addiction
The realities of addition; the truth about living under, above and beyond the influence of drugs and alcohol.
When Love Feels Like Anxiety
Caleb loved Iris so much he couldn't sleep. Not in the romantic, staying-up-talking-all-night way. In the lying-awake-at-3-a.m.-heart-racing-mind-spiraling way. In the checking-his-phone-every-five-minutes-when-she-didn't-text-back way. In the can't-eat-can't-focus-can't-function-unless-he-knew-she-still-loved-him way. People said he was in love. And maybe he was. But it didn't feel like the love depicted in movies or described in songs. It felt like standing at the edge of a cliff, constantly terrified of falling. It felt like his entire nervous system was wired to one person, and if she withdrew even slightly, his whole world collapsed. It felt, more than anything, like anxiety. They'd been dating for eight months, and Caleb had never felt this way about anyone. He thought about Iris constantly. Needed to know where she was, who she was with, whether she was thinking about him. When they were together, he felt euphoric. When they were apart, he felt like he was suffocating. "You're so intense," Iris said one evening after he'd texted her fourteen times because she hadn't responded for two hours. "I was just at dinner with my sister. I'm allowed to not text you for a few hours." "I know. I'm sorry. I just... I worry when I don't hear from you." "Worry about what?" Caleb couldn't articulate it. That he worried she'd realize he wasn't enough. That she'd meet someone better. That she'd wake up one day and wonder why she was with him. That every moment she wasn't actively choosing him felt like she might be about to leave. "I don't know," he said instead. "I just love you a lot." But it didn't feel like love. It felt like drowning while pretending to swim.
By Ameer Moavia11 days ago in Psyche
PAPER THIN. Content Warning. AI-Generated.
Raffaelo learned the rhythm of cruelty before she learned its intention. It arrived dressed as humor, wrapped in familiarity, passed hand to hand at family gatherings like a shared inheritance. Buffalo. A word chosen not for meaning but for sound, because it rhymed, because it landed easily, because no one had to think before saying it. Her parents said it with smiles, squeezing her cheeks, proud of how unbothered they believed she was. They never noticed how her laughter came a second too late, how she began standing at the edges of rooms as if apologizing for occupying them.
By Designed by Romaisa11 days ago in Psyche
The Year She Forgot How to Be Around People
Emma had been alone for 347 days when she realized she'd forgotten how to have a conversation. It wasn't intentional isolation. It started with the pandemic—everyone retreated into their separate spaces, and Emma's one-bedroom apartment became the entire universe. Then her remote job eliminated the casual water cooler chats. Her best friend moved across the country. Her weekly book club dissolved. One by one, the threads connecting her to other humans frayed and snapped. And Emma told herself she was fine. She had video calls sometimes. She texted people. She scrolled through social media seeing everyone else's lives. She wasn't truly alone. But when her neighbor knocked on her door to ask about a package delivery, Emma opened her mouth to respond and the words came out wrong. Stilted. Like she'd forgotten the rhythm of human speech. "I... yes. The package. It's... I haven't..." She couldn't form a complete sentence. Her neighbor looked at her with concern, and Emma felt a wave of panic. What was happening to her? After he left, Emma sat on her couch and tried to remember the last real conversation she'd had. Not a transactional exchange with a delivery person or a scripted work call, but an actual spontaneous human interaction. She couldn't remember. And when she tried to imagine having one now, her brain short-circuited. The social scripts she'd once known automatically—how to read facial expressions, when to laugh, how to know when it was her turn to talk—felt like a foreign language she'd once been fluent in but had somehow forgotten. Emma wasn't just lonely anymore. Loneliness had physically changed her brain. And she had no idea how to change it back.
By Ameer Moavia12 days ago in Psyche
Watch Out Wednesdays! (New Year's Eve Edition) - Opinion. Content Warning.
Happy New Year's Eve to everyone! Here is what to watch out for as we head into 2026! 1. Look for vengeance. For 2026, seek to avenge yourself of all of your enemies. Please be 100% in reaching your goal. Please make sure that they cry long into the night. Those who have plotted against you will be in misery when they see you being successful anyway.
By Adrian Holman12 days ago in Psyche
When Silence Hurts More Than Words
Mia grew up in a quiet house. Her parents never screamed. Never threw things. Never called each other names or slammed doors. To anyone looking from the outside, they were the picture of civility—calm, controlled, perfectly composed.
By Ameer Moavia13 days ago in Psyche
The Psychology of Emotional Neglect
Sophie was eight years old when she stopped crying. Not because she stopped hurting. But because she'd finally learned what her parents had been teaching her all along: her pain was an inconvenience they didn't want to deal with. She'd fallen off her bike that afternoon, scraped her knee badly enough that blood soaked through her jeans. She'd run inside, tears streaming, looking for comfort. Her mother was on a work call. She'd glanced at Sophie, held up one finger—wait—and continued talking. Sophie stood there, bleeding and crying, while her mother discussed quarterly projections as if her daughter wasn't falling apart three feet away. After twenty minutes, her mother finally hung up. "What happened?" "I fell. It really hurts." Her mother barely looked at the wound. "You're fine. Go clean it up. I have another call in five minutes." Sophie went to the bathroom alone. Cleaned the wound alone. Bandaged it alone. And something inside her went quiet. My pain doesn't matter. My needs are a burden. If I want to be loved, I need to stop needing things. She didn't think those words consciously. She was eight. But her nervous system absorbed the lesson completely: To be acceptable, I must need nothing. By the time Sophie was ten, she'd perfected the art of emotional self-sufficiency. She stopped running to her parents when she was hurt, scared, or sad. Stopped sharing her excitement because they seemed annoyed by her enthusiasm. Stopped asking for help because they were always too busy. She became the "easy child." The one who didn't cause problems. The one who took care of herself. Her parents praised this. "Sophie is so independent," they'd tell relatives. "She never needs anything from us." They said it like it was a good thing. Like self-sufficiency at ten years old was maturity instead of survival. What they didn't see—what they never asked about—was the little girl inside who'd learned that her emotional needs were unwelcome. Who'd concluded that love was conditional on not requiring emotional support. Who'd started building walls around her heart to protect herself from the pain of reaching out and being ignored. Sophie wasn't independent. She was neglected. And she'd learned to call it strength.
By Ameer Moavia13 days ago in Psyche
Why Some People Feel Alone Even in Relationships
Lena woke up next to her husband of seven years and felt like a stranger was sleeping beside her. Not because Tom had changed. But because somewhere between the wedding and this Tuesday morning, they'd stopped being two people who knew each other and become two people who lived in the same house.
By Ameer Moavia13 days ago in Psyche
