In the cognitive courtroom, shackled, with no key, perhaps the gavel will fall soon, or the jury might break for tea, I resent the judge’s stern frown, his cruel, unhelpful tone, yet under his wig, above his gown, a face as familiar as my own.

TW Just saw a judge video where a girl was complaining about a mom suing her for money when her mom is her agent and gives her younger sister (at 17 years old) better work because they exploit her body and THEY SHOWED PICTURES. I saw it and was like “oh my gosh is that actually what I think it is?” Then after realizing it’s like I was too shocked to look away. What is bothersome is that I wasn’t immediately repulsed enough to turn it off and didn’t immediately do so and when the picture kept showing up it’s like I kept looking at it to make sure what I saw was actually what I saw. Also, the false memory is hitting hard because now I’m wondering if I had intrusive thoughts judging her body. Now I feel like a perv and pedo 😭 It’s like I’m anxious over not being anxious enough about the situation while actually being incredibly anxious. I don’t if that made ANY sense but someone please help. I will say my mind was already incredibly vulnerable because of burnout and other very stressful events recently. Still, I feel terrible and feel I deserve to be in jail.

Does anyone feel like they’re fighting a war inside of them? I’ve slowly opened up to people about my past and things that happened ( I never thought I would ) but at times, I value truth and honesty and wanting to be a good person and this is something I just want to let go of because I’ve suffered with the guilt and shame and regret but my mind keeps on dwelling on it and bringing it back. Like I’m a fraud. This implies to all my mistakes that I’ve learned from. I normally tell my mom things but I don’t want to tell her these things. I love her and don’t want to bring shame upon my family or for this to be brought up over and over again. I did stupid things without logically thinking and I have the best mom ever and she trusted me with things when I was younger. I made mistakes with that trust and it makes me upset. I now feel like I’m ideally the “ideal” kid for my family and I wish to stay like that no matter my age. I’ve been trying to mange with my childhood mistakes. The shame and guilt. I’m trying to be a bit more compassionate but there’s always the thought that scares me, what if I was really evil? I used to hate looking at pictures of myself when I was younger but now when I do, I finally realize what they meant by “you aren’t your worst mistake” because I’ve done good and I’ve also screwed up. But I feel like I’m fighting a war with myself because I value justice and truth and so but I don’t even wanna talk about this or bring it up and my mind keeps targeting it and it’s exhausting.

I wrote these two poems for an open mike poetry night at my college a few years ago. Freshman year of college my anxiety ate me alive. I chickened out last minute and never performed, but I recently found the notebook I wrote these in and thought I’d share. i’m sO sCareD You say, "Oh my god, I’m so OCD about my notes," while I am drowning in the undertow of thoughts that refuse to let me go. You say, "I just like things neat, you know?" while I check the lock again and again, wondering if this time will be the time my brain believes me— but it never does. It's the monster under the bed except it lives in my head, whispers masquerading as instincts, warnings dressed as logic, fear that wears me like a second skin. And oh, how easy it is to laugh it off, call it a quirk, a habit, a punchline, while I stand at the brink of a thought so loud I can feel it crack my ribs. You say, "I’m so OCD about my computer icons." I say, I can’t hold my mother’s hand without tracing the veins, make sure she’s alive, still beating and bleeding, rewinding, replaying, repeating, repeating, until I become the pattern itself. I say, I live on a hill. And if the picture frames aren’t straight, the ground will shift, the walls will give way, my home will collapse beneath me. And I can’t let it go? I say, I step in threes, three, three, three, reset, three, three— reset. Because if I do it wrong, something worse will happen, though I don’t know what, only that the terror knows it for me. I am not particular. I am prisoner. So when you say OCD, I hope you mean the way it steals— the way it clings, the way it suffocates, because it is not about preference. It is about survival. hallway girl. Why can’t I have the helpful OCD? The organized one, the productive one, the one people praise instead of whisper about? Why can’t my compulsions make me a genius instead of a joke? Why do they make me the hallway girl— “she’s still walking the hallway” as if it’s a comedy show. As if it’s funny to be trapped in my own head. You see it in sitcoms— the guy who can’t handle an uneven stack of papers, the woman who scrubs the counters too much, laugh track ringing loud— but no one laughs at the panic that coils in my lungs no one sees the terror when the stairs don’t add up and suddenly the earth is shaking and I can’t move No one shows the moments I cry over a step miscounted, staring at the hallway, knowing I have to start over, but already too exhausted to move. No one shows the shame, the whispered apologies, the effort of convincing myself this time, maybe, I’ll be strong enough to resist— but I never am. And no one shows the shoes. How I would run, sprint, chase time through our fifteen-minute break, Back to my room, because if they moved— if they weren’t exactly right— my dad would have a heart attack. And it would be my fault. So I checked. And checked. And checked again. Until I was breathless, But still had to sprint back to class and pretend I didn’t leave my mind behind with my shoes. So when they call me hallway girl, I bite my tongue so they don’t see how hard it takes Because if OCD is a joke, why am I the only one who isn’t laughing?