#this is a real experience but it’s okay to revolve for whump stuff

[justbreakonme]

It is so exhausting to be optimistic.

To keep fighting even when the people around you shrug their shoulders and sigh, lay down their fight because “why does it matter?”

To try to convince not only others but yourself not to give up or give in because things are going to be okay, goddamnit I will make them okay, I will mold them with my bare fucking hands if I have to.

To just…be there. To look on the bright side. To placate, to assume the best, to forgive. To not ignore the pain that is so sickeningly real and bright but to also work to change it.

To go to bat constantly with all the people who, intentionally or not, want you to believe that giving up and just accepting “fate” is the easiest, most merciful and morally correct choice. TV, social media, friends, family, everything in an echo chamber of “nothing matters”.

And knowing if you can’t keep your spirits up for others, if you fall apart outside of the safety of privacy, everything you’ve been working on for weeks will fall apart.

If you struggle, if a setback knocks you flat on your ass, if you are starting to come apart at the seams, you still have to grin and bear it because you have to be stronger than this, you have to keep going or there will never be a future to rest.

You can’t get angry, you can’t scream and throw things or snap, you can’t be the kind of angry that would soothe that awful expanding feeling in your chest, the kind you’re almost afraid of because what if you don’t break down and cry? What if you explode?

There’s only so much sleep can do for the kind of exhaustion it brings. You go through the little positive media you can find like a kid with Halloween candy, and all it leaves you is hungry for something real but sick to your stomach, a disgusting feeling in your mouth.

You can’t channel this feeling very easily. The anger is hard to direct, the sadness only helps you understand what you already knew, the apathy ties you to your bed and cuts you off from the people you care about, the people you want to help.

You feel helpless but you can’t be.

You know better.

You can do better.

But the only thing you want to do is lay your head down and for everything to stop for a minute.

But that’s not going to happen.

So you clean your room, you cook dinner, you take a shower, you take a deep breath, you listen to your own advice. It feels hollow but in the morning, it’s enough to start again.

It’ll be okay.

Eventually.

The only way out is through.

You just wish you weren’t doing it alone.