Tainted Perception

If you’ve been around this blog long enough, you may have gathered that I was not a happy teen. My later teenage years, when I was 17 and 18 years old were pretty good. I was coming out of a deep depression and gaining a new perspective on life, although I was still far from finished (and ever will be) with my mental battles.

But before that time, things seemed very bleak. I remember many days where I would come home from school and shut myself in my room. I didn’t want to see anyone or go anywhere and I would often lie on the bed without any desire to move.

I spoke of suicide almost daily to one of my closest friends at school but she didn’t seem too concerned. I was stung to eventually realize that she thought all of it to be a joke. In my yearbook she wrote, “Summer, It’s going to be so depressing not seeing your shiny hair every day. You have to call me this summer and amuse me with your crazy antics and threats of suicide…”

Shiny hair refers to the state of my personal hygiene. Why should I take care of myself when I hated me? I knew people could tell I rarely washed my hair (and therefore anything else) but I loathed myself too much to care. When I wasn’t in school uniform I was hiding behind baggy clothes and long bangs that hung over my eyes. It felt like some sort of protection at the time. Some good it did me. I felt ugly inside and out and there was probably more than one person taking “amusement” at it.

The despair continued. One day during the winter, my dad took me shopping for a new winter coat. I looked through the selection and then picked out an over sized, plain, dark gray coat. It looked as ugly as I felt and was therefore, perfect. My dad took a look and told me he would be right back. He returned with a velvety black coat that had purple and gold trim around the shoulders and he asked me to try it on. It was lovely, and as I looked at myself in the mirror I realized that the coat I was wearing had more value in my eyes than I did. I wasn’t worthy of it.

But my father insisted. He pulled my hair out of my face and made me look again, telling me how beautiful I was. Suddenly I felt his belief in those words and it brought tears to my eyes. It was only the beginning of my path toward healing but at least I was finally beginning. About one year after that experience I felt compelled to put it on paper.

Tainted Perception
© Summer Owens

From the turmoil of a wounded heart
She saw life through tainted glass.
A broken will she let rule o’er her
Her sadness a malignant mass.

Thoughtless words she let seep in
Poisoning her caring soul.
Is she showed no emotion, she thought,
The pain would never take its toll.

She began the act for she failed to see
The damage wrought within her mind,
Was not incurred through ignorant words,
It came because the hearer was blind.

Blind to the fact that so many loved her.
Blind to the fact that she had a choice.
She thought flawed was all she could be.
She listened to the wrong voice.

Then one day she looked in the mirror
A worthless life her eyes beheld.
Two loving fathers stood beside her,
One she saw, the other she felt.

A glimpse of hope she then let spark.
Tears rolled down her weary face.
Love offered itself and she let it in,
Her life changed course for a better place.