Me Poem by Allison Lyons

Me what a word isn't it? It's only 2 letters but it has the power to make you think about various things. I try my hardest to do everything in my power to not think about "me". I help people with their problems on a daily basis to avoid thinking of my own. I am my own enemy. I bring myself down more than anybody else can. I get frequently told how other people's opinions shouldn't matter and the only one that should is my own but my own opinion is the worst opinion and when I proceed to tell them this all they say is but you're so beautiful smart and etc. but you're another person and you just told me other people's opinions should matter only my own there's no advice left for me when I'm the one tearing myself down. I can't seem to come to terms with who I am because I quite frankly don't have a clue who I am. Currently in art class I'm supposed to make a ceramic slab box and it has to relate to me in some way but I don't know who I am or what my purpose is. The simplest thing for everyone else to do I completely dread. Our parents are supposed to teach us about trust at a young age, at one point or another as a child you tried something new like swimming and your parent might have told you, "don't worry I got you" or "I got your back" and you trusted them to catch you if you started going under but what if you never had that you never build that trust? To me and my sisters "I got your back" is just a funny inside joke about how my father would get drunk and scream "I got your back" and the moral of that is he never did. Our parents are supposed to teach us about the world while we're young and when you learn on your own you're forced to grow up thinking the world is inconsistent and unreliable. I lack self-awareness and self-value. Everyone tells me I'll learn who I am or that I'm only thinking this way because I'm young and I'm growing up and because it's hard as a teen but I've been questioning myself for years I can't even begin to describe the times I stood in front of a mirror crying and pinching my cheeks while questioning if I was even real? If I even existed? I guess you can say this is more than an identity crisis and this is more than my bipolar disorder it's bigger than myself but what is it you may ask? Oh right I'm not the best at figuring things out I mean I still cannot fathom who I am or what I'm here for.