Another layer of lonely I need to name:

I came here to be seen.

On a continuum.

Not because I can give something to you.

(Trust. Regulation. You feeling seen.)

I came here to be noticed.

So when someone reads a note like this and exhales through their nose and whispers, “Me too”- they will understand what my soul has endured.

A witness.

A mouth turned “oh” and a swift understanding exhale.

---

So I scroll through other voices building their villages, stitching up their comment sections with threads of belonging.

“Substack send me beautiful souls…” they chant.

“Substack send ones that will interact with my brand of crazy”

---

And I wonder:

Where are my people?

When do they arrive?

But here’s the secret ache the ghost stitched into my bones long before I ever clicked publish:

My lonely didn’t begin here.

It began the moment I entered this world.

Pure. Brand new. So full of life and hope.

And then day three:

My mother lay on the floor beside my crib bruised, beaten by my father within an inch of her life, collapsed.

She was ready to die. She promised herself not one more move. She was done.

And then a cry.

Me. Beside her in need. Helpless.

A sound so pathetic and raw.

Something inside her stood up.

⁺ ☆˚₊✧₊⁎

Since that day, I’ve been her reason to fight.

Which sounds brave. Sacred, even.

But it’s also lonely.

I was never just the baby she adored.

I was the cry that kept her breathing.

The tether to this earth.

Our whole relationship was forged in that first silence-breaking.

Her surviving.

Me making it survivable.

---

And now, here I am again.

Sending my cry out into the open space of the Substack sphere.

Just…hoping for recognition.

Not to be a reason.

Not to be your savior.

Just to be real.

I don’t have energy to fight any more.

I can’t hustle my way forward, getting the algo to take interest in me.

To brand myself into a beacon….

I want to be found.

So Find me.

Or don’t.

See me.

Or don’t I guess.

⁺ ☆˚₊✧₊⁎ ⁺ ☆˚₊✧₊⁎

But if you’re out there—quiet, cracked open, wondering if anyone else knows this kind of ache… I do.

Because I’m here.

Still surviving.

Still making it survivable.

Still hoping to be more than the reason someone else stayed.

This time, I want to be loved just for existing ♡