The Quiet Room in My Head - by Onlyreal

The first thing I lost wasn’t hope. It was silence. Silence used to exist in clean, breathable gaps—between thoughts, between heartbeats, between nights and mornings. Then one day, without warning, the gaps sealed shut. My mind began speaking even when I begged it not to. At first, it whispered. You’re tired. That seemed harmless enough. Everyone was tired. I accepted it the way you accept dust in the air—annoying, inevitable. But the whisper didn’t leave. It followed me into mirrors, into showers, into the soft dark behind my eyelids. Then it started using my voice. ⸻ They say depression feels like sadness. That’s a lie people tell because sadness is easier to explain. What I felt was erosion. Like something inside me was being slowly sanded down, grain by grain, until there was nothing left sharp enough to matter. I would sit in a room full of people and feel like a misplaced object—a chair no one needed, a light no one turned on. Conversations passed through me without sticking. Laughter sounded distant, like it came from another building. And somewhere deep inside my skull, the voice kept talking. You don’t belong here.You’re pretending.They can see through you. I started checking faces for proof. A twitch of an eyebrow. A pause too long. A sigh. Everything became evidence. At night, the ceiling watched me. I don’t mean metaphorically. It watched. The cracks above my bed formed shapes that shifted when I wasn’t looking directly at them. Faces would almost appear, then rearrange themselves when I focused too hard. I learned not to stare too long. The ceiling didn’t like being observed. Neither did the voice. ⸻ The voice changed tone the day I stopped arguing with it. Before, I fought back. I told it it was wrong. I reminded myself of memories, of people, of reasons. But resistance exhausted me. One evening, I just listened. That’s when it smiled. See? it said gently. Doesn’t it feel easier when you stop struggling? And it did. That terrified me more than anything. The relief felt wrong—like sinking into warm water without realizing you were drowning. ⸻ I began to notice things missing. My reflection lagged behind me in mirrors, just a fraction of a second too slow. When I brushed my teeth, the person in the glass finished smiling after I had already stopped. When I frowned, my reflection held the expression longer, like it was savoring it. Once, I mouthed “Who are you?” The reflection didn’t copy the words. It answered. I’m the part of you that’s honest. I smashed the mirror after that. The sound didn’t echo the way it should have. It was swallowed, like the room itself didn’t want to acknowledge what had happened. ⸻ Time stopped behaving normally. Days folded into each other. Weeks felt like single afternoons stretched thin. I would wake up exhausted, as if sleep were just another place where the voice waited for me. Dreams became interrogations. In them, I sat in a white room with no doors. A chair faced me. Sometimes someone sat in it. Sometimes it was empty. Either way, I was always asked the same question: Why are you still here? No matter how I answered, the room grew smaller. ⸻ People around me began to sound scripted. A friend told me, “It’ll get better,” with the flat certainty of someone reading lines they didn’t believe in. Another said, “Be strong,” as if strength were a switch I’d forgotten to flip. The voice laughed. See? Even they’re tired of carrying you. I started to believe it. I started to believe that my existence was a kind of noise pollution—something unnecessary, irritating, best reduced. The world didn’t feel hostile. That would’ve required effort. It felt indifferent, and somehow that hurt more. ⸻ One night, the quiet finally came back. It was sudden. Heavy. Absolute. No thoughts. No voice. No fear. Just stillness. I should have been relieved. Instead, panic crawled up my spine. The silence wasn’t empty—it was watching, patient, like it knew I would eventually understand what it wanted from me. In the silence, I realized something horrible. The voice had never been trying to destroy me. It was trying to replace me. All those whispers, all that erosion—it wasn’t pushing me out. It was wearing me down so it could fit. ⸻ I stood in the dark, unsure of my own edges. My hands didn’t feel fully attached. My name sounded unfamiliar in my head, like it belonged to someone I used to know. You don’t have to hurt anymore, the silence said—not in words, but in certainty.Just let go of the struggle. For a moment—a terrifying, fragile moment—I wanted to. Then something interrupted it. A sound. Small. Imperfect. My own breathing. Uneven. Shaking. Real. It anchored me like a nail through fog. The silence recoiled, irritated. The voice hissed, You’re still clinging? “Yes,” I whispered, not because I was brave—but because I was stubborn. Because some irrational, broken part of me refused to disappear quietly. The room felt angry. The darkness thickened. The pressure returned. But I was still there. And that, apparently, was enough to ruin its plan. ⸻ The voice never fully left. It still comments. Still questions. Still waits. But now I know something it hates: I am not required to answer. Some nights are worse than others. Some mornings feel like dragging myself out of wet concrete. But I exist in defiance, not hope. Hope feels too big. Too fragile. Defiance is smaller. Sharper. And for now— For now, it keeps me here.

Other insights from Onlyreal_Sochi

Referral Earning

Points-to-Coupons