We Are Not a Mistake

We are told to
Suck it up 
It'll be alright 
Don't worry about it 

Or 
We get ignored
Laughed at for being different 
Talked about because we have demons 
We have scars 
No one understands the story 
That's why we hide

That's why we become alert around others
Alert to a shadow 
Our minds are showing flashing red lights
Sirens ringing  in our ears 
So we isolate 

Because of anxiety overload 
We isolate to recharge 
Our bedroom
Home
Or somewhere we feel we  belong
We feel safe

But everyone says we are different 
Everyone says we don’t belong
That we are monsters 

The hurtful things 

It makes us feel like a mistake 

I am here to tell you 
We are not a mistake 
We are different 

Don’t mistake us for weakness 

This poem is about putting ourselves first and finding our strength.

When writing this, I realized a lot of us are told to ignore how we feel, but when we do, we sink deeper; we feel ignored by others as if no one cares then we feel hurt by what people say. People can be really mean, no matter how old we are. 

I get it; I understand the mask we have to show because of people, the judgment we go through, the negative words people say, or the bloody stares; it does make us feel like we are a mistake, and we feel small. It is extremely hard to accept this; even I still have trouble.

 Everyone says they are jealous of us, which is why people treat us the way they do, but I think it's because they don’t care.

Except for someone who does. And that someone is you.

You are still here, and I care too, but you are the main focus. It hurts; I know when other humans don’t treat us right. 

The feeling of a mistake is valid; it's fair to feel this way. I have felt that way before when I feel that way, it’s because of the hurtful things when we are treated unfairly, we automatically think we are a mistake we think we are the problem for the mistreatment. 

Still, we aren’t. I don’t know why people do things, but I do know we don’t deserve this. 

The laughs and stares are unbelievable. Just because we are different, we don’t go around telling everyone our story. We don’t even trust everyone, but people like to laugh because of our appearance or because we are a certain way (these are examples). 

That's why we hide because of judgment; that’s why we don’t trust everyone. That’s why we feel different; we cry at night, wishing everything would be different, and it will. I just don't know when. 

The ending I really like, “don’t mistake us for weakness,” is a powerful line to me because the world thinks we are weak because we struggle with crowds (example), but the truth is we are not weak. We have a hard time because of our story. 

We all have a story, and every story is different, and that makes us unique because we have survived. Now we are surviving the burn and the pain. 

That neutral feeling is real; the heaviness will come and go, but that doesn’t mean we are a mistake. It doesn’t mean we fail; it means we are souls who are surviving.  

I know life is a lot to handle; at times, it feels like everything we do is wrong, like every door we open is a brick wall.

 A brick wall can feel defeating, but when surviving, we can accomplish anything. The brick wall doesn’t mean defeat; we are not a mistake; we are surviving.