Writers 
Then something worse came: numbness.
Not peace.
Just quiet pain that didn’t scream anymore.
I stopped crying because there was nothing left to cry out.
I stopped hoping because hope started to feel dangerous.
I moved through days like a ghost in my own life.
Work. Eat. Sleep. Repeat.
No joy, no grief. Just flat.
I became good at pretending.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Just tired.”
“I’m working on it.”
But inside, everything was muffled.
Like I was underwater and everyone else was on land, laughing.
I lost time. I lost interest.
I lost the version of me that used to care so much.
The one who felt everything at full volume.
That girl felt too risky to keep around,
so I put her away to survive.
I stopped answering calls.
I stopped making plans.
I stopped believing that good things lasted.
Because every time I reached for something soft,
it slipped through my fingers or it hurt me.
The quiet pain was worse than the loud pain.
Loud pain means you’re still fighting.
Quiet pain means you’ve given up on being heard.
And I was so tired of asking to be seen.
So I went silent.
I went small.
I told myself this was what surviving looked like.
Empty, but alive.
Breathing, but not living.
That was the part of the year that scared me most.
Not the breaking. The not-feeling after.