I spent most of my life, holding all of my thoughts and feelings in. Thinking that I was what was wrong with the world. The psychic damage passed down through my grandparents and then my parents, left a gaping hole in my soul. They did not know how to help with mine because they had covered theirs up with a thin piece of cloth. They did not want to dive too deep into mine, as they were afraid of ripping open their old wounds. I looked around at all the paler faces around me. Their chests had no sign of emptiness. They were shielded from this pain, due to ignorance passed down from their grandparents and then their parents. Because ignorance is bliss right?

Because they had no hole in their chest like me, I wanted so badly to be like them. They seemed to admire me when I did so. My chest slowly began to get covered up by a thin cloth and for a while I felt okay. Then, I opened my eyes and recognized the invisible poison building up within me and around me. I panicked, moved too quickly, and ripped my cloth. Everything that was there before leaked back out again, except there was more. It consumed me. I was drowning.

I felt myself give up and sink to the bottom of the hole, heavy with my thoughts. I felt as if I would never be good enough, smart enough, pretty enough… Why bother trying to swim to the top, I asked. I will never measure up to everyone’s standards. Swimming to the top was too hard and I am too heavy. I felt the weight of my words on my back, holding me down.

In those deep waters, I saw a blurry reflection from above the water. She looked like me. She looked like a goddess with her dark brown skin and thick black hair. She was reaching a hand out. She looked so beautiful and at peace even from so far away. I could feel myself wanting to be up there with her but realized my thoughts were still holding me back. I started tugging at my weights. I twisted and turned in the water, fighting with myself. I started screaming, “I like who I am! I am worthy! I belong to myself! I owe it to myself! I have no limits!” The weights broke off and I began to swim to the surface. In the back of my mind I thought about how easy it would be to just sink to the bottom again, but then I remembered how agonizing it was, and swam even faster.

As I breached the surface, I was met by the warm sun. I floated on top of the water and pondered to myself. How did I get to that point? That hole was too deep to be caused by just my own pain? Who else helped to dig that hole?

All of a sudden, I realize the hole I had once been sinking in, has closed up. I am lying in shallow water. I sit up and hug my knees to my chest. I rest my cheek on my wet thigh. I am grateful to have made it out. I never figured out where the woman I saw in the water went, but I knew I had to share what has happened so no one else would be stuck in that place again.