Mom, my fear becomes as big as a man's belly in a small town diner

It becomes smaller when I finally let loose, but it doesn’t go away

It stays hidden like the monster under my bed, until it finally gets the attention it wants

It doesn’t allow me to breathe, creeping in my thoughts for days without end

Taking over my dreams, making them become nightmares

Mom, says “Relajate nada va a pasar, no pienses en eso tanto”

If only it was that simple, but it isn’t, the fear I feel orbits and clouds my mind and body

And I simply allow it to take over, as if all the fight in me exits my body as if it was never there

I tend to keep those thoughts to myself, because if I allow them to leave they’ll never come back

They’ll cause as much chaos as they once did to me

It will only frustrate my family even more, now that I let the demon inside of me go

When it really gets worse, I let out my emotion onto my pillow, drenching it wet, afraid that my mom will come home any second and barge in to see me crying letting out my feelings

Cause if she catches me it will infuriate her because she has never dealt with it before,

If she were to find me she'd say “ Hay ya para porfavor, para de ser dramática”

My mind makes something so simple, become far more complicated like a first grader trying to learn Algebra 2, when they simply know addition.

It takes no time for the fear to become greater than me itself.

It starts with a prickle of blood transforming into my cells, my organs, my everything

My spirit has left the chat, and the fear takes its place

Sometimes I try to make the fear leave my brain by just simply not thinking about it

I wish my body and brain could exhibit the same power and confidence my mom radiates, how the fear probably never existed or it was minimal at best.

I see the people surrounding me in class living their best life, but who knows what happens behind closed doors

If you see me I always try to be positive, to always be happy and radiate sunshine on a cloudy and rainy day, which for some of us it’s everyday

I hide my emotions behind the mask I so well use on an everyday basis

Because I know nobody wants to see the person behind the colorful mask

How the person is shy, insecure, scared, terrified, vulnerable and breaking as each day passes by  

But my mom says, “ Hay vas de dramática otra vez, no pienses en eso, mejor ponte a estudiar, has algo con tu vida, para de malgastarla , yo quisiera tener tu edad para no pasar todo el dia trabajando y pagando biles, has algo con tu vida”

Oh how those words replay in my head, like a broken record player, repeating, repeating, repeating but those words will never change

Those words help my fear become bigger, bigger, bigger and ferocious as every word is spoken

My mom thinks that by giving me “advice” the fear will go away, but it just becomes worse and worse as the days go by

My mom has always allowed me to be independent since I was quite young, because she wanted me to learn to not rely on people that much

But that independence has become one of the main reasons why my fear exists, it’s not celebrated or brings happiness like the 4th of July

Sometimes I wish I was still a little kid who is expected to be reliant on her parents, to be able to hide from the fears behind my mom’s long dress, but it’s not that simple

I can’t use a time machine to go back to the past

I guess I’ll just have to get over it or grow out of it like my mom says,

“Hay tienes quince años ya, toda una mujer y estás actuando como si tuvieras 5, comportate como una señorita, que vergonzoso.”

She also says, “ Tengo sufficiente problemas no necesito esto ahorita, mejor hablamos más al rato”

But we never end up speaking afterwards about the thing that’s killing me the most, but I mean by ignoring it, it will go away right???

But the fear just won’t vanish like ice cream on a summer day, it will continue to stay hidden until it finally tiptoes out and gets what it wants, to overpower me like a pharaoh

Making my body and mind its slave.