Maybe it's just the weather that's pulling me down with the temperature, but I can't help but feel like this cold that has settled deep within me has been iced over a thousand times. The iron shackles around my wrists and ankles have become brittle and broken in my own sub-zero attitude yet I am frozen, stuck in my own head and unable to leave. Even the warmth of the company of friends and family do nothing to melt the ice that's settled in my bones.

I don't even understand why I'm feeling so...worthless.

For weeks, I have been unable to coax myself out of bed any earlier than 12 in the afternoon - trapped and suffocated by own blankets and dread: dread to get up, to leave, to face other people who look at me with eyes just as cold as my own.

The snow that's falling outside as I write this isn't as cold as the emptiness I'm feeling.

It spreads like a virus, stemming from some dark corner of my soul to the tips of my fingers and toes. I can't feel anything anymore. Nothing. Someone could shoot me and I wouldn't feel a thing. Everything I touch seems to reflect it, dusted in frost. It is false in its alluring quality, hiding the disease within behind its sparkling exterior. It coats my skin, my bones, my heart, my lungs. It's colder than the furthest depths of the ocean, emptier than the furthest reaches of outer space. I might breathe easier in the vacuum of space actually.

Everything just feels so heavy. It closes in on me, surrounds me, welcomes me hollow and broken into this parasitic relationship that only has brief reprieves before dragging me back into its harsh embrace.

Wallowing in this feeling isn't good; it isn't healthy. I know that. Yet nothing I've done seems to help it, to ease this pressure that's building. Friends and family can only do so much. Medications can only do so much. Counselling can only do so much. It comes to a point where, when nothing helps, I have to wonder...am I worth it? All of this work and effort to make me feel human...am I worth it?

Most days, I can believe that I am. But recently, I'm not so sure about that.

I've gotten so cold, become so hollow. I can't help but feel just a little bit...worthless.