Throughout my young life, I feel I've always been ill in one way or another.. I have had some major illnesses, but even beyond those, there's always been something to complain about.. I've even been embarrassed and ashamed thinking I bet people just think I'm doing it for attention. I truly did have genuine symptoms, but now I just had this.. Realization, or feeling that all that being sick all the time was actually this deep, deep grief and sadness that I didn't have words for and didn't even understand before now.. There was just always something I desperately wanted to get out but couldn't - the fact that I was unloved.

I wish I could have just told someone.. My dad didn't love me, he never has. He just doesn't know how to, and I don't think he'll ever even consider the possibility of learning because it'd mean he'd have to open that well, deal with his own demons.. I desperately wanted to tell someone about how this made me feel but couldn't! I just didn't understand it. So yeah.. In a way, I got ill for attention. I LOVED my mom taking care of me when I was ill, but there was always something I needed to tell her that she just couldn't reach.. And this was it. I'm so grateful I realize this now.. I wasn't a bad person trying to make other people's lives difficult! I was showing physical symptoms of an emotional problem. A broken heart. Being too alone. Not having adults in my life who would have got it. Tragic.. But I survived!!!