Get Out Of My Head

Inspiration comes from the strangest places sometimes. Reading a blog yesterday sparked a conversation about bullying. I admitted that I was bullied in elementary school and that the words said to me during those formative years have helped shape how I view myself today. The thought of someone still being in my head after their physical influence struck me as something significant…

Get out of my head, pre-adolenscent boys. You didn’t understand how I could be taller than you, bigger than you, smarter than you. You could have ignored me but instead you called me ugly. You called me dog. You called me fat. You called me every name imaginable until I believed them, internalized them, refused to think you were wrong.

Get out of my head, fashionable tween girls. You stared at me in disgust in my homemade clothes, my KMart clothes, my cheap, poor person’s clothes. You didn’t understand how I could stand to be so unfashionable, never understanding that the only escape from my life was found in the books my nose was always buried in. You knew and reveled in the fact that I looked upon your clothes, your hair, your make-up, your jewelry with longing. I was too young to understand the value of people instead of things.

Get out of my head, Dad. One angry moment, one misspoken word, and of every good memory I have of you, it is this one bad memory of a time when you let your frustration show, your true thoughts show, that I carry with me always. Beached whale, Daddy? Really? I was 9 and reading a book, on my way to becoming the intelligent woman you were so proud of, so sure of, that on your deathbed you made me promise not to let your death derail my college graduation. But telling me that I reminded you of that..that phrase I still find hard to write, harder to say, BEACHED WHALE…why that? Why was that what you thought to say to your daughter?

Get out of my head, teenage boys with groping hands. You liked me because I laughed at myself, because I wasn’t afraid to talk about sex. You assumed because I talked about it, rolling my eyes at every innuendo, that I knew something about it. You never realized that I knew how to deflect attention, that I knew how to get reactions, that I knew how to make you see what I wanted you to see. In the backseat of your car, you learned. You learned I was a scared, little girl who simply wanted to be loved – and so you ran away because there was no easy fuck to be had from me.

Get out of my head, nameless boy who took my virginity. I remember your laugh. I remember your impatient thrustings. I remember you getting off of me as quickly as you’d fallen on top of me. I remember the darkness of the room and the faint pink glow from a red light bulb. I don’t remember the hangover the next day, but I remember that. I remember the shame of throwing away something I’d guarded so closely in one drunken night. I remember the shock when I realized you would never call, that it had been for nothing, that it had been lies.

Get out of my head, Lion. You promised so many things that will never happen. You taught me to wear my heart on my sleeve and then in the kindest way possible, you ripped it apart, stomped on it, and handed it back. I still hear your words in my head sometimes – promises made, love whispered. I hear your whispers of regrets as you shattered my heart. Now, all this time later, I hear the resignation in your voice from our final conversation. You knew, and I didn’t, that you were walking away forever, leaving me empty, afraid, in pieces on the ground.

Everyone who hurt me, get out of my head, leave me in peace!

Let me see the beauty that he sees. Let me love with my whole heart. Let me be less afraid. Let me be above the influence of those who hurt me. Let me find peace within myself.