Awake and Unafraid

I wasn't the happiest kid growing up.

I had lost a cousin who I considered to be my best friend at such a young age that nothing really mattered anymore. I was just so angry with her for leaving, angry with God for taking her away, and angry with everyone else for not being able to bring her back. Without her, I didn't see a point in living.

This changed who I was for several months. I didn't really talk to anyone, laugh or joke about anything because I felt guilty. How was it fair that I was alive, while my cousin was six feet under? Why couldn't I just join her?

The emotional pain was too much, so I turned to the physical alternative: cutting. My arms, legs, hands - anything that could easily be patched up as a scratch from a fence or something, I would cut there.

Then I turned to music. It helped block out the world.
I discovered a band that many people know and love, a band that has saved so many people...

My Chemical Romance sang the words that I would never say out loud.
The guitars and drums were my silent screams.
They have helped me so much and I honestly never thought I'd reach seventeen.
With their words of encouragement and knowing that I wasn't the only fucked up one in this crazy world, I kept going.

Eventually I asked for help. There was still that burden, that anger, deep in my heart and I was finally ready to speak.
I went through two years of seeing a therapist every single day, at the same time, in the same office and in the same chair. It wasn't easy at first and I remember wanting to just trash the counselor's office because everything hurt so much. I tried for so long to block out all thoughts of her, to make myself go numb and forget. So when I had to open up again, to tell my therapist everything that was going through my mind...I could have died right then and there and I would have been perfectly okay with it.

It eventually got better.
The sessions stopped.
The music kept going.

But the cutting continued.
Not nearly as often as before but every once and a while I would pull out that old razor, just to make sure I could still feel something. While I was much happier, I was also very bitter and sometimes I felt like a robot: heartless.

So tonight is a big deal for me.
After six years of hiding them in my closet, in a little box buried deep within my sock drawer, I finally threw out my razors.

I'm incredibly emotional right now because I had depended on those little pieces of metal for most of my life. They were my security and I knew that if anything went wrong and I couldn't handle it, I could just pull out that little box and all my problems would go away.

Well, not really but that's how I felt.

The whole reason I decided that it was finally time to let go was because I found this MCR video, where they were constantly saying that it was okay to be who I wanted to be, even if it meant that I was different from the rest. To stand up to world and say 'f*ck you for ever doubting me.'

Now that they're out of my sock drawer, out of my house and out of my life, I feel...different.

I'm not perfect but I can accept it because no one is.
My scars will just help remind me that I got through it all, that I'm alive and ready to keep on runnin'.

If I had the guts to tell my family the truth, I would thank them for all the help they gave me in those dark times.
My friends know how important they are in my life and how happy I am that they've stuck by my side for this long.

And MCR?
Well, I'll get my letter to them one day. They'll know that they managed to save another life.

I am not afraid to keep on living because I am happy.

oxo.
Iero My Hero.