didn't have it bad enough to consider myself abused, and partly because part of me sometimes questions rather or not everything I remember is as traumatic as I make it out be, perhaps I'm just dramatic. Sometimes, people tell me that. Sometimes I agree with them, and sometimes I become livid. I never really know how to feel, or what I'm supposed to feel, and when I'm supposed to feel things, and if it's possible for me to feel things such as happiness, or if I've even felt it at all before.

I think I began to feel lost the day that I ran away from home at 18 years old, the day that my step-mother choked me. At first, I was excited, I was free. And I was, I experienced more life in my senior year of high school than I had ever had a taste of before then. I went out with friends, stayed up late at night, wore leggings to school instead of jeans, picked out my own shoes, spent my money how I wanted to, hung out with who I wanted to. I ate what I wanted to, and didn't what I didn't want to. I bought the books I've been wanting to read and cherished every single word that dripped down from their pages.

Everyone at church adored my step-mom. I don't blame them, she was outgoing. She constantly smiled, shook everyone's hand. To this day, I don't think anyone ever discovered who she is on the inside, despite the pastor living right across from their house... the house I was broken in. Sometimes it hurts, because I know what Christianity stands for... and then I know the secrets of those who attend that church, and it makes me petrified. What if the entire world was that way? What if nobody ever practiced what they preached? What if they're all faking it? These questions, today, keep me away from my faith. I'm scared of people, even more scared of those who go to church. I wish I wasn't.

It's quite cold in my mind. I panic at the sight of other people. I panic at the thought of them yelling at me. I panic at loud sounds, at loud voices, at the memory of a door slamming. I panic at women who have short haircuts. I panic at men with beer bellies. I panic, and I freeze, and I can barely live.

I'm 22 years old, but everything around me is a memoir of my childhood. Every person, every face, every breathing, living soul around me terrifies me. I keep sinking and to be honest, I don't know rather or not I'll be able to find my way out.

I wish I could be young again. Back at my mother's house during summer vacations, swinging on swing sets with my little brother. Drawing disfigured cartoon characters on the cement, and racing his miniature toy cars through custom race tracks.

I wish I could cry when things didn't go my way. I wish I were small enough to cuddle with my mother again. I wish I didn't have to get a job, or to pay bills. I wish I could have an abundance of stuffed animals and crayons. I wish that I wouldn't have to go outside. I wish I wouldn't have to grow up. I wish that strangers would still look at me lovingly. I'm a 22 year old woman, and all I can see is the past while my future runs ahead of me.

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Author's Note: I know this isn't very professionally written, and that I didn't go into a lot of details about my abuse. I mainly wrote this as a rant, a way for me to express how I'm feeling at the moment. That being said, I didn't do a very strong proofread and there's probably going to be a lot of mistakes. I don't plan on using this rant for anything professional, so take that little piece of information and do with it as you will. I just wanted someone to hear me, without having to be too loud.