Aknowledged - A Poem.

<Edit - holy moly a feature?>

Everyone has to fit a label.

I have to be a good child, so bubbly and happy. But that’s not who I want to be.

I just want to be acknowledged.

But to be acknowledged, I have to be normal. I’m not good enough to be normal. So I get beaten up.

To be cool, Boys have to look hot, have a six pack and be strong, playing sports all the time.

To be popular, Girls have to wear ripped jean shorts, be extremely thin, and hang with the “hot” guys.

To be normal, I have to be heterosexual.

To be normal, We have to bully kids who aren’t the same as us.

To be normal, I need to swear every five seconds and yell words that are seen as inappropriate to teachers.

To be normal, I have to force everyone to do what I want, so I’ll look intimidating and be considered as “cool.”

To be normal, cool, popular, or to be heartless. Aren’t they all just the same thing?

But it doesn’t just affect me. Because somewhere in The Philippines, a child is getting beat by their own parent because they aren’t good enough, because they’re ugly, because they don’t listen to every word, because it’s legal, and it makes the parent laugh.

And in 5 years, that same child is probably going to be found at the bottom of a lake because they jumped off of a bridge, when they’re only 14. But there won’t be a coffin, because the parent will say that ‘they deserved death, they were ugly, stupid and they were just brought to exist for people to pay to give them a job.’

Then somewhere in America, a young girl, who mind you is extremely chubby, walks around with a 2 year old child, at the age of fifteen, everyone calling them names, despite the truth actually being something else she’d rather never talk about what happened, and how she was too broke. And to add the pressure, due to being chubby, she’s called fat, by everyone she es by on a run, trying to lose the extra weight that she can’t control.

Almost every hour and forty minutes, a teen takes their own life.

Half the people could care less. They think it’s just “I never knew them, not a big deal” or they think it’s “They weren’t very smart, or pretty, and I hated them, so they deserved to die.”

And then that one person, who actually cared hears the news.

If they came back to earth, the person who cared, covered in cuts, tying a noose. And then it causes an infinite cycle. Why do we do this to ourselves?

Nobody thinks before they speak. Everyone just goes with the flow. They run away from their problems by bestowing them upon someone else.

Everyday, millions of teens go to school, with a mask on their face, which smiles, thinking today is going to be a better day, while underneath that mask, they are regretting ever leaving their own room to go to school, because they miss their bed and the comforting feel that they can get away from their problems.

But it’s illegal.

What’s more important.

Education or Life.

Make up your damn mind. Because school is one of, if not the biggest reasons teens have depression. They cut, threaten suicide, and a small portion get away with suicide. And suddenly the adults realize what they did wrong, and they think.

Yet they still prioritize education.

I know I’m not the only one who deals with this problem every damn day.

Not everyone gets a happy life in the end. Almost nobody does.

What will it get to take someone to recognize this problem?