A Controlled Descent
- Abby Deisinger
- Mar 6
- 4 min read
by Abby Deisinger
It begins with inventory.
Names, tones, hallways.
A register of glances sharp enough to teach you
where to stand so you won’t be noticed.
Bullying is not a single event—
it is curriculum.
It teaches posture.
It teaches silence.
It teaches how to apologize
for existing in the wrong proportions.
I learn early that rooms have hierarchies.
That laughter has direction.
That cruelty prefers an audience
but never claims responsibility.
They do not need to strike;
repetition does the work for them.
Each comment sands something down.
Each look files me closer to acceptable.
The body adapts.
It always does.
Shoulders fold inward.
Breath shortens.
Voice learns to arrive already ashamed.
I become efficient at disappearing
while still being present enough to be blamed.
Self‑hatred arrives disguised as logic.
It speaks calmly.
It presents evidence.
It uses their voices,
but removes their names.
This is how it survives—
by sounding reasonable.
I begin to narrate myself as
if I am already gone.
As if distance will soften the damage.
As if objectivity is safety.
Mirrors stop reflecting;
they report.
Every surface becomes an audit.
Too much.
Too loud.
Too visible.
The body is recast as error,
something to correct or contain.
I start negotiating reductions.
Smaller wants.
Smaller reactions.
Smaller dreams.
If I can become unobtrusive enough,
maybe the world will stop reacting.
It doesn’t.
Self‑loathing is not emotional.
It is procedural.
A checklist of faults.
A schedule of restraint.
Kindness is withheld as punishment,
not because it is undeserved,
but because it feels dangerous to allow.
I learn how to punish without witnesses.
How to internalize enforcement.
How to become both verdict and sentence.
The mind grows teeth
and turns inward.
At some point, the thought appears.
Not loudly.
Not violently.
It presents itself as an option—
neat, quiet, efficient.
A way to stop negotiating.
It is not despair that brings it.
It is fatigue.
The exhaustion of constant self‑monitoring.
The weariness of being misunderstood
and blamed for the misunderstanding.
The idea does not demand.
It waits.
It stands at the periphery of every moment,
making ordinary objects feel significant.
Everything acquires an edge
without being sharp.
Time begins to flatten.
Days lose hierarchy.
Future becomes theoretical.
The body continues its routines
without conviction.
There is a particular coldness to this stage.
Not sadness.
Not panic.
A narrowing.
The world reduces itself
to what must be endured.
I rehearse absence
without imagery.
I imagine subtraction, not violence.
A quiet accounting:
what would continue,
what would be relieved,
what would barely notice.
People mistake this for attention‑seeking.
They have not lived inside the logic
that convinces you
your disappearance would be a courtesy.
Self‑harm thinking enters as structure.
As proof of agency.
As a way to translate noise
into something measurable.
It is not about pain—
it is about boundaries.
About knowing where something begins and ends.
The body resists without comment.
Reflex overrides intention.
Instinct intervenes without explanation.
There is no heroism in this—
only biology.
Still, the thought deepens.
It becomes familiar.
Predictable.
It stops frightening and starts instructing,
not in actions,
but in conclusions.
Bullying taught me how to disappear.
Self‑hatred taught me why I should.
Suicidal ideation teaches me
how thin the line is
between wanting silence
and wanting relief.
History accumulates here.
Every insult archived.
Every dismissal preserved.
Memory becomes evidence,
stacked carefully,
undeniable to the one who carries it.
I reach a point where fear dissolves.
Not courage—
absence of reaction.
The idea feels inevitable,
like gravity pretending to be destiny.
There is no moment of clarity.
No cinematic pause.
Just a long, narrowing corridor
where each step feels smaller than the last.
The world continues its functions.
Lights change.
Phones vibrate.
Someone laughs in another room.
None of it feels relevant.
People say there are warning signs.
There are.
They are subtle.
They are misread.
They are often explained away
by those who benefit from not seeing.
I exist in a suspended state—
neither choosing nor refusing.
The mind loops.
The body waits.
Fate feels less like intention
and more like attrition.
There is no rescue here.
No sudden tenderness.
No hand reaching in at the last second.
Just delay.
Just hesitation.
Just the quiet fact
that nothing has happened yet.
Survival, in this moment,
is not a decision.
It is inertia.
I remain.
Not because I want to live,
but because wanting is not required.
Because the system has not been resolved.
Because the thought, for all its persistence,
has not concluded.
The floor is cold.
The future remains abstract.
The body is still operational.
This is not recovery.
This is not hope.
This is a pause
mistaken for permanence.
The story does not end here.
It does not resolve.
It does not instruct.
It simply stops speaking
at the edge of itself.
***
My name is Abby Deisinger. I’m a highschool student and one of my many passions is photography. When I’m not striving to take new photos you can find me spending time in the outdoors hunting or fishing, spending time with family and friends, or working on trucks. After Highschool I plan on going to welding school to become a journeyman for welding.
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