Happy Birthday, Self.

I am needy and hopeless and lonely.
I dive into spirals and I fall too fast and too hard,
I leap and I dance into "I love you"s and best friends,
I am pressing and overwhelming and LOUD,
The sort of person who gets high on life.
Because inside I am insecure and miserable;
I feel a constant loneliness, even surrounded by friends.
If you happen to read this, and care,
Trust me, it's not you.

There's something wrong with me.
I've said it over and over again.
I keep forcing myself to hope even though it's a constant source of disappointment;
Even though I'm terrified and I know it's stupid but -
SUE ME.
Sue me for wanting to not lose another friend,
sue me for being a selfish brat -
I know I am.

But I spend my whole life worrying about others,
Being the guarantee, the person they can talk to;
In my family it's a joke because I'm the shrink.
I am 18 years old today and I am more happy than sad.
Or at least I'll try to be, I woke up early feeling different;
And I never feel different on birthdays, but today -
Today I am a legal adult and I am stronger than anyone else I know
(except maybe my mom and a couple of other people
who've gone through hell and back).

I have had friends not talk to me for months than talk to me again,
Sometimes because they need help,
Othertimes because they just forgot.
I have been told "you don't count" as a friend,
Because I am everyone's friend and always there,
So once again I am reduced to a "nobody".

Of course that's how I see myself -
My mother cannot undo the work of my peers,
Especially when some of it still comes as a surprise to her,
Some of it to the woman I tell everything to.
And still the anger, we live together, it's going to happen -
I don't blame her, it's clearly my fault.
I am lazy and useless and untrustworthy and ---

Even when people don't say these things they feel insinuated and I add them to my collection of words to murder myself with.

I am 18 years old today.
I am scared I'll lose another friend.
And why can I not find the connection I need?
Even people who are trying,
I pull back and shove myself away -
Except for my boyfriend - who I met online - and my best friend - who I met online - and the person who betrayed me because her family made her choose and she bowed down to the force of the will.

So once again I crawl into my corner,
forgive,
and am forgotten.

18 years old and feeling different
sure hasn't changed much of my life.