Every Last Word

by Tamara Ireland Stone

“Then this particular mistake has done its job. Forgive yourself and move on,

I can’t even speak when I’m sitting on a patch of grass next to people I’ve known my entire life.

It’s about the crazy. My crazy. All here, spilled in ink. Suddenly, I feel more like a stripper than a poet, two minutes away from exposing myself to these total strangers who may think I’m plastic, but don’t currently think I’m nuts.

The negative thoughts overpower all the positive ones, and the familiar swirl begins.

“We think those places matter. We think they’re worth sharing, you know? Because when you share them, they become part of the poem.”

“You seem to know how to articulate your feelings and share them with other human beings. I’m afraid my gift is the exact opposite; I’m skilled at holding everything in.”

We all share a secret, and it makes me feel small, in a good way, like I’m part of something bigger—something powerful and magical and so special it can’t be explained.

If you really knew me, If you could see inside, You’d find shy and insecure and afraid. Acting as if.

All these words On these walls. Beautiful, inspired, funny, Because they’re yours. Words terrify me. To hear, speak, To think about. Wish they didn’t. I stay quiet. Keeping words in Where they fester and control me. I’m here now. Letting them out. Freeing my words Building better walls.

“Sometimes there’s a whole side of your personality you don’t always show everyone,

over the years, I’ve become an Oscar-worthy actress, so skilled you’d think I’d tricked myself into actually being one of the normal ones—

I feel that familiar swirling in my mind, starting like a whirlpool, spinning slowly, steadily, but preparing to build and speed, fed by information and the need for more information, until it’s a full-on maelstrom.

I’m still following this white rabbit down the hole, trying to feed my brain enough information to reach my own personal wonderland.

It’s my OCD, this inexplicable, uncontrollable need to know one thing, and then one more thing, and then yet another thing, until my brain is exhausted.

My logical mind knows these things are true, but still, when I close my eyes, there’s this image

These are all good things, all normal things. And rather than enjoying them, you find a way to twist them into something toxic.”

“Trust me, I want to stop thinking. I wish I could.”

And you, my friend, stand there in the batting cage and let those balls smack you in the head, over and over again. But you don’t have to.”

It’s not that I don’t have the time, it’s that the time’s not right.

I knew the thoughts were irrational, but one thought led to another, and to another, and once the spiral started, I couldn’t control it.

I was tired all the time, because trying to function while you’re trying to ignore all those swirling thoughts is physically and mentally draining.

“I didn’t go there looking for you. I went looking for me.” My voice is soft, low, and shaky. “But now, here you are, and somehow, in finding you, I think I’ve found myself.”

I’m obsessed with my thoughts and I can’t sleep and I count in threes.

I try to reconnect with the part of me that said and truly meant those words. I blow out a breath and lift my shoulders, standing a little taller.

And I want to stop, but I can’t, because telling someone with OCD to stop obsessing about something is like telling someone who’s having an asthma attack to just breathe normally. My mind needs more information. The rabbit hole still hasn’t come to an end.

He makes me feel normal because he thinks I am normal.”

I’m getting better at saying what I think. I’m not as afraid of my thoughts, maybe because I’m not holding on to them so tightly anymore.

Your brain works differently, Sam. Sometimes it does things that scare you. But it’s very special, and so are you.”

It’s okay to want a life without medication.

I can feel myself tuning out the voices on the stage and giving the ones in my head far more attention than they deserve.

You take my mind off my mind.

I like how the sound of his voice keeps me present, bringing me back to him if I start to drift away.

“Do you know the dictionary’s definition of ‘crazy’?” I shake my head. “It means both ‘insane’ and ‘a bit out of the ordinary.’ That’s a pretty broad scope, don’t you think?”

“Don’t think. Just go.”

You start being kind to yourself, making decisions that are best for you, not best for everyone else. You look around at the people in your life, one by one, choosing to hold on to the ones who make you stronger and better, and letting go of the ones who don’t.

the thoughts are gathering and swirling, and I start panicking.

Don’t think. Go.

“It’s been happening as long as I can remember. I can’t turn off my thoughts. I can’t sleep without being drugged into it. My mind just…never stops working.

I study his body language like I do with Sue each week, watching the way he moves in direct correlation to the words I say.

She speaks her mind and she doesn’t care what people think about her. I’ve always been too scared to be that person, but that’s who I want to be, all the time, not only when I’m alone with you,

all my life, I’ve just wanted to be normal.

I’ve said those same what-kind-of-person words myself. They’re especially damaging, the kind of thing that can make a thought-spiral tornado unexpectedly change course, shifting into an entirely new and even more destructive direction.

My life might not be perfect and my brain might play tricks on me and I might be overwhelmed by my own thoughts, but now that I think about it, I’m lucky to have as much normal as I do.

You’re still here stitched into me, like threads in a sweater. Feeding me words that break me down and piece me back together, all at once. Tightening your grip, reminding me that I’m not alone. I never was. None of us ever are. You are still here stitched into the words on these walls. Every last one.