This is a really hard time of year, the deeper I seem to walk the more that hits me and knocks me off my feet, and the more alone I feel I am. Sleep seems to be something for others but not for me. Nights turn to morning, it's light out and still I lie awake afraid and unable to even connect to time that just passed as it seems it vanishes with the daylight, but yet, what weighs and preys on me is ever present around me, through me, silently torturing and won't let go.

Knowing that I drifted off at times, awakening terrified and feeling lost to where I am, knowing that I somehow have to get back and be okay. Funny how time goes on, I don't even think it knows I am not there, in today, maybe it doesn't care, for now I need to function and push through, hiding it all as if I am okay and strong. That is what the world expects, and whether I can or can't doesn't matter, I have to.

Finding my way to smile, pull on that mask again, pretending I am present in an ever forward world, part of me is terrified and afraid of failing, part of me doing all it can to just be there. But we are good at pretending, meeting what is expected, being strong whether we are or not. Coming across as strong, having it all together, we've set a presence we must maintain.

But silently, unknowingly to the world around us, we are tortured in what no one else sees or can understand. At times silence, at times forgotten, but always strong, whether we really are not; we are. We have to be. And the world around me either cannot see or refuses to see the struggle and that I cannot always be what they want, expect, or need me to be; but I do it anyways. Whether me or us, it gets done, it has to.

I don't know what I am trying to say, what I am asking for, but somewhere just for someone to know we are not as strong as we appear. Sometimes painting on a mask of knowing something we really do not know or understand, sometimes painting on that mask a smile to make it easier for the world to accept us and not walk away.

Today I am trying to be okay, to be in the present, to be human and to be someone accepted and okay-----I have to be or I am no one and this darkness that seems ready to swallow me, will. God help me to stay, to be okay, and to not disappear into the darkness.

Please just don't judge me, I do that enough already. It may seem easy to just be present, strong, and okay but it really takes all I have to do that each day. I have had to, always had to, so I come across as someone who can be what is expected and needs to be what is expected for myself; and whether expected or not, it is in our mind, a mind that has always known to be.

Inside I am crying, falling to pieces, and so afraid. It doesn't match my outer self. I'm afraid; afraid to be alone, but have learned to be anyways, even when I need someone the most. Today I am trying to be okay, and I will be, because I have to, but inside I am failing because I am anything but okay. But the world around me doesn't need to know, I will be what the world needs me to be-----just please don't judge me......I'll be what I have to be at least until darkness once again comes, and the world disappears once again behind closed doors and I once again remove the mask that is not me.........

and once again am taken away.......

I'm trying.....the world does not seem to be what it is.....but then again, how do I know.......I am lost between worlds......but I am trying. Please don't leave me, I'm trying. I wish for a hug, for a word of understanding......that is all. That is all..............