The Weight of I’m Fine

“I’m fine.”

It’s a phrase I’ve worn like armor. Automatic. Comfortable. Safe.
It’s protected me in rooms where my truth felt too heavy, and it helped me survive in silence for a long time.

But the girl who wrote I’m Fine wasn’t fine.
She was holding her breath every day, hoping no one would notice how much she was drowning.

And recently — I finally told some people.
I even reached out to my doctor. I admitted I couldn’t keep doing this on my own.
I said the words I swore I never would: “I need help.”

And while there’s a strange relief in not holding this all in alone anymore… there’s also fear.
Now that I’ve opened up, it’s like there’s this unspoken pressure to be “getting better.”
Like the moment you speak it out loud, you’re expected to heal overnight.

But healing doesn’t move that fast.
Some days I still feel like I’m slipping back into the girl who smiles too easily and says “I’m fine” before she even checks in with herself.

This poem is for her.
It’s for the version of me who thought she had to carry it all — the trauma, the heartbreak, the weight of staying silent — just to be loved.

And it’s for you too, if you’ve ever felt like you had to fake being okay just to make it through.

This post doesn’t have a perfect ending.
I’m still in it. Still learning how to ask for help, how to eat, how to stay.
But I’m not in it silently anymore.

And maybe that’s enough for today.

“I’m Fine” 

I’m fine
That’s what I tell myself.
Two little words
Holding me together
Like glue over glass,
Keeping the cracks from showing.

I’m fine
That’s what I tell everyone else.
Because I can’t be anything less.
The people I love need me to be okay.
They need me to be
Fine.
Because who am I
If not the one who has her shit together?

I’m the friend who checks in.
Not the one who gets checked on.
I’m the one who makes people laugh
When their world is falling apart,
The one who holds others
Even when no one holds me.

I’ve worn this mask for so long,
Even I believe it now.
I’ve convinced myself
That this pain,
This ache,
This silent suffering,
Isn’t a problem.
Isn’t real.
Isn’t mine to speak.

Most days…
I believe I’m fine.
But then the darkness creeps in,
Like smoke under a locked door.
It wraps around me
When the world goes quiet.

That’s when I hear the thoughts
Crawling out of the corners of my mind,
And I know
I’m not okay.
I’m not fine.

Because underneath this mask
Is the weight I never speak:
The sexual assault.
The self harm.
The emotional abuse.
The self-hatred
That gnaws at me in silence.
It’s all there
Pulling me under
Like hands made of memory and grief.

It terrifies me.
To feel it.
To admit it.
To carry it and still try to smile.

I pray for peace.
For stillness.
For a way out of this storm inside me.

Because the truth is
I’m not fine.
I never was.

But if anyone asks?

I’ll smile.
Say the words.
And I’ll always be
“Just fine.”

– K