How do you cope with all the pain you've been through? Why did you allow them to do this to you?

As a child you keep telling yourself, "one day i'll be strong. I'll learn from other's mistakes and I won't make the same wrongs. I'll build up my walls and make them as high as the sky, and only that special someone will I allow to come inside!"

Then one day you look around to find your world's been torn apart. The walls you took such care to build were being torn away from the very start.

Why was I stupid enough to believe all the lies that were said? Was I too blind to realize that with each passing day my life was being torn to shreds?

And now with my guard completely down and out of sight, they slithered in like snakes to steal and take from me the sole remnants of my life.

I've learned over time how to put on a pretty good front. I can be happy and cheerful and silly and blunt.

Yes my walls have been shattered, along with my heart. I tried so hard to protect them, but failed miserably and got hurt.

With each passing day that my two true loves are not at my side, Instead of my heart just breaking piece by piece, it's beginning to harden and die.

The love that I have for my children is so very strong, but the heartache I feel being away from them is turning me to stone.

So I'm done building walls that seem so easy to destroy. It's like a game for some people, they must think the heart is a toy.

But I don't have to worry about things like that anymore, for the pain that I've felt these past years and all the times before.

Along with the pain has come anxiety and torment. For where my heart should be there is only hardened cement with a broken heart etched upon it.

But like I said before, I've gotten good at putting on a false front. For those who do know me but don't care to look much deeper, they will never see all of me, just the mask I hide myself under.

Day after day I go through the motions of life, while moment after moment I'm slowly dying on the inside.

To those of you who have hurt me time and time again, the blame not only lies at your feet, it also lies within.

I blindly allowed you to have too much control over me, and for that i suffer a pain I wouldn't wish upon my worst enemy.

I'm not as complete as the person I used to be, but a mere shell of that person playing a roll for others to see.

I don't know how to deal with the pain that I feel every second of every minute of every hour every day. I just keep praying that one day God will take it all away.

But the pain is still here and so am I, though I feel as if I'm in slow motion and my life is passing me by.

I'm not sure what to do next. When does it end and where do I begin?

I guess for now I am stuck on the outside looking in.

By Christy Cornett