I Go Quiet Before I Even Know I’m Scared

Dear Delyara, A man raises his voice in the grocery store. A boss uses the wrong tone. A face changes mid-conversation. A room gets cold. And before my thinking mind has had the chance to catch up, my body has already made me smaller. Softer voice. Less eye contact. Shorter answers. Careful smile. That familiar internal folding that says: survive first, understand later. I’m so tired of how quickly I disappear from myself in those moments. How automatic it is. How invisible it probably looks from the outside. People call that being calm. It isn’t calm. It’s old fear in fresh clothes.