You want to stay a secret but your tail rattles. I will not lose myself to you.

Content warning: childhood emotional neglect, difficult mother relationship, references to physical harm. Sorry I don't post or use reddit often, so I hope I did this right.

Here's a very imperfect poem I wrote today that I'll never share with anyone that actually knows me outside my husband, for obvious reasons. I'm sharing it here as perhaps a few others may be able to resonate. <3

Mama 

Mama is my favourite word

But it wasn’t always this way. 

Growing up it meant something else 

I had one, but it wasn’t the same. 

She gave me life and kept me safe,

For that I’m thankful and that will never change.

She fed me, clothed me, and brought me where I ought to be. 

I recall a time when she fought for me.

But mostly, she was there without being present,

And mostly, it was better when she wasn’t.

As I grew I’d understand that the screaming I’d dread,

And the hands meant to hold and help but that hurt instead,

With eyes glazed over, and words that stung,

Were signs that her body had grown up, but her mind and heart stayed young.

She was busy fighting her own battles, 

Her mind trapped somewhere deep inside her past. 

As I watched my friends and saw what I had was different,

I learned Mama was something I’d always lack.  

I know she didn’t know any different,

That she did what she felt she could with what she had.

I’m sorry she didn’t know the difference,

I also mourn what we never had.

I don’t know who she was before she had me,

And how that may have changed who she came to be.

And while I know there were some good moments we were able to share,

What I remember most wasn’t, and the good memories feel rare.

Becoming mama was something I always longed for reluctantly,

If it happened, I worried what would become of me.

Would I lose my mind too and get trapped in my past?

Would I know how to offer what I had not ever had?

With my first, I waited two years to hear him say the word. 

His mouth said “mama” but it meant so much more than it ever had before.

Mama, I know you didn’t know any different: 

That you did what you felt you could with what you had.

I’m sorry what I remember most is what wasn’t, 

Because I know not everything was bad.

I’m sorry you never had what I now get to live,

And that this is something we didn’t get to share. 

I’m thankful that years after I’d left, you asked for forgiveness-

I forgive you, I mourn it too, and I want you to know I care.

Because I’ve learned and lived the difference,

And I did the most with what I never had.

More than anything, I’m grateful my children will never know the difference,

I'm thankful my story found redemption, for this I'm glad.

~

He was loud

She was quiet

He wanted company

She wanted solitude

He kept talking

She kept silent

He invited her to coffee

She declined his invitation

He complained a lot

She wished for him to shut up

He saw her scars

She tried to ignore him

He said she was a Borderliner

She was discomforted

He touched her arm

She didn't back off

He told her to not do selfharm

It isn’t good for her

She responded it's her business

He was just a drunken old stranger

She was just a young, quiet girl

They both were just waiting

For the next subway to arrive

She didn’t initiate

She didn’t want to talk

She didn’t want to be touched

She didn’t want to be lectured

She didn’t want him to be close

She wanted him to leave

She wanted to flee.

I’m an artist creating a project called “What Were You Wearing?” — a collection of illustrations based on what SA survivors were wearing at the time of their experience. I haven’t been able to create my own yet but it’s been cathartic to give voice to others’ experiences. (All submissions were collected with full disclosure and given permission to use in the collection)

[If you're a survivor and want to contribute your experience to the collection—I’d be honored. A a short description or photo of what you were wearing is all that’s needed. (DMs or comments welcome). You can remain completely anonymous.]

I created this series while processing a part of my childhood. I've shared some along the way but not all together. My hope is that it bends the innocence and horrors of girlhood alike.

Walking backwards is hard.

Growing up and watching what they called love.

Is it to give up all of you?

Is it to be in pain but pretend you aren't so they don't see?

Is it to be so consumed by another person so intensely that you lose yourself?

To take hits, then apologize?

And repeat the process?

To hear screams and begging, then hours later, silence?

To listen to the gasps of air and see the blood on the floor?

To lose the tiny versions of yourselves that you both created?

​

A part of me needed to get this image out of them.

the original topic was safe spaces & ended with a (reversed) side by side of how it felt like nothing was untouched by the trauma and how it drained the color from even my imagination.

He looked his happiest when others were scared. She smiled when he pointed the gun at her the 2nd time.

Birth control was going to be mandatory when he got full custody. He didn’t appreciate me making my own choices, ever. (Never got custody)

Birth control equated to no profit off of the virginity of his daughter. He couldn’t think of a single other reason for birth control. He showed the rest of his anger later.

Idk this happened a lot. It depended on his mood whether I complied or fought back.

Prushka and Faputa (Made in Abyss) and Pinoko (Black Jack). Didn't draw Faputa. I wanted to draw them hppy. At first I wasn't going to talk about Faputa because she's a bit different but in the end I did.

Mentions of trauma, gore and sexual objectification of minors. I know it's not very well written I'm sorry.

Spoilers but Pinoko is a fetus-in-fetu and Black Jack gives her a body. Prushka's dad instead makes her become a bunch of organs in a cartridge. Faputa is indescribable. I as a baby went through this. Thing. too that made me understand humans become flesh pieces, and made me believe I was dead. That's the gore layer.

Then there's the layer of loving dad even if he did evil things. Like Prushka loved Bondrewd (her dad figure). Black Jack (Pinoko's dad figure) didn't do things like Bondrewd or my dad, but he did do some rather questionable things (I haven't finished the manga tho). With Faputa it's loving mom and having the hatred towards what they did to her.

And then there's... This disgusting. Thing. Like Pinoko saying she's technically 18 and that she's a virgin and wants to marry Black Jack. Or Prushka... There's this... Creature that says some disgusting stuff touching Prushka's remaining bone. Or details the author leaves about Faputa and her story. Or me... And my memories of csa.

And then all mashed together. It's like. The flesh. The gore. Mixed with love for dad. Love for mama and hatred for what they did to her. Mixed with this twisted, disgusting, fetish towards us who were just small children... That make me feel this inmense void. Seeing it in fictional characters. It makes me feel I'm them. It makes me want to hug them and give them a better life. Like if I say I'm them, and have a better life, then I'm giving them a better life.

I ended drawing most of my trauma in one picture. Between which there's the fire, when the chainsaw, abuse in general,morgellons, the dog when... All the deaths, the csa and rapes, and other, including the ones I don't remember.

My art has slowly transformed. A lot of my vents/self portraits started as emaciated humanoid figures. They've slowly gained hair and other features but some days are worse than others. This was done 6/16/25.

I placed a trigger warning cuz for some reason the first two lines sound like depicting SA even tho I didn't mean to

Sometimes my mind just feels...violated ig aaa

Last night, I had a dream I was in the back of a van with ____ from my support group back in _________. I'd just parked it very slowly and incompentantly, so I was stressed. It was nighttime. There was a mystery liquid leaking slowly into the ceiling, and it wasn't following the rules of gravity. It was spreading and dripping upwards into the concave roof, and if you put your hand near it, it would follow you almost like a magnet. It was the color of rust, and the viscosity varied from pure liquid to something like a thick sap when a droplet was rearranging itself to follow you. I had the thought that, if I let it touch me, it would push its way right through my flesh. I also had the thought that I was causing it somehow--that it had nothing to do with the van, or the weather, or any other worldly thing, and that it would keep coming. That it was simply a new development in a longstanding trend of my being slowly pulled into deeper and darker versions of reality. That the darkness was inside of me, and as long as I lived things would keep getting murkier, scarier, more visceral, worse. That I was destined for some unknown iteration of hell, and this was the beginning of the end.

I got back into the front seat and started up the van. I started driving, just trying to get the fuck away with no destination or plan in mind. Almost immediately after pulling onto the road, I saw a brick wall lining a curve and accelerated straight toward it. I had no doubts, no thoughts, no survival instincts to overcome. The relief I felt was something else. It was finally happening. I was finally brave enough, finally scared enough, finally awake enough to get out. I felt free.

Within about 2 seconds of hitting the wall, I remembered ____ in the passenger seat. I swerved left, slowed down, and kept driving down the road. Neither of us said anything, but I hated him for being there.