the view from my window

 For a long time, the view from my window was all i saw of the outside world. Trips out my house were scarce, small fleeting moments far apart. 

I didn’t see a sunset or a sunrise for a while. It was weird, it was something so mundane, but i often found myself, in my short waking minutes, wishing i could see the glow that was cast across the streets. I missed the warmth on my skin, the gentle breeze. Hell, i even missed the sound of people shouting in the street after a night out.

I never knew my life could become so isolating. Years before Coronavirus even existed, i was living in a quarantine. Confined to my house, isolated from friends and family. For a long time, what people have faced in the last year, was my reality. It was my day to day life. I was alone aside from my household, living in a little bubble of exhaustion and pain, fear and loathing. 

I was terrified and angry all at once, scared as i watched myself slipping away with no idea of why, no idea how to stop it. I was angry, because why me? Had i not been dealt enough bad hands with my health before? I’d already lost enough, why did the world have to take the small amount i had left too? I was a mess for a long time, unsure of what to do, how to cope, how to even keep myself conscious for longer than an hour at a time. 

I was trapped inside my body, inside my bed and inside my brain. Stuck in a dream world, barely conscious, barely existing. Decaying away in my bedroom was how i existed for a while. I still only left the house to venture to the doctors and the hospital. Though that glimpse into the world, that escape, that chance to see other people, was far from the paradise i’d imagined from my bed. I was met with snide comments, attacks on my body, neglect from the system and people that were supposed to help me. 

I was faking it. I was lying. I was doing this to myself. It was my fault. 

Even years later, their words still haunt me, the memories pick away at my brain until i’m shaking and crying. Because this way i’m living, this prison my body has become, is inescapable and painful, and for a long time, i truly believed this was some sick punishment. Maybe for my attitude, for my shitty grades, for that one nasty comment i made to my brother once. They twisted my words and my own brain until the enemy became myself, rather than them. I was fighting a losing battle.

I waited for relief to come, for this mysterious storm to pass. I waited years, silently. Hoping and begging for whoever or whatever was listening to take this away from me. But i know now, relief will not come, not now, not ever.

People only see me smiling, happy, functioning. Truth be told, i hide the part of me that’s broken, decaying, deteriorating. I cover tired eyes with makeup, layers of blush and concealer, hoping no one notices just how pale i’ve become. Whether it’s the illness or the lack of sun it’s resulted in, i look sickly. Though i feel that’s fitting, the outside finally reflects the inside. But still, i push it away, post only the photos that show me smiling, i censor my own life from those around me, afraid to hear the words my doctors told me all those years ago. 

Sometimes i just wish to be pitied, for people to treat me like how i actually am, struggling. Keeping up a facade of healthiness and happiness is tiring, adding more and more fatigue onto my already exhausted body and brain. But they do not want to see the ugly side of these conditions, they want to see disabled people that are pretty, confident, disabled people that fit their narrow perception of us. They minimise our struggle into what they can use for themselves, the inspiration, the saviour complex. 

We are so much more than that. We aren't here to make yourself feel better. We exist not for your own sick gratification that comes with the inspiration porn you use us for. 

It’s been years. I just wish i could still see more than just the view from my window.