My Inner Constriction

This is a book of poems, but first I want to give you a little insight on how my head works. This is the original short story I wrote my sophomore year of high school, spring 2016.

The past five years I've felt it. It's like a tight pull on my brain. The first time I felt it I was eleven. I was laying in my bed and it became me. At first it was stress. I thought it was that I was growing up. It still could be. The older I got the tighter it pulled and it became more than stress it became fear, betrayal, abandonment, loneliness and many more. Maybe I'm just made of feelings. Places, people, and various words trigger me. It's like a paperweight on my heart, a floor of needles and I'm in the dark. Every moment I live it pulls tighter. Every lie that graces my ears I drown deeper into the ocean of them. That feeling of hopelessness and not being good enough. Makes it harder to sleep. Why is my mind the way it is and why do feel this inner constriction. Who knows where this road will lead me. Will my constriction get tighter or will it release me.

Eleven, twelve, and thirteen weren't as strong. I felt it but the constriction was only minor. I still wondered why I thought so differently from other people. It wasn't until I was almost fourteen that something snapped. It came over me and I had no clue why, but there was a dark cloud. I tried to pull away but the constriction pulled tighter. Every so often It wouldn't pull so tight. It would let me live without restraints. Then something would happen and for months it was as if there was nothing but me and my cloud. I would try to fight against the constriction but there was no use. My friends look at me with confused looks when I talk about it. I twist and turn through life trying to ignore the constriction so they can't see. I've never been quite clear on what it is myself. The world would never understand.

I still have that question in my head. Why am I like this? Why can't I let go of things. Why do I stay up at night thinking about things that other people could sleep on? Why do I have to care so much? None of these questions seem to have answers. My life is just a whirlpool of things I don't understand. I breathe and keep on breathing but I can't live without that question or the longing to be able to live with contentment. My brain is a bungee cord it stretches out but it still pulls tight. Still every now and then it will let me go. But just as quick it pulls me back.

Maybe it's a good thing. Maybe the way my brain works is special. I can only hope. One day it will release and it won't go back. I'll grow up and contentment will replace the constriction. My brain will always be my brain. I will always think the way I do. I'll always want to be the best I can be, I'll always love the things I have, the people I know, and places I go. Even if it constricts me. Even if it chokes me to death.

When I talk to people I wonder. How do their brains work? I think everyone has a constriction. whether it's a tight pull or just a slight tug on their brains. We all feel. We feel pain, happiness, and contentment. In different orders at different times of our lives. To different degrees. Some people don't feel at all, some people feel too much much, some people are too afraid to feel. Everyone's brain works differently but they also work the same. No one goes through life without the pain of the constriction.

It's strange the feeling I get. Knowing that I'll never get to change. Sometimes I'm content with it. I'm not by myself. There's plenty of others like me. Whenever you feel like you're the only one. Just know someone somewhere else sometimes not so far is feeling it too. My brain may work in a strange ways I think things and feel things that other people don't think and feel. The constriction pulls me in. Only to let me go. But in an instant it pulls me in again deeper and deeper I fall into the abyss of nothingness, surrounded by the dark cloud, tied down by my paper weighted heart, strangled by my inner constriction.