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I am inferior. 

I am not a first choice, I am a back up plan. And I am so fucking sick of people acting like they care when they very obviously don't. 

I am shell of who I once was and I can't do this anymore. I'm not funny anymore. I lost my humor, the one thing I had going for me. I may not have been the prettiest or the smartest, but I was always the funny one. And I'm not anymore. 

No one laughs at my jokes or smiles when I'm goofing around. No one genuinely likes the person I am. 

I keep everything at bay and it's still not enough. I'm still not funny and I'm still aggravating and I still don't know who I am. I am trying so hard to go back to the person I was before all this shit. 

Before I had a boyfriend who hit me, before I let the person I loved most get away, before my dad got arrested, before I lost myself. 

I tried so hard to find myself again after Shane. And it took years and effort and energy every fucking day but I finally did it. With a little help from my friends, I finally came to be the best version of myself and I was happy. For once in my life, I was truly content with who I was and where I was going and who I was going to be. 

But I never thought my life would turn out to be this way. I never though lt that I'd be who I am now. I am pushing everyone away and losing myself in the process. Again. 

I can't go through that again. I simply don't have the energy to find myself after all this time. Again. I've been through hell and back. And I've smiled the whole way through, staying optimistic, convincing myself that things would get better and I'd be okay by the end of it. 

But I am far from okay. I am far from who I was, who I was when I was happy. 

And I don't know how to get back to that point. How to smile at the autumn leaves that turn beautiful colors and fall in perfect patches, just waiting to be crunched. I don't know how to laugh at good jokes and smile as if I didn't have a care in the world. I don't know how to be the best version of myself and I'm fucking scared of who I'm becoming. 

I'm becoming more of a robot than I ever was and that's saying a whole fucking lot. 

I will never allow myself to be vulnerable again. I will never be comfortable with who I am because I am not anyone. I am not someone who belongs, someone who matters. 

I am a back up plan. I am placeholder. I am the shell of a girl that used to be everything. And now I am nothing. 

I have nothing left to give, I've already given it all to a person who threw it away in favor of something brighter, something better. Because even my best and my brightest still isn't good enough for the person I walked through hell with. 

I wonder if he realizes that I was there for it. I think he forgets that I've seen his highest highs and his lowest lows and I still think the world of him. 

I wonder if he realizes that no matter how hard I try, I still give him all I have. I give my time, my energy, my money. And what does he do with it? He throws it away. He throws it away because he doesn't want those things from me - he wants it from someone else. 

So I'm done giving. For my own sake, I have to be. I can't give away who I am in return for absolutely nothing. 

And I don't know how to fix it. I don't know how to get back to thinking the sun shines out of his ass and I can trust him with anything. Because I can't anymore. I don't trust him. 

He confirmed my worst fears and told me to my face that I wasn't good enough for him. That I have given him all I have to give and yet it still isn't anything. Everything I've done, every part of who I am, it just isn't enough. 

Why? What is so terrible about me that I just can't have anything that I need?

Maybe he isn't what I need. Maybe he's holding me back from finding out exactly what it is that I need. Maybe I need to distance myself from his weight and relearn how to carry my own.

All I know is that I'm not strong anymore. I'm not who I was. And it's killing me. I always held on to my strength. Even if I wasn't funny or pretty or smart, at least I was strong. At least I could carry my own weight and be happy with at least that. And I can't even say that anymore. I don't know I am. I've lost the most integral part of myself. My strength. 

I don't know who I am, but I know that I'm not who I was. 

Expectations

You know when life just didn't go as you had planned it? When all of a sudden it's 3:30 in the morning and you're drunk and wondering why all the things that happened to you happened in the first place?

That's where I'm at now. I'm laying in bed in absolute silence wondering why. 

I'm wondering why I was never enough for the people who were always enough for me. I'm wondering why I can't express my feelings. I'm wondering why it's oh so easy for me to write them here but not say them out loud. I'm wondering why I can put on this facade and pretend like everything's okay one minute and sob the next. I'm wondering why I'm not worth anything. I'm wondering why it seems like so suddenly the things that made me happy four years ago don't make me happy anymore.

I want to be happy again. I can feel it slip through my fingers everyday. I'm almost grasping it, so close to the feelings I want so dearly, only to feel it slip through my fingers as easily as sand. 

It was so easy before. It was so easy to look past my struggles and put on this brave face. I may have known it was always a mask, but I was so comfortable wearing it. 

So what changed? When did I decide it was okay to be vulnerable? 

I'm still stuck with the same type of people. The kind of people that lie to my face and do things they know will hurt me behind my back. The same cowardly people that shy away from confrontation. 

Why do I allow myself to open up to people that have continuously let me down?

Because I have no one else. Because I'm stuck. 

Because if I leave theses people, these people that care about each other more than they'll ever care about me, I'll have no one. I won't have anyone to spend the night with. I won't have anyone to conquer to boredom with and to quiet my demons for me.  

I have run out of strength. I have exhausted all of my resources in this piece of shit town and there is no one left to drown my fears. They are my last option. I have gone through every other one.

I know I could leave them. They have hurt me more than any other person has because for the first time in a long time, I opened up. And they abused that. 

How do I justify that for them? How do I explain that away and make excuses for them for that?

I'm tired of making excuses. I'm tired of pretending like everything is okay because it's not.

I am sad. I am not who I once was and I'm fucking losing it. And they don't care. 

All I've ever done is be there for them and they can't give me the simple respect of being honest with me. 

So why do I stay? Because I have no one left. And if I lose them, there is no one else. And shitty friends are better than no friends at all. 

I'm stuck. I'm sad and I'm stuck. And I fucking hate it. 

Dustin

What you don't seem to realize is that I am the moon and she is the sun. You may be a star, but there are so many of you. You fill the sky - nothing special in comparison to your neighbor. As singular masses of being, we stand alone. And yet, we compliment each other. You only compliment yourself. 

I hope you wake up one day. I hope you pull your head out of your ass and finally see what is right in front of you. You have two beautiful people who would give up the world for you. And you don't care. 

I couldn't care less if you don't give a shit about yourself. But the fact that you honestly don't give a damn that people give a damn about you blows my fucking mind. 

We fight for you every goddamn day. We try our hardest to love every part of you and every time we think we have you back, you show us just how far you've gotten away from us. And you don't care. 

You don't care that we try. You don't care that we accept every apology you throw at us. You don't care that we let you use us as your floormat to wipe your dirt on. You don't care that we are still here, despite it all. Despite the fact that you make us feel replaceable, like an outdated toy. 

And as I lay here haunted by the thought of not being good enough to make you happy, you still don't care. You are so wrapped up in your own head that it's impossible for you to realize that maybe we have our own thoughts too. We have our own opinions and our own demons and our own battles to fight. And we try our damnedest to be who need us to be. And you still don't fucking care. 

You once told me that you don't see us as real people, instead as extensions of yourself. That is all of your problems in this friendship wrapped in to one set of words. We are people. We have pasts, presents, futures. We have thoughts and feelings that matter just as much as yours. 

Your effect on us is substantial and maybe you don't see that. I know you label yourself as this third wheel, and maybe you are. But we have never treated each other the way that you treat us. You make us feel like loathsome human beings and it takes the two of us to remind each other that we're not. We cling to each other because we have a common enemy - you. 

You set yourself up for this. And I guarantee you there will come a time when we make a mutual decision of the fact that we have had enough. That we have had more than enough. 

And when that time comes, I hope you look yourself in the mirror and come to terms with the fact that it never had anything to do with us. It's all on you. It's never been about how we dealt with you or how we treated you. It's about the fact that you don't care to deal with us and you don't care how you treat us. 

So stop the crocodile tears and the fake apologies and promises you have no intention of keeping because I'm not falling for them anymore. I know who are. I know exactly what you're capable of. I'm not falling down for you. 

Are you worth the heartache? Are you worth everything I feel when I have to coddle you? Are you worth staying up at night for? 

I'm finally pulling my own head out of my ass a realizing that no, you're not. You're not worth the trouble of trying to keep with you. 

Maybe it was never about me not being good enough, but more about you not being enough. 

You're not enough to keep me happy. It's taken me a damn long time to realize it. 

I hope that one day you are enough. I hope one day the sun shines so brightly that it seems like it only made an appearance for you. 

But I'll be damned if I stick around to see it. 

Selfish

I've considered myself a lot of things in the past twenty years - juvenile, insecure, moody, spontaneous, narcissistic. But I don't think I've ever truly considered myself selfish until tonight. 

I'm pretty good at putting the problems of others before my own. I can push past my own problems, take care of them myself, and weigh a little less so I can carry the burden of others. But I realized that the most important person's burden to take awayis my family's. 

I thought that that was what I was doing. I was taking away the burden of the family I made for myself - Peyton and Dustin. I was putting myself in the back burner for them because they needed me. I needed them, too, but not as much. And it was worth it to sacrifice for them. It is so worth it to carry your best friends - your family. 

But I've been letting them help me with bits and pieces too. I've been opening up more, letting myself become vulnerable in a way I have never allowed myself to do in front of anyone else. It makes me uncomfortable, being vulnerable, but I know they don't think differently of me for it. I know that they will always think the sun shines out of my ass. Because they love me. Like a family does. 

But blood is thicker than water. And my mother needs me now more than ever. 

And while I've been putting myself on the back burner for my friends, I realized that I've been putting my mom on the back burner too. I got away. I left that house that was sucking the life out of me two months ago and I moved in with Dustin and I haven't looked back. Not even when my mother called to me, asking me to turn around. I refused to. And that's selfish. 

It's selfish because I took an out she doesn't have. She had one, years ago, when I was young and we still lived up north. And she didn't take it. She didn't take it because she was selfless. She was hopeful, naively so, that things would get better. And they didn't. 

She left that out to fade away behind her because my sister and I were young and impressionable and she didn't want us to face the consequences of her and my father's problems. So she carried her own burden and decided that her own little family, no matter how broken it was, was good enough for her. 

How did she come to that conclusion? How did she look past all the warning signs that told her it wasn't quite the darkest her life would get and continue to guide our family and our lives anyway? How did my mother become so selfless? And more importantly, how did it take me twenty years to figure out just how selfless she is?

She wants me back. She wants me home. That place may not be home to me, it hasn't been for a long time, but I am home to her. And I've been unfair to her. I've been so caught up in my own shit that I haven't had the energy to realize that maybe more people need me than I thought. She need me more than anyone else. 

It's going to exhausting, but it's a battle I have to fight. I have to go back to that house. I have to fight this war with the person who needs me most. Because it never occurred to me until now that my best sidekick is the person going through the exact same thing - my mother. 

I need her as much as she sees me. I need  to be less selfish and give a little back to the woman who gave me everything. I need to stop being so blind to a strong woman's fights and fight them with her. And with enough time, I will. As long as it's not too late. 

Home

Home isn't a house. It's not even a place at all. It's not a place or a person or a sight or a sound. It's not something you can direct yourself to. Home is not something you can pick up and hold. It's a feeling. 

Home is a road trip with a banging soundtrack. Home is walking into a room that feels brighter and warmer than the one you were previously in. Home is a smile that lights up someone else's face after you've told a witty joke. Home is happiness. It's excitement and joy and optimism. 

I don't think I've ever been this homesick. I can't recall ever reaching for those feelings so strongly. I'm grasping at air, stretching my arm far out to only to find that there was nothing there. Because home isn't anything tangible. 

I think I may be searching for the wrong thing. I'm looking for something permanent, something I know I'll never have to live without. But my whole life, I've just been flying by the seat of my own pants. I've taken whatever road I came to and wandered down it, willing to find whatever lays at the end. And there's a certain beauty to that. 

There's a kind of excitement that I find in not knowing what will happen next. It's terrifying, but what's the point in living a life that isn't a little reckless? At least it's not boring. 

This homesickness can't last much longer and I know that. I know that I'll find that feeling in little every day things someday soon. I know that I'll have that joy in my life and I'll love every day for its own reasons. 

I'm optimistic at this moment. I'm hopeful because I've learned that most of the time, things have an amazing way of working themselves out. And if they don't, I'll make my own way through. Nothing has killed me yet. 

Maybe I'm looking for home in all the wrong places. Maybe I need to stop grasping at air and let home come to me. Maybe I need to live more in the moment and let the future come and the past be. Maybe I can hold on to this feeling for a while. 

This new outlook is inspiring. I want to live in this moment and this mindset for the rest of my life. I love it here. This is home. 

I hope this isn't the best home gets for me. I hope everything feels even better tomorrow, or in a week, or in a year. And I have faith that it will. And that's home. 

Black

"It's always darkest before the dawn" never really made much sense to me. If everything is awful, how could it be cleared so easily? How many times to you really get a break in life?

I can't think of a single moment in my life when I felt comfortable enough to sit back and think about how good things are. I can't think of a time where everything felt settled. It's always had a way of being swept back and creating another twister. 

Maybe I only say that because everything frightens me. I don't know what's going to happen and that scares the shit out of me. Every fucking thing about my life is up in the air right now and I don't have the patience to wait for it to be settled. And if I'm being honest with myself, which I very rarely am, I don't know if everything ever will be. 

I don't know if this pain in my chest will ever go away when I think about it. I don't know if I'll find the motivation to set myself up for when I'm older. I don't know if I'll ever find anyone that genuinely cares about me. I don't if I'll ever sleep easy at night again. I don't know if I'll ever be content with just myself and not have my self worth tied to someone else. 

I'm constantly worried about someone or something and I can't breathe. I can't sleep. I can't function. I don't know what's happening and I'm scared. I am so scared of everything.

I want everything to be okay but I don't even know what "okay" is. I haven't felt "okay" in far too fucking long and I don't feel like I'll ever be truly happy again. 

I don't know what's missing. I have this vast number of tangible things at my disposal and I don't want any of them. I don't need them. But I don't know what I need. I don't think I'll ever know exactly what I need and I'm losing my fucking mind. 

All I'm saying is that if it really is the darkest before the dawn, it's bound to break soon because I've never been immersed in such an emptying shade of black. 

Knots

I have officially given up. I don't care anymore. Fuck Dustin for not thinking that I'm enough and fuck my best friend in Virginia for leaving and fuck my parents for blaming me for being sad and fuck school for being a constant reminder that the only thing I'm capable of doing well is fucking up. 

I've been doing okay too. I've been marginally happy and optimistic and been doing things that I should be doing. And of course I can't be happy for long. Of course I can't be satisfied with my best adventures. They're never enough for me. Something has to be wrong. It always is. And I'm fucking over it. 

It's like my life is this huge knot and every time I unravel some of it, put it back in pocket, and forget about it, something else gets tangled up. And I can't fucking stand it anymore. I can't stand being second best. I can't stand surrounding myself with the same people who don't really give a shit about me. I can't stand being a disappointment and not having anyone to talk about it with. I can't stand having all of these feelings I have with no idea how to express because I'm so comfortable being a robot. 

I hate being alone. I hate crying in my car in the middle of the day and having strangers look at me like I'm fucked in the head. I hate being with people in supposed to be comfortable with and feeling like I have to sensor myself. I hate not being able to get myself out of my own fucking head. I hate the headache I get after I cry. I hate the weakness I feel while I'm crying. I hate it all. I hate it. 

And I can't do it. It's over, I'm done. I'm done fighting for everyone around me, including myself. I'm done watching myself waste away in front of the world while they turn a distracted eye and pretend not to notice. I'm done building people back up and try to be everything they need when I'm just some background character in their life. I'm done trying to save people. I'm fucking losing it and nobody, including myself, fucking cares. 

It's Isa throwing herself a pity party like she always does. It's Isa getting up in her feelings and refusing to talk about because she never does. It's Isa being moody and taking everything personally. It's all my fucking fault. 

I can't keep taking two steps forward just to be thrown back another fifty. I can't keep up with the revolving door of people in my life. I can't keep pretending that everything rolls off my shoulders. I can't keep acting like nothing keeps me up at night and that I'm not falling apart. 

I write all of this knowing that I will never fucking say anything out loud. I'll never confide this in anyone. I want people to realize but I'm not willing to mention it. And that's fucked up. I'm a waste of a person and it's all so fucking clear. 

I may not be as transparent as I think I am. Maybe my happy act really is fooling everyone and it's not that they don't care it's just that I'm too good at pretending that I don't care. So yeah, fuck everyone but mostly, fuck me for being completely incapable of asking for help. 

I don't need it. I'm strong enough to handle this in my own. And if I'm not, I'm strong enough to get myself out of it, one way or another.