– TW: domestic violence

It starts with subtlety.

With questions like – “Why do you bother?”
and – “Why don’t you find something you’re actually good at?”
Or – “Leave it; I’m better at this kind of stuff anyway.”

And because I love you, I stay.

It continues with small, unsupportive acts,
designed to make stressful situations even more stressful.

It continues with subtle but insidious social isolation,
until you are my entire world.

It continues with holding me to one standard and yourself to another,
while somehow convincing my rational brain that that’s okay.

And because I love you, I don’t say anything.

Because I love you, my will becomes smaller and smaller
until there’s very little individuality left;
I have no more needs except the need to meet yours.

Because I love you, I buy into the lie
that this is the fairy tale I’ve been waiting for,
and that any cracks that appear are my job to fix.

My panic attacks, the chest pains, the hysteria and the sleepless nights,
they all go away when we’re happy…
(and we are happy, some of the time…
that makes all the bad stuff worth it, right?)

We spiral down, each rock bottom giving way to the next…

It ends with me ceasing to exist.