You don’t know because you don’t see it, because I don’t let you. Be kind to me because you don’t know the ocean I hold behind this skin. My skin is no thicker than yours, my brain just knows how to shut down so it doesn’t speed my heart up with thoughts of him. I have memories…so many memories. 1,183,680 minutes of memories.

I’m no different than any of you. I spent the mandatory 4 therapy sessions in a small room with too many chairs to determine that I wasn’t suicidal. Stamped and approved as just another lonely, heartbroken girl. There’s too many of us to be deemed different or special anymore. We’re just price tags who use too many tissues. I only deny the pills I’m offered because I’d rather have the burning emotions hidden inside than feel the emptiness of just his absence.

We’re the same, you and I, I’ve also cried nights alone in my unfamiliar room wearing his t-shirt, clinging to his scent. “There, there it will pass.” They say putting a time limit on the love I felt…feel. Pushing ahead is the only thing keeping me alive. Without looking forward I trip and fall, scraping the delicate skin I’ve worked so hard to keep together. “This isn’t fucking over!” I scream to a room that has already moved on and can’t hear my silence.

So we’re the same because it is over. I just don’t look behind me and I keep walking. I don’t mention his name in conversation anymore and I don’t tell anyone I wish his arms were still wrapped around me. I don’t act less than strong and I don’t crumble in front of others. The tears I shed fall so silently and so infrequently that sometimes I don’t even notice them anymore. This is for the best. This can only makes things better. This will help me move on.

It has to.