This is not just about faking happiness, this is about becoming a stranger to myself. This is about looking at the mirror and asking "Who am I?" I don't think I know anymore.

<img src="/media/inline_insight_image/1000101909.png"/> I tried so hard to be what people wanted, to be what everyone wanted.I wore the smile like it was stitched to my skin. Practiced it in mirrors until it stopped looking like me.I studied the right answers, laughed at the right jokes, clapped at the right times.I tried so hard. To be the smile they needed. The silence they preferred.I bent until my spine splintered, molded myself into something palatable—smooth edges, quiet voice, agreeable mind. I wore the mask so long it fused to my face.Even when I was alone, I couldn’t take it off.It wasn’t a performance anymore. It was a prison. I remember once, someone said I was "perfect."I went home and cried for hours.Not because I was touched.Because I knew it was a performance they'd fallen for.A mask. And the second it slipped—just a little—they’d see what was underneath.They’d flinch.They always do. See, the problem with being everything people want is that you lose track of what you are.And when I finally started to crack, when the weight of pretending started leaking through,they looked at me like I was the problem.“You used to be so happy.”“What happened to you?”"You’re not even trying anymore."Every time I let a piece of myself slip through the cracks, it cost me.A friend.A home.A reason. I kept burying the ugly parts deeper—the rage, the sorrow, the black, festering thing inside me that whisperedyou're not wanted,you're not needed,you're not real.The mask continued to crack. But I kept on trying. God, I tried so hard Tried to stay upright while something inside me caved in.Tried to matter, even when the mirror started rejecting me.Tried to be enough—but never quite getting there.Never getting there. But then they finally saw me—the real me, raw and trembling and wrong—they recoiled like I was a stain on their reality.Like I was a glitch that needed erasing."You used to be so good," they said.As if goodness was ever something I had the luxury of owning. I became the bad one.The excuse.The shame they didn't want to admit they helped create.Now, even the silence screams.Walls breathe heavier than I do.The air feels thick with regret, and none of it is theirs.It never is. I lie awake, staring at the ceiling,wondering how much of myself I’d have to carve awaybefore someone finally said, “This version. This one is okay.” But I know the truth.There is no version of me that will ever be enough.So I'll always be hereSitting in a room that doesn’t feel like mine.Breathing in a body that doesn’t feel like mine.Listening to the echo of a thousand expectations I could never meet. I know what they whisper behind closed doors.I know the way they pause before saying my name.Like I’m a regret.Like I’m a burden wrapped in skin. And maybe they’re right. Because it doesn’t matter how hard I tried.Doesn’t matter how many versions of myself I killed off just to survive one more day.In the end, all they see is what I failed to be. A disappointment. That’s what I am.Not loud. Not tragic.Just quietly not enough. And the worst part?I think I’m starting to believe it too. Because I know No performance will earn back the love that was never real.So I rot quietly,smiling at ghosts of who I tried to be.Pretending not to notice the decay in my chest.Pretending not to hear the word they left echoing behind my back like a curse.Disappointment.That’s what I am.Not misunderstood.Not tragic.Just a mistake that stayed too long.Breathing.Existing.Apologizing.And still—not gone.Not yet.

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