Avoidance

I learned avoidance,
and wrote it off as "putting it on a shelf" 
Because it's a mindfulness skill to put it on the shelf for a minute.
But I never took those problems off the shelf.
I would pretend to my parents.
That my stumbling in my room 
was just an accident.
Pretend that my stumbling mind,
was just a side effect of too much school.
I began a pattern of avoidance so my parents would forget a time
anything was different.
Anytime I actually enjoyed their company.
I would pretend I didn't want anything to do with my little brother.
So that they would never ask me to babysit him,
Because I didn't feel good enough to be around him.
He was pure,
And every time I saw him,
I felt my walls coming down.
He brought out ever pitfall,
and so I allowed them to have him.
I disappeared behind the back drop and pretended I liked being there.
Because I knew,
I knew I was so messed up I wanted to give them a do over.
And with putting him in the spotlight,
letting him have all the attention.
I could put my pain on a shelf.
No one asked me about it so I wouldn't tell.
I refused to go to show and tell days at school,
And I spent hundreds of days home from school throwing up/
Fear, and adrenaline eating away at my mind.
and pretending something was going around school.
I learned avoidance at school.
and was reinforced through family.
Because no one had the tie to solve what was going on.
So the whoozing mind,
and empty bottle stacked up.
I let my brother have the spotlight.
I wanted him to at east have a shot.
At not watching empty bottles pile up,
because that was everything I knew.
Addiction is the greatest form of avoidance.
It allows you to stop feeling and is the greatest for of shelving it.
Avoidance is not mindfulness.
But I used the excuse because it fit.
People would be proud to see me using my skills.
They would think that I was getting better.
And if they thought I was okay.
They would focus on my little brother.