An Open Nerve

A nervous system on high alert, Every emotion heightened and felt tenfold. Always feeling like you're too much, because that's the theme with everyone's words: "You're too much. You're too emotional. You care too much. You love too much. Calm down or you're going to get hurt." Everything is heightened for me: my love— my hatred— despair, desire, defeat, and exultation. It's not too much! It's just how I feel. We all feel at different rates; my brain just intensifies the default. You're just not used to feeling as intensely as me. I can't wear the mask like I used to. When I had to, it was the opposite: I was far from enough, I didn't feel, I had no elation. I was avoidant with everything and everyone, constantly numbing myself with physical pain or intoxication just to get by. Both versions of me are draining. They leech my very soul from me and contort it painfully, warping it, distorting it, until it breaks, leaving me hollow. Even though I savour the return of my feelings Becoming "too much" for everyone again, it at times makes me wish I could mask again— at least for a day, Just for a little reprieve. I need to rest, but I never can. Ten thoughts at a time, every feeling at once, even when I am "resting." An open nerve, forever denied respite.