Anxiety is an endless invisible string you carry on your shoulders
Anxiety is often misunderstood and not a simple to-be-fixed mistake
Anxiety is a daily struggle that never stops
Anxiety takes over the mind with overthinking, worries, and constant self-shame
Anxiety can’t a hundred percent be fixed with medication
Anxiety can make you look calm, but you feel like you’re dying inside
Anxiety can cause mental and physical struggles unknowingly
Anxiety can easily cause panic attacks like your lungs collapsing
Anxiety makes you worry over the simple little things frequently
Anxiety can make you practice conversations in your head before you speak
Anxiety makes it uneasy to relax and destress and takes guidance
Anxiety involves every stress of life that makes it worse
Anxiety isn’t just “you’re overreacting” or “just relax.”
Anxiety can cause misunderstandings and misinterpretations
Anxiety can lead to some having a lack of empathy when it’s unbearable to grasp
Anxiety can make you isolate from social situations and want to be alone
Anxiety isn’t for the weak but shows how strong you really are
Anxiety is a big deal of a disorder and is treatable but still tough
Anxiety is a horrible mental struggle that not many understand
Anxiety takes depth to truly comprehend and help those when needed
People who don’t understand anxiety need to understand two things
It is a struggle and know what to do to help and deal with someone who does

Just yesterday, I watched a girl laugh at a joke she didn’t find funny.
Not a real laugh—just a quick, practiced sound,
a reflex built from years of knowing when to play along.
Her friends didn’t notice.
They grinned, clinked their glasses, kept talking.
But for half a second, her face fell,
and I saw it—
the quiet between the noise,
the moment where she was just herself.

And I just stood there.
I didn’t ask if she was okay.
Didn’t tell her I knew what it was like
to sit in a room full of people and still feel alone.
Didn’t tell her that sometimes, pretending to belong
is lonelier than never belonging at all.

But here’s what she didn’t see:
I recognized that laugh because I’ve used it, too.
I’ve filled silences with words that weren’t mine,
nodded at conversations that never really reached me.
And I’ve left rooms where no one noticed I was gone,
wondering if I was ever really there in the first place.

This is how it always is.
People think loneliness is being alone,
but I promise you, it’s lonelier to be misunderstood.
It’s laughing on cue,
filling a space where you don’t quite fit,
and realizing—when the night ends—that no one saw you at all.

I feel everything at 110%,
but I only know how to show it at 10%.
And silence has never been good at explaining itself.

Somehow I’ve spent a whole week
Trying to figure out who I am. And
I’ve been living with myself for over twenty years, and
I’ve seen everyday my nose, feet, hands, and
I’ve heard my thoughts louder than anyone can, and
And yet I can’t seem to figure out who I am.
But identity crisis? No. That was so two years ago.
I’m just a bit incohesive.

I make myself inexcusably late (but excused by my chronic lateness),
Stuck deliberating between
My Pantone two eighty jeans or the two eight two blue
That might match a little better
With my one dollar belt, my eight year old coat, and my handmedown tee
So that people don’t see me
As a frumpy kid who’d be better off
If still dressed by her mom.
I don’t think it’s wrong to put in the effort without putting in the cash,
And besides, it’s not like I don’t have money to spend;
I just choose to treat myself
In moments shared by family and friends.

And before I leave, I glance in that silver coated glass.
Walk away. Return. Another quick glance.
A stranger looks at me
Through brown eyes, brown hair, brown
Skin, but really it’s more of a Pantone one sixty three.
I almost forgot I can’t be brown when there’s colorful people around.
I am so full of muted colors and triumphs
from the past
That I am lost searching for me in the present.
And though my Jewish heritage runs coarse through my blood,
Thick blood like that of the Paschal lamb that is now our mezuzah,
I don’t believe in that stuff.
And though my body is defined by being female,
I either hate it or don’t recognize it.
And though my Mexican heritage flows rich on my skin,
It only shines in the sun in the summer.
The equatorial sun has kissed my blood
But European skies suck out all the fun.
Now my darkest shades come from
The spots on my face, my neck and back dotted,
But I’m the one who put them there.
Just like I’m the one responsible for the bits
That don’t rest nicely on my stomach or my hips.

I’ve peeled back that fleshy pink layer
To examine my mind. I am
A floating consciousness: black and white, cartoon-drawn,
Just a brain and a spinal cord encased in an
Invisible vessel. To the world I am not colorless,
But I wish it were blind to me.
Here, I have no shape or form; I’m either all in power
Or all entropic. But to be who I am, I have full control
Over behavior, traits, the things that make me a whole
Person. What to think. How to speak. Who to be.
My senses are intrinsic to me.
For all I know, you and I could have a different green
Where you, dear reader, see Pantone three six two
But I a three fourteen.

I create and build, crunch numbers ‘cause I can.
I’m proud to present as a woman in STEM.
Ideas bounce around my head, but no structure to my thought,
So how can I build bridges
When I can’t even build a sentence of prose?
Who knows? Maybe by the end of this
I’ll find there’s nothing I can do.
I’ve the EM spectrum in me, but you only see visible light.
My rainbow may be quenched, but
There’s more to seeing than sight.
I’ve spent the week trying to figure me out;
I just had to close my eyes.

Have you seen a garden of Lilies and Forget-me-not’s?
Deepest melancholic blue,
And a pure white,

They grow only in the best soil, and that’s my chest.
Their roots tangle into my lungs and nourish them with tears.

You could never understand this strange creature I call a heart.
Ripping Flowers from my skin to make you a bouquet.
My blood drips for you, my ghost.
Something that wasn’t truly living could never die.

Like the warmth from an “I love you”
It lingers every day, to once a week, once a month,
Soon enough to become an ache in your chest.

I can wish on Stars, but I know the cost of the dead.
But hope is the last to die, so I grow a garden in my chest.
Each flower is a gravestone for every hope, dream, and what-if

But my Ghost, and my love, it grows back every time
Even if you won’t take my flowers,
I love them just as much as I love you.

As an addict, I know
How it feels to be misunderstood.
Most feel judgement,
Feel inadequate,
Once you make the decision
To get clean, in my opinion. Feels
Like nobody cares, lost in despair.
As the ones who have never
Been there, throw shade.
Not understanding the difficulties
In place. Probably why I feel
More comfortable, around
Other’s who have been through
The pain, it’s not easy to
To express if you don’t relate.
From the outside Looking in,
It seems crazy, just like anything.
At first it’s misunderstood,
Sometimes, you need the experience!
Not just the scriptures out of a book.
I know when I tell my story
It will resonate with somebody.
Understand me when I say,
“Not everyone is gonna feel your pain”.
But like most we’re all
Misunderstood, we can
Only imagine what another
Has been through.
If you see someone
In a Mercedes or dresses fancy.
You might think, ohh, they got it good.
But that’s just the surface.
You don’t know how they got it
Or what it took.

Maybe they don’t feel me
Maybe they don’t understand
Maybe they’re buying into
Everything they think I am
Maybe my reputation precedes me
Maybe they Googled my name
Maybe they’re bringing up old shit
And the internet is to blame

I hope they see me as
Confident not arrogant
Relevant & pertinent
Affluent & Heaven-Sent
Walking in my purpose
And saying what I meant
Flyer than a paper plane
Marvelously working brain
Shining like a supernova
Without one trace of rain
And when I stand up & speak
All their knees get weak
Cause my personality & delivery
Be all the way on fleek

But deep inside
Despite my shine
I feel lonely, conflicted in my mind
Scared to show my true self
Cause they wouldn’t understand
All the levels and dimensions
Of everything I am
All my insecurities
The powerful shadow side of me
The good bad and ugly
What an awful sight to see
I feel that they won’t get me
So I have to protect me
And be everything I should be
Until I’m brave enough to just be
So I show them my light side
Turn my wattage up real bright
Just maybe I can blind them
Into believing I’m alright

(c) 2025 Misty Oaks Paxton (“Misty Reign”)

It’s exhausting. Over-explaining, then under-explaining because now I’m scared to open my mouth and talk about it. Always an argument, always a debate, always a back and forth. I’m tired of it. So many times I have to correct myself to stroke people’s egos that I am now trapped in my own mind. I belittle myself to make others feel big. I have to explain over and over what I mean when I’m simply speaking to someone without the ability to comprehend. I diminish my thoughts because others are insecure. I hate being fake; I’d rather be real even if it hurts. See, no one ever holds their tongue with me, but I have to abide. So misunderstood, I feel like one of those princesses that’s great, but people have me locked inside. I’ve created my own anxiety and insecurity because I can’t be me. Overthinking every response because I don’t want any backlash. I’m tired. I’m tired of being caged while others roam free. Their trauma runs so deep they can only hear from their level of “free.” I’m paralyzed when others don’t do their healing work. I’m constantly in circles because others are hurt. When I’m alone, I know my worth. Being around those who don’t understand me cages me mentally. I just want to be free to be me without the misunderstandings.

Oh, let me count the ways:
I cannot shoot a basketball,
I cannot sketch your face,
I don’t kiss pretty girls,
I don’t play petty games,
I won’t ever win a game of Smash Bros,
And I won’t ever drop my masks.
I think I laugh too much,
And I think I smile too large,
I have a coat of dusky scars, from acne not from war,
I have stretch marks, bone spurs, heat rash and
I guess this is rosacea, the bloodrush from my mother’s side,
(And I guess my face is prone to catching fire)
I have never been inside a school bus,
And I have never had a secret, at least not
A secret more than this:

I struggle with
speaking
like I’m
reading
two / of / lines / poetry
of / two / poetry / lines
simultaneous.

/Special/ is the word you’d use
For someone you just can’t quite understand.
But that’s not what I am:
I can’t shoot a basketball and
I think I laugh too much.
Is that so hard to understand?

Little Miss

Little Miss
Understood
Little miss
Never good
Little Miss
Selfish
Little Miss
Hellish
Little Miss
Feeling down
Little Miss
Broken crown
Little Miss
Always mean
Little Miss
Never seen
Little Miss
Sit quiet
Little Miss
Silence your riot
Little Miss
Hate the world
Little Miss
Take you for a whirl
Little Miss
Drama queen
Little Miss
Overtly keen
Little Miss
Sunshine
Little Miss
Undermined
Little Miss
Raging storm
Little Miss
Not the norm
Little Miss
Outcast
Little Miss
Backlash
Little Miss
Hopeless
Little Miss
No sense
Little Miss
Do as you should
Little Miss
Understood

I have learning disabilities, it’s not one that can be spotted by looking closely at the features of my face. And because it remains hidden I fear that sometimes I am misunderstood because of it.

When I share that I have a learning disability I fear that people see me through a different lens than they previously did.

I’ve had family members who have known about my learning disabilities tell me they didn’t know I was smart enough to make it on the honor roll even though I made honors every single semester of high school.

When I tell people I have a learning disability it’s as if they expect me to then cause a disturbance and act out. But I sit there quietly absorbing everything.

When I tell people that I have learning disabilities they immediately start putting limits as to my abilities and what I can and can’t achieve. So it’s easier to say nothing and silently prove them wrong.

When I tell people that I have learning disabilities people tend to assume that my IEP and accommodations exempted me from hard work. I HATE when people assume that. I worked twice as hard as to learn the topics. And even though my accommodations lessened the amount of math problems I had to solve I would sometimes end up doing more than what I was assigned so that I could make sure I mastered the concept.

When I struggle with learning or doing a task because of my learning disabilities people get frustrated with me and tell me that this should be easy. But in actuality my brain works differently and I may need to see it done a couple of times or have it explained in a different way in order to understand.

When I tell people I have learning disabilities they tend to cheapen my achievements as if I weaseled my way through a Master’s program and was handed a degree instead of earning it myself. In reality though I worked countless hours to make my way through grad school and to end up where I am today.

I had a boss who upon finding out about my learning disabilities made some distasteful and unprofessional comments about them as if I were bad and defective and not fit to serve in ministry. Oh the irony that this was after we had done a whole Inclusion Initiative geared towards people with disabilities. She barred me from helping with it.

When I tell people that I have learning disabilities they often tend to question or doubt my capacity for leadership. But I can still lead and I lead with a greater empathy and understanding because I know what it’s like to struggle.

I wish when I tell people I have learning disabilities they would see me for who I truly am…..

An intelligent
Inquisitive
Attentive
Hardworking
Tenacious
Creative
Problem solving
Professional
Empathetic
Leader

Who demands and deserves respect
And who can do whatever she puts her mind to.

You don’t get me
You never will
I’m sitting here screaming
And you still
Don’t hear me
Don’t listen
Don’t care
Don’t see
There is chaos
Inside of me
A mind that is not my own
Consumed by thoughts
That I don’t own
Things I say
I really don’t mean
Never heard
Often seen
The highest of highs
The lowest of lows
I don’t understand it
But that’s how it goes
I’m tired of the meds
Tired of pills
The pain isn’t numb
It actually kills
My spirt
My soul
My will to survive
Yet I go on
Trying to thrive
Navigating roads
Yet unable to drive
I’m tired
I’m drained
Not mentally there
To young to give up
To old to care
What you think
How you feel
You haven’t a clue
How it feels
What it’s like
When you are the glue
Holding together
A paper so thin
Knowing I’ll lose
But hoping I’ll win
So please be kind
When I am around
I’m totaly lost
Looking for found
Mental illness
It’s not for the weak
Wanting to hide
But forced to seek
Love
Acceptance
You think that you know
You haven’t a clue where my mind can go
And I don’t know either
It’s truly a trip
When you hold on so tightly
But never had a grip

I miss being confident.
Having a secure attachment style.
I miss not being on antidepressants
or anti-anxiety pills
or testosterone.
Being content with life.
I miss my in-laws—
More like family than my actual family.

I miss a life that doesn’t turn itself inside-out every other week.
One week, I’m Dad of the Year.
My kismet, supposedly, according to astrology.
Demystifying geometric terminology,
explaining the difference between punching up and punching down,
helping girl scouts glue
and get
Their shit together.

The next, I’m wearing eye-liner
Mascara
Deep inhale of poppers;
searching for an escape.
Like an episode of Euphoria — surrounded by
Creatures of the night.
The duality of man isn’t poetic.
It’s fucking comedic.
But like, the Shakespearean version of comedy…
Tragic.
Heartbreaking.
Wretched.
But wretched enough to laugh hysterically at.
People win Oscars for playing these types of roles, after all.
Can I at least get some residuals out of this?
No? Fine.

I’m not a fucking poet, anyway.
But this poetry class sure makes me want to be one.
I googled how to write poetry—
Find different words.
Avoid is/was/are, when possible.
Be vulnerable.
Experiment
With
Line Breaks.
Whatever.

So I put on my eyeliner and mascara
And put the lip gloss in my pocket for later
As I plan my temporary
slipfast
drift
Windows down, racing,
Crisp night sky enters
Montrose lures.
Madonna or Gaga drown out the voice
Telling me to stay home.
Gin and tonics mute my poor, wrinkled brain
Filling in the cracks, to make it smooth.
Smooth brains don’t think.
It’s an insult, and a metaphor
so it works.
Choking it
when it screams at me to stop numbing it.

And I wear the makeup
Instead of the makeup wearing me.
Because you need confidence to pull off wearing makeup.

My own is strong and fearless
It has scars but is fearless.
It has been silenced and shooed.
But now stands tall and renewed.

My own is purposeful and unique.
It tells a story that has made its peak.
It shines light into those who are weak and provides words for those who cannot speak.

My own is beautiful and bold.
It has depth and is precious as gold.
It seeks value and truth.
The love of my own can never be renewed.

My own is my voice. It’s my weapon of choice.
Sometimes misunderstood but protected from all the noise.
It’s powerful and worthy, standing out no matter the journey.

Always pondering on where marks were made.
Never wanting to feel betrayed.
My own fills dark rooms with light
Something that will be worth the fight.

I always felt misunderstood
Being the black sheep of the family or the escape goat
I knew the dynamic wasn’t healthy but i couldn’t verbalize it
I would just lash out because of it ,
whenever i felt overwhelmed i would lash out again
Cursing out someone ,hurting someones feelings because my feelings were hurt
Not knowing maybe they didn’t know how to use their own words
Sometimes its a cycle and they didn’t question things , they just continued the behavior
How sometimes family members felt like strangers
For the longest time i didn’t feel emotionally safe i was always in danger
Not from physical harm but by verbal hard and those words i would use back were razor sharp
Over the years of going to therapy along with maturing and taking psychology i started to see
Alot of this behavior was learned and gone through generations
Well it stops with me even if its the end of me it will stop with me
No longer the villain now as my siblings got older they understood the method to my madness
All the moments as when they were kids they did not get until they grew up and started to get it
The villain was the hero all along
I started to establish and enforce boundaries and it has been what has saved my sanity
Also has saved my family , we have along way to go but we have come so far
Now with the education and emotional maturity i can sit down and have conversations to be heard and understood
Even if we agree to disagree that’s fine with me
No longer yelling or saying anything to intentionally hurt someones feelings
We are closer because of it
Love your “misunderstood” son ,brother ,grandson , nephew ,friend
Isaac

In shadows deep, where secrets dwell,
A heart so tender, beneath a shell.
Choices made in the dark of night,
Searching for love, just to feel right.

Unseen abuse, scars from the past,
A child’s heart broken, growing up fast.
Running away, chasing the light,
Yearning for love, in an endless fight.

Yet here I stand, keeping it real,
With love’s tender touch, I’m made of steel.
Beneath the surface, storms rage inside,
A story of hope, where pain can’t hide.

So judge not the paths that I chose to roam,
For every misstep, I still seek a home.
In the search for love, we each play a part,
With wounds that linger, yet still, I have heart.

I’m worth more than a few licks between my legs. More than your legs caressing a sacred place I sometimes call home. You do it so well in making me believe I’m the true source of what you need, even though I know deep down I’m really not what you want or need. Love me, I’m a touch me please. Not just your side piece. I like Reeces, but that doesn’t mean take all my pieces until I have nothing
left for me. Yes I’m a masc, but I don’t mask who I am. For I am and will always be a woman. Underneath these clothes are vulnerability, desire, needs that you refuse to see. Stop intentionally making my femininity irrelevant. You’re not the only one who wants to be bent. You see, that toxic masculinity has your mind so skewed it’s almost impossible to fix. I refuse to try and try again only to learn over and over again, my love is simply not enough to carry the both of us. I want things that don’t qualify as a “true masc woman”, but you withhold things from me simply because you choose to see me as a placeholder. I’m not your filler man until you get who you really want. I’m not a fantasy. I’m reality. Hold me, dominate, reciprocate. Keep going until I see the heavenly gates. A simple question would’ve provided the answers. I keep it real simple. Loving me is not a game. It’s a privilege.