Tree roots. Riptides. Cancer. They are all practically invisible to the naked eye, lurking beneath the surface. And yet, all three can deceitfully trip you up (quite literally in the case of roots who break out of the soil).

I think people are a lot like that too.

The sad part is, it’s intentional. Many of us masquerade around, pretending life is sunshine and rainbows. Social media perpetuates this, showing us the highlights reel of everyone we know living their best life, making us believe we’re failing if we aren’t doing the same.

Then there’s people like me—people who fear showing their true colors because the world has taught us that, if we don’t fit into the tiny boxes we’ve created for ourselves, then we are clearly not worthy of anyone’s time. You can’t be too much, but you also need to be just enough, because anything less than the status quo is unacceptable.

I learned to be very good at wearing masks. By the time I reached middle school, I had learned how to be whatever it seemed people wanted, even if that meant I had to constantly reinvent myself multiple times in the same day. In science class, I might be the kid using swear words and breaking pencils. But just an hour later in English, I’d be a model citizen.

Life is a constant game: survival of the fittest. And I was determined to win every single time.

No one needed to know how invisible and alone I felt. They didn’t need to see the freshly carved wounds up and down my arms. They wouldn’t believe me even if I told them what made me act this way. That would draw attention. People would ask questions. I’d be rejected, an outcast forced to display my own scarlet letter.

And yet, to this day, I try to give those I interact with the benefit of the doubt. I look for the best, while accepting that I’ll probably draw out the worst.

I bring out the worst in everyone. I scare them away. All it takes is a glimpse into what’s beneath the surface.

Since late September, I’ve felt like an entirely new person. The constant screams of anxiety and doubt have dissipated to less than a whisper. Where there were once overreactions to small infractions, there are now rational responses. Instead of my thoughts and feelings controlling me, I control them.

It’s simultaneously remarkable and a bit disconcerting. I’m both my true self and an unrecognizable stranger.

And yet, I know it’s all still there, lurking beneath the surface.

I’ve been here before, this place where I’ve let enough of the positive show that I can’t display the dark side of the moon when it starts to bubble up. If I want to be accepted, if I want to be loved, I can’t go back to that place… I can’t be that person. 

It’s funny, I thought healing would make me feel less alone, not even more isolated. And yet, there are moments where I feel like I may never truly be myself because that would require me to lay all my cards out on the table. It would require me to trust others, to trust myself. It would require me to believe I have the power to reel it in, to ride the waves, to calm the storm.

Strength. Courage. Determination. My therapist says I have these things, but I don’t see them when I look in the mirror. Perhaps it’s all part of the illusion, the mask I wear. Pretending I have my shit together until I know I’m alone and safe.

Then I fall apart.

It’s both a blessing and a curse to hide it all. It’s what I must do if I ever want to be accepted. And even though I know it’s there, just beneath the surface, no one will ever get to see it.

Goodbye authenticity. Goodbye to myself. Stuff it all inside a box, it can’t stick out. I can’t be too much, only just enough.

Because I am not strong enough to lose anyone else. I can’t lose anyone else if I want the darkness to remain beneath the surface.