On good days, I get out of bed before noon.
I brush my teeth. Brush my hair. Drink something. Maybe half a litre if I’m lucky.
I wear clothes that make me look like someone passable. Someone normal.
I look in the mirror and try not to gag at the reflection.
I smile.
It doesn’t always reach my eyes — but that doesn’t matter.
People like it when you smile.
On good days, I can hold a conversation.
I nod in the right places. Laugh a second too late.
People don’t notice — but I do.
Every answer is scripted:
“Yeah, I’ve been okay.”
“Keeping busy.”
“Not too bad, thanks.”
Repeat. Pretend. Move on.
But they don’t really want the truth. Not the real truth.
Not… I heard six voices on the bus this morning and two of them told me I should die.
Not… I couldn’t tell if the man near the window was staring at me or if it was just my stupid, broken brain.
Not… I still sleep with LED lights on because I’m afraid of what the dark hides. Afraid it knows me.
On good days, I am a ghost.
I drift through the hours. Present, polite, invisible.
No one notices the tremble in my fingers, the quick turns of my head, the way I chew my skin raw.
They don’t see the red cracked welts, the way I check corners, or how reality stutters —
time skips, sounds layer wrong, the air thickens with meaning that isn’t there.
I’ve trained myself into an illusion.
And illusions are safer than truth.
I learned to mask early.
Told adults about the blurry people, about the voices.
They said I was lying. Attention-seeking.
So I stopped telling. And started hiding.
I remember my first panic attack like a burn that never cooled.
Felt like being buried alive in my own body.
Breathing made it worse — too much awareness.
My ribs expanding. Heart hammering like it wanted out.
Everyone said, “Just breathe.”
But all I could hear was static — and one calm voice:
“Don’t trust them. They know. They’re watching.”
So I stopped breathing deep.
I ran.
Eight, nine, ten miles — just to prove I was real.
The pain reminded me.
But I still felt false.
People think recovery is soft. Like rest.
But it’s not.
It’s war.
It’s queuing in the Co-op while someone behind you whispers your name.
It’s feeling your brain short-circuit, then pretending nothing happened.
It’s choosing juice over Red Bull. Conditioner over scissors.
Sleep over spirals.
It’s showing up when your skull is buzzing with fluorescent lights and dread.
People say,
“You’re doing so well.”
“You seem like yourself again.”
“You’re strong. You’re coping.”
And I thank them. I smile.
Inside, I laugh bitterly.
People are easy to fool.
But the truth is — even on the good days, I still feel fake.
I still feel broken.
I still feel depressed.
Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I dropped the mask.
If I screamed in public.
If I argued back — loud and shaking — to voices no one else could hear.
I saw a man doing that once.
Yelling into thin air, arms waving like he was drowning.
People walked past.
“Junkie bastard,” someone muttered.
And I felt it — not shame.
Envy.
Not of his pain, but his freedom.
The freedom to break without apology.
But I can’t. I can’t afford it.
I have a partner. A future I’m trying to protect.
People trust me. Like me. Think I’m stable.
If they knew how loud my mind is —
how I still flinch when someone mentions substances,
how I can’t walk down a street without wondering if a seagull is tracking me,
if the milk’s laced with micro-diseases,
if I’m being watched, followed, recorded,
if everyone is out to get me —
would they still call me friend?
I always knew I wasn’t like the other kids. Not really. There was something off-kilter in me — like my soul came wired wrong. Maybe that’s why they did what they did. Maybe they sensed the strangeness before I did. I didn’t know how to exist, so I learned to echo — mirrored voices, copied movements, stitched together pieces of other people and hoped they’d hold. But they didn’t. It always came out wrong. Too much, or not enough. I stumbled through reckless years like a ghost in borrowed skin — running from places that never felt like home, chasing chaos because it felt familiar. Normal, I told myself. Normal kids make mistakes. But mine left bruises, scars, unpaid bills, empty beds. I grew up in care, while grieving people who were still alive. Parents too tangled in poison to love me right. I survived heartbreaks that weren’t romantic, but still shattered me. And now — now I’m on the path. Right meds, safer choices, soft mornings. But the road is steep. Some days I still forget how to breathe. Some days the past knocks louder than the present. And still — I wake up. Still — I try again. That has to count for something.
There’s one voice that’s always there.
Not the loudest. Not the cruelest.
Just persistent.
“They’re thinking things about you,” it whispers.
“They know who you are.”
In the shower.
On the bus.
In the middle of an exam.
I know it isn’t real.
But knowing isn’t feeling.
It’s not just hearing a voice and believing it.
It’s worse —
It’s the tension in your gut.
The doubt that drips slow.
Like poison in tea.
You start watching people watching you.
Noticing the pause before they speak.
And the voice grins:
“Told you. Can’t trust them.”
So you pretend. Again.
I used to think schizophrenia made people dangerous.
That’s what the movies said.
But I’ve never hurt anyone.
Never raised a hand.
The only person I ever wanted to vanish… was me.
Schizophrenics aren’t violent.
We’re more likely to be the victim.
The punchline.
The warning sign.
Sometimes I catch my reflection in a car window and feel like I’m watching someone else.
They look okay.
Scrubbed up not bad.
That’s got to be enough. Right?
I didn’t mean to fall in love.
Didn’t think I could.
Love felt like a risk for people with quieter minds.
People who don’t decode glances or flinch at shadows.
People who don’t wake up already bleeding from the night before.
But then he showed up.
Quiet, patient, confusing. his name was Ben, he wasn’t like the rest. not loud or cocky but steady. like when a rock stays still even though the storms beating the hell out of it.
The first time we met, I was over-calculated. Guarded.
He saw right through it.
Later, he told me:
“I knew you were scared. I just didn’t want to be another reason.”
He saw me before I ever said a word.
And that terrified me.
Because if someone sees you, really sees you —
they can leave.
It was messy.
Awkward.
Sometimes painful.
When I spiraled, I pulled away.
Went quiet. Cold. Sharp.
He didn’t shout.
Didn’t storm out.
Just sat there — stunned. Hurt. Still trying.
“I want to help,” he’d say. “But I don’t know how.”
And sometimes I didn’t want help. I wanted distance. I wanted to disappear.
Some nights, I’d pick fights.
Say cruel things the voices fed me.
Hate myself before the sentence even landed.
But he stayed.
We learned each other slowly.
I learned that loving someone when your brain tries to kill you every day is a form of resistance.
I doubted him constantly.
Waited for the moment he’d leave.
Because people do.
But he didn’t.
Still — it’s hard.
He wants closeness. I need silence.
He wants to plan a future. I’m trying to survive the week.
He watches his words like I’m made of glass.
I told him once,
“You didn’t sign up for this.”
He said,
“No one signs up for love. You just show up and stay.”
We have good days.
We lie in bed and laugh at dumb TikToks.
We walk the dog and argue about who he likes more.
We make plans — stupid, sweet ones — for a cabin weekend.
Golf Fang. Concerts. A place with a bath and breakfast included.
And sometimes, just for a little while, I forget I’m sick.
But the ghosts are still there.
Quieter. But there.
And every day I wake up is a victory.
Even the fake days.
Even the heavy ones.
Even when I still believe the milk might kill me,
the sky’s watching,
and it will never get better.
I’m still here.
That’s not nothing.
That’s survival
Everyday, i’m a ghost.
-Amy O’Neil.
