VII. Daughter

I have many names: the selfish daughter that only cares about herself, not interested in family, never comes over, never invites.

Her reality doesn’t match ours, so it doesn’t exist. I was the best daughter when I was faking a smile, plastering the walkways with it.

I made the effort that no one else would make for me, and still I was expected to do more. Consumed with the thought of being a bad daughter, but in reality, I never was.

I wasn’t the version of myself they wanted, the one who would simply accept the pain from the people who are ‘supposed’ to be family, just because we share blood. They believe that being related gives them the right to hurt you without consequences.

Always told to open up, but each time I did, those very words would be used against me in the next argument that wasn’t a matter of if, but when.

I was the angry daughter who found peace in my own independence, in my own loneliness, because at least then I wasn’t screaming at a wall that would never open up to listen to me.

I was the lonely daughter who got used to being secluded from family events that I was never invited to, and somehow that would always remain my fault.

I am the daughter that no longer feels obligated to satisfy people who won’t take accountability for themselves. They see me as ‘changed’ and wonder why. The truth is, I had to change to survive. I had to, or I would have drowned as the family burden the one they blame for everything, the one whose pain they called weakness. I am not their slave anymore.