I am going to a community college. I am getting my own apartment right out of high school. I am working my way through and towards my future.

Don’t tell me you’re disappointed in me.

I have given my heart and soul to this world for every reason other than for myself. I have given and given all of me until there was so little of me left. I am not a taker.

I destroyed myself for years acting as a human giving tree, putting myself aside to take care of everyone else. That is who I brought myself up to be; that is who the world needed and presented itself as such.

But after all this time, it has taken its toll.

My heart is heavy, and my body is tired. I’m not healthy enough mentally, emotionally, or physically to be the person I’ve been before. I realized so late that I’m one of the things I need to take care of. I’ve had to teach myself what self-care and love is through trial and error.

No matter how much I’ve given, I am seen as selfish for deciding to protect and hold myself as my own charge the way others are capable of doing. I’ve spent too much time worrying about the opinions of those who will judge me for taking something for once.

I broke recently. I realized that I need to live; I need to start over. I have to give myself the same care that I’ve given everyone else. No matter what anyone says, I have to do this for me. I have to do what I want and what I think I need for the first time in my life.

The hardest part has not been understanding what it is I need, nor is it the fear that I am incapable of taking care of myself because I have never allowed me or anyone else to do so. The hardest part is watching the people around me crumble into the rubble of man as I realize what is best for me.

“But that is not the plan I imagined for you in my head!”

They scream like dark crows from the caving rafters in my old library of a mind. I can’t listen to them. I’ve done it for too long.

Now, I’m going to live.

I’m going to fall asleep in my apartment alone reading a book with a horror movie on in the background. I’m going to learn how to cook. I’ll go to the farmer’s market on Saturdays, book clubs on Tuesdays, painting parties every other Friday night. I will meet strong individuals who are passionate about what they do, and those things won’t be drugs or drama. I’m going to take classes on any and everything I can find. I’m going to find out who I want to be.

I am going to do this in a place where I won’t be surrounded by people I know. People who have a preconceived notion of who I am and what I’ve done from years ago. My world will be a new one. I am going to be born again as a person who is capable of being what I want to be. I will give “me” a chance.

Don’t look at me and tell me I’m wrong for doing this– that I need to be selfless and take myself in a direction I don’t want to go. I’ve been selfless my whole life, and I’m tired of giving to those who don’t deserve it. I’m tired of surviving for everyone but me. Don’t tell me what I want; don’t tell me what I need to do to earn my place in this world.

I am alive, and that is enough.

I am finally going to live for myself.

Don’t you dare tell me you’re disappointed in me.