The Girl and the Q-Tip (ND-meno, cotton-bud truth)

The Girl and the Q-Tip

(ND-meno, cotton-bud truth)

I was raised

never put them in your ear —

the UK’s cotton-bud gospel,

the rule we all know

and all break.

I raised my kids the same way,

don’t do it,

don’t do it,

and still

I did it.

Yesterday, in hormonal fog,

battery flat,

spark missing,

arms full of washing

and a hand full of jewelry

and the need to feel like myself again,

I ran upstairs

on autopilot.

Bathroom.

Cotton bud.

Two seconds of nothing-thinking.

My brain shouting

where does the jewelry go?

put the washing down?

do what with what?

And then —

I poked my own eardrum.

Or something close enough

to snap me out of autopilot.

Not hurt-hurt —

just that instant

oh no

that makes the world stop

because your focus finally lands

exactly where it should have been

five seconds earlier.

Pain.

Instant.

Sharp.

The kind that makes you throw everything

onto the bed

because you already know

what you’ve done.

And then the stick —

the beating-myself-up stick —

because I broke

my one rule,

the rule I’ve preached

my whole life.

Three days later

my ear still aches.

Sad that I hurt myself.

Sad that my brain misfired.

Sad that meno-logic

and ND-logic

sometimes collide

and leave me bruised.

What did I learn?

Hopefully never again.

But also —

I’m human.

Hormonal.

Neurodivergent.

Trying.

And sometimes

the cotton bud wins.

Footnote - Hannah from "Girls" (stuck in my head) and yet I did it.   The most amazing writer, LENA DUNHAM