Don’t get drunk when you’re already soberly sad. The sadness will become so amplified that you will fall asleep to the feeling of yourself drowning in your own tears.

2. Sleep on the ground without a mattress for one night. You will wake up feeling sore and bruised, and thirsty for the comfort of your own bed. See this as a metaphor for how you feel on the inside. Recognize that the bruises will fade. Find a way to embrace the power of longing.

3. Let him hold you while you cry. Get your snot all over his shirt, sob into his shoulder, let him comfort you. You went without comfort for so long it’s about time you let go and let yourself be loved.

4. Write it out. No one will ever understand your pain down to the bone but you. Bleed out through the pen instead of the skin. There’s no such thing as a page that would rather remain blank.

5. As hard as it is to accept, sometimes the only thing you can do for someone who’s hurting is remind them that you love them.

it was sunday night when you broke
the silence by asking me what i was
thinking about, and i admitted that
i was thinking about the rain before
leaning my cheek on my palm and
turning my head towards you, and
i asked you what you were thinking
about,

and it was quiet, and you unbuckled
your seatbelt and shifted your body
and admitted that you were thinking
about me, and when i leaned over the
console and placed my hands on your
neck; when you pressed your forehead
against mine without smiling; when we
just stared at each other and you silently
told me that maybe we really weren't
just friends,

i was thinking about you, too

Just because you don’t have the love and support from that one person who should, in a perfect world, always be loving and supporting you, does not mean you don’t deserve to be loved. Read this again. And again.

2. It’s both tragic and funny that whenever a good thing happens to you, a bad thing always comes up and tries to interrupt your joy. Just because you’ve always felt like a bad driver in a thunderstorm with no windshield wipers doesn’t mean the sky chooses to torment you. The sky is just being the sky. You have weathered these storms before, and you will weather them again. One day you will see how strong the tempest has made you.

3. You are unconditionally loved by more than one person. Not many people have that. Don’t be afraid to throw that love back out into the world with your helium balloon of a wild heart. And no more late night pity parties with that sappy “I don’t deserve love” refrain.

4. You cannot be mentally stable if your body is constantly trying to keep up with you. Feed it, wash it, clothe it, rest it. Just because you’re sad and scared does not mean your body deserves to suffer. I know taking care of yourself hasn’t really ever been your forte, so go lightly. Drink some water for a start.

5. Just because you’re struggling doesn’t mean going back to your old ways of coping are going to cure you of your struggle. The definition of a crazy person is someone who does something over and over again while expecting different results. You remember that person. You remember those results. How about not going down that road again, yeah?

6. You can doubt everyone’s love until the cows come home but in the end no amount of love from anyone else will ever feel like enough if it doesn’t come from yourself. It’s the oldest, most difficult thing you can ever do and we all need a little reminding every now and again.

7. Stop blaming yourself for still being afraid of being abandoned. There is no deadline on healing from old wounds, they have been embedded in you almost all your life. It wasn’t your fault then, and it’s not your fault now. If people leave, it’s their ******* loss. Your worth does not depend on who does or does not decide to stay.

8. You’ve always loved too fast too hard too much, but that’s just who you are. Love and suffering are synonymous. The sooner you accept this, the less likely you will be to inflict unnecessary suffering upon yourself because of it.

9. Sensitivity and compassion are two of your best qualities. Being ashamed of that is a complete waste of time.

10. Healing is difficult, but you have to keep trying. Stay for the love. Stay for the music. Stay for the summer days of iced tea and copper skin. Stay for the mornings you wake up in a pair of arms that make you feel like you’re home. Stay for coffee and popsicles. Stay for soft kisses and raindrops on your tongue. Stay for the sadness. Stay for the joy. Stay for yourself. Stay.

2 years ago
i was sitting on an old, ***** love seat
in a musky garage
that belonged to your mother
taking hit after hit
from a pipe made of tin foil
holding hands with you
on that love seat that had me
laughing 'till i didn't know
if i actually existed
and other times, it had me
wishing i didn't exist at all
but that first time you
pressed your lips softly into mine
it didn't feel like a kiss at all,
but more like a trigger being pulled.
for the last 2 years,
i have been stuck on that love seat
not knowing how to exist
in any other way besides
trying to find you on it but
you left a long time ago
and i don't know if i've finally
found my way home
or if i am just disappearing
as the months pass and i
forget more and more what
it felt like to have bullets
for a tongue, sitting next to you
on that old, ***** love seat

and what's worse is that
i couldn't go back if i wanted
and it may be that my life
is getting duller and greyer
every second that i
am forgetting how
to miss you.

I'm sorry you're so clinically sad
and I'm sorry I don't know what you're thinking
I'm sorry I keep apologizing for things that aren't my fault
but I wish I could help you (in some way, any way)
I wish you would let me

Let me tell you about the first time you said my name
And every time you traced the small of my back to let me know you were there with that distant half smile
I want to dance my fingertips across your veins and memorize the tempo of your pulse
to kiss the scars that decorate your wrists and prove to you they were never worth it
Now your heartbeat is just a distant bass pumping the blood that keeps you alive but not well
My loneliness stings like salt water in fresh wounds
A few too many songs I've stapled to you

i loved you in ways i could never explain.
i loved you in blues and purples and reds.
i loved you in bruises and broken blood vessels.
i loved you in whispered secrets and early sunrises.

but now i love you in dishonesty.
i love you in broken promises and disbelief.
i love you in backroom conversations.
i love you in ****** poetry.

and now i cry when you smile.