When did everything change?

"There was a time not too long ago when hurting yourself felt good. Back then though, it was called something different. It wasn’t about inflicting pain, it was about feeling something, anything, that was different than what you already knew. I’m talking here about the newness of things. I’m talking about moments that could shock your entire body and leave you feeling high for days. Baby faces doing grown up things. Little hearts filling themselves up with experiences. There was always a story at the end of it all and it didn’t usually end in tears. That, like everything else, would of course soon change. It’s hard to discern when the change happened though; it’s hard to tell when you became incapable of shaking things off like you once did. 
All you know is that it happened. Don’t know how. Don’t know when. But here you are: hurting yourself for different reasons. Here you are hurting yourself and it actually starting to feel like pain. The lows aren’t so dramatic. There’s no screaming, no yelling, no visible anger. Instead they just creep under your skin and stay there, chipping away at your resolve. The permanence terrifies you. The permanence is proof that you can no longer afford to be silent when it comes to running your life.
When did everything change? You wonder this as if knowing the answer will make everything better. It won’t. Growing up is difficult — you have to mourn the newness and accept being old enough to know better — but it’s what you have to do in order to keep living. Because there’s only so long you can keep asking the wrong questions and expect to find a good answer at the end of it. There’s only so long you can check out of your life before it starts to belong to someone else." 

- Ryan O'Connell

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you provoke something in me i can't even begin to explain and understand.