I Saw a Mountain Lion - A Letter to the Lifelong Struggle With Emotional Neglect - Oct 20 2022

A Letter to the Lifelong Struggle With Emotional Neglect - Oct 20 2022

Nov 8, 2022

162

2 Mins Read

We were raised with a stick in our mouth.

Don't cry, it makes you weak.

Don't show your emotions.

It's not ladylike to be angry.

It's not okay to feel big.

It's not like we're a siphon.

We can't take in and let go.

We take in and

hold and

Hold and

break.

This battle of needing

And craving the love we were denied as a child.

Versus the domineering shadows

looming,

expecting only submission

to the way we were raised.

Maybe it's a battle I don't want to keep fighting in.

We have been swinging our fists in the dark for so long.

And no matter what I do,

I change my position and

the enemy swings back.

Maybe the only way we truly know to win

Is to be brutal.

Act out and they'll pay attention.

Cut yourself

They'll look then

Scream

Everyone looks for the source of the scream.

But if you keep acting out they get used to it.

You become the boy who cried wolf

and suddenly no one cares if there is a wolf,

because there's always a wolf

and it's not like any of the wolves bite.

So then it becomes this hopeless fight

between going far enough they'll care again

and going too far.

But then you go too far

and they tell you to get better

so you try

but then they think you're better when you aren't.

I'll always be that kid.

That little child.

Watching their dad disintegrate before their eyes.

Losing their mom in every capacity but physically.

And no one thinks.

No one stops to think.

Hey, maybe that little kid.

That little child.

Who's parents still feed it.

Still bathe it.

That child needs love.

Because to the outside that was love.

But it was suffocating malaise.

Utter lack of care.

Constantly burning fever.

This itch right under the surface that everyone seems to be able to ignore

but that little child.

Like looking a dying dog in the eyes

and promising you'll go on a walk tomorrow.

No. No you won't.

Because tonight the dog is dying.

And you've been saying you'll take him on a walk for the last two years.

But you never will and you never did.

You promised to care and then never did.

It's not love.

Maybe all I want is to be seven again

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A Letter to the Lifelong Struggle With Emotional Neglect - Oct 20 2022

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