if i could change one

if i could change one thing, i would release the stigma on mental illness

like a goddamn balloon into the sky,

popping when it gets too high in the atmosphere,

never to be seen again.

and i'd wave goodbye because i'd be happy to see it go.

nobody would treat me different anymore when they found out about my depression and anxiety.

they wouldn't tell me i "was a big girl" when i said i couldn't ride the bus alone,

they wouldn't be confused as to why i couldn't go to that party or hang out with those friends,

they wouldn't treat me either like a child that needs taking care of or a Thing Not to Be Spoken of, 

they wouldn't force uncomfortable things on me or make me feel even more like the scared little girl i know i am inside.

i wouldn't have to convince other people that i'm not lazy, i have an illness,

i could actually take mental health days on the days where getting out of bed seems pretty much impossible,

i could tell my p.e. teacher that if he made me play softball i'd have a panic attack and he wouldn't dismiss me like i was just looking to get out of class.

i lead a pretty privileged life, so i'm not insinuating that i wouldn't still feel like shit if people stopped having a stigma about the way my brain works,

but it's a start.

because it is how my brain works.

it's called an illness for a reason- there's a chemical inbalance in my brain and there's only so much "thinking happy thoughts" can do.

i sometimes feel like a ticking time bomb,

and that's hard to explain to people who, when something bad happens to them, they feel upset and then move on.

i can't move on.

so it'd be nice, maybe,

for society to realize that not wanting to participate in uncomfortable and triggering situations doesn't equate to laziness,

and instead is the result of something deeper, something you can't see on the surface.

because underneath every person is something else,

something, perhaps, darker than it may seem to an outsider,

and it's not your job to dig and assume and make the dark feel lonely, too.

living in the dark is lonely enough without people who don't understand skipping over feelings and requests like rocks on a pond, ignoring the water underneath.

living in the dark wouldn't be so lonely if someone out there would lend me a goddamn light.