This Fractured Self

More expectations than can be managed. Never enough. Never hitting the mark. This fractured self. Will it ever be whole?

Lying awake counting Not sheep. But the ways I didn’t measure up today.

This cannot be all there is. And, yet it is too much. Far too much.

Putting on a smile. Pushing down the pain. One self, a tiny self.

A new face. A different self. This one bold and strong.

In truth, scared and alone. Also a tiny self. This one more to your liking.

Tiny selves. Tiny pieces of me. Fractured, by your expectations.

Your boxes. Your categories. Your comfort.

Your figures. Your sizes. Your desires.

Tiny me makes you comfortable. This fractured self sets you at ease.

Why?

Because you cannot handle all of me.

I’m smarter than you want me to believe. I have vast knowing in my cells.

You try to convince me it’s make believe.

My intuition is stronger than your knowing. Every damn day.

I challenge you to pause. To breathe and feel. To allow.

I challenge you to see. To really see. The full of me.

I am not what you want me to be. I am so much more.

And, by finding your way to see me for me. To know that you do not have to make me less For you to be a man. Perhaps you can finally be all of you too.

You haven’t known it like I have. You dined on the toxicity all your life. It kept you full. And that fullness made you feel above.

You haven’t known it like I have. But, you too, have been a fractured self. You have been so much less than you’ve ever known.

You’re never going to know all of you. You’re never going to be free. Until you can see a woman like me And not see something that needs fixing.

I’m working to piece together all the fractured pieces of me. No longer consuming the toxicity you helped create. Trusting each cell of this miracle that is me. Working to know that I have always been enough.

Your fate is up to you. I wish for you an un-fractured self too.