Today didn’t explode.
It eroded.
It wore me down sentence by sentence, look by look, until my voice stopped sounding like mine and started sounding like every fear I’ve ever had about myself. We weren’t just arguing we were digging up years. Every unfinished conversation. Every time I swallowed my feelings so she could breathe easier. Every time she thought she was helping and I felt like I was disappearing. We yelled because whispering never worked for us. My chest burned. My hands shook. I wanted her to hear me not just the words, but the panic underneath them. The part of me that’s always scared I’m too much and never enough at the same time. Then she walked away. And that’s when it broke. I screamed that I hated her not because it was true, but because I wanted the pain to leave my body. I wanted it to land somewhere else. I wanted her to feel how alone I felt in that moment. The words echoed back at me like a curse. When she came back, her eyes weren’t angry. That was worse. They were tired. Final. Like something had quietly shut its door. “If you hate me,” she said, “get out of my house.”
Not our house.
My house.
Suddenly I wasn’t her child. I was a problem standing in her doorway. I said no, but it felt weak. Like begging without asking. Like standing on the edge of something and realizing there’s nowhere to go back to. Now the house feels hollow. Every wall feels like it remembers what was said. The air feels thick with things we didn’t apologize for. I sit alone, and that’s when my mind turns on me the way it always does when I’m tired and hurt and unloved all at once.
The past comes back quietly.
Not screaming.
Not demanding.
Just waiting. I see the knife and suddenly I see me the version of me who thought pain was the only language anyone listened to. The version I worked so hard to bury. The version that learned early that hurting yourself is easier than admitting you need comfort. I don’t want to go back there. But I’m scared because part of me remembers how familiar it felt. I cry until my head hurts. Until my chest aches. Until my body feels like it’s collapsing inward. I replay the fight over and over, wondering why I always ruin things, why love feels like something I’m always about to lose. I don’t feel dangerous. I feel small. Like a child who just wants to be told they’re still wanted. Like someone who made one mistake and thinks it erased every good thing they’ve ever done.

Question

Today didn’t explode.
It eroded.
It wore me down sentence by sentence, look by look, until my voice stopped sounding like mine and started sounding like every fear I’ve ever had about myself. We weren’t just arguing we were digging up years. Every unfinished conversation. Every time I swallowed my feelings so she could breathe easier. Every time she thought she was helping and I felt like I was disappearing. We yelled because whispering never worked for us. My chest burned. My hands shook. I wanted her to hear me not just the words, but the panic underneath them. The part of me that’s always scared I’m too much and never enough at the same time. Then she walked away. And that’s when it broke. I screamed that I hated her not because it was true, but because I wanted the pain to leave my body. I wanted it to land somewhere else. I wanted her to feel how alone I felt in that moment. The words echoed back at me like a curse. When she came back, her eyes weren’t angry. That was worse. They were tired. Final. Like something had quietly shut its door. “If you hate me,” she said, “get out of my house.”
Not our house.
My house.
 Suddenly I wasn’t her child. I was a problem standing in her doorway. I said no, but it felt weak. Like begging without asking. Like standing on the edge of something and realizing there’s nowhere to go back to. Now the house feels hollow. Every wall feels like it remembers what was said. The air feels thick with things we didn’t apologize for. I sit alone, and that’s when my mind turns on me the way it always does when I’m tired and hurt and unloved all at once.
The past comes back quietly.
Not screaming.
Not demanding.
Just waiting. I see the knife and suddenly I see me the version of me who thought pain was the only language anyone listened to. The version I worked so hard to bury. The version that learned early that hurting yourself is easier than admitting you need comfort. I don’t want to go back there. But I’m scared because part of me remembers how familiar it felt. I cry until my head hurts. Until my chest aches. Until my body feels like it’s collapsing inward. I replay the fight over and over, wondering why I always ruin things, why love feels like something I’m always about to lose. I don’t feel dangerous. I feel small. Like a child who just wants to be told they’re still wanted. Like someone who made one mistake and thinks it erased every good thing they’ve ever done.