“I see it in your eyes. Your eyes are sad.”

The words are piercing. I lose the ability to protect myself as the fortress I’ve built comes crashing down and wonder if that is also obvious.

I feel completely exposed. Here, take my lungs–they’re no use to me anyway, I’m hardly breathing.

My eyes give me away, if infrequently, only to someone who is really looking.

I don’t feel like I’m going to pass out from an override of anxiety. Instead I feel grounded as grief fills me and pours out. My eyes are sad because I’m overflowing with shame and guilt and fear and I don’t see the point to life when I get in this space.

Rejection by others was so high this week, I created a plethora of stories about how I’m not worthy, valuable, or important to anyone. Connection disintegrated. I started to want to be invisible–to match physically what I was feeling emotionally.

I still feel this way. But I allowed and even asked for embrace. I allowed it to remind me that I’m here now. I am loved. And most of all, I need to keep fighting.