Open Letter To The Ones Who Are “Never Good Enough”

You will be out with friends and notice how the conversation always lulls when it becomes about you. You notice, you have always noticed how no one ever seems to ask “How are you,” how no one ever seems to care. But these are the people you call “friends.” These are the people you have trusted with your secrets for years, but hasn’t it always felt like confessing to a wall?

So you come home.

You will arrive home and notice how your mother lights up with affection when your brother, your sister say “Hello,” yet go rigid when she hears your footsteps. You notice, you have always noticed how every accomplishment fell on deaf ears, every failure welcomed with a slap back. So you say “Hello” and receive silence. So you walk on your tiptoes just a bit lighter. But these are the people you call “family,” the person you call “mom.” This is whose feet you have always licked without being kissed in return, but hasn’t it always felt like whiplash?

So maybe you seek solace elsewhere.

You will go to him to nestle on the sanctuary that is his chest and notice how he never quite meets your eye when you exchange “I love yous.”  You notice, you have always noticed how his gaze casually flickers towards the skinny white girl with the toned ass, the perky tits. You have always noticed how you blame other people for your misery. But this is the boy you call “lover,” and you are what you call “unwanted.” These are the moments when you’ve felt like discarded trash, but hasn’t it always felt like surrender? Hasn’t it always felt like self-punishment?

You think you are not good enough. Not sexy enough. Not funny enough.

And you aren’t. You are more.

You are more than your loneliness, than your self-pity, than your hunger. You have noticed, and you will always notice how there’s too much space between the both of you when you hug, how all your life you’ve been trying to keep up with people trying to leave you behind, how you often seem to be in the outer edges of a circle. Uninvited, unsure.

Your jokes will never be enough. Your text messages never enough. Your gifts, open palms, and naked love never enough. Your absence goes unnoticed. Your words make no marked difference because you’re no one, you’re nothing, you don’t matter. But not to the right person. You should never be made to think that you are too difficult to be loved, because you aren’t, but to the wrong people you will be.

Your worth is not composed of the hearts of people who refuse to love you. And how “enough” you are isn’t measured by how many people make you feel like it.

You are not defined by the number of people who like you.

You are not an option, or a filler, or somebody’s goddamn poster child.

You are enough. You’ve always been more than enough, but to the wrong people you’ll always be inadequate.