The Guy Who Ate My Feelings

The art of not taking things personally (even when they're digested).

I was twenty and in treatment for the first time, which is a very polite way of saying I was emotionally unraveling like a Dollar Tree paper towel in a hurricane.

The place wasn’t bad, exactly.
It had a certain psych ward chic—linoleum floors, bolted-down furniture, and a heavy air of “No one here is doing great.”

None of us had the answers.
Just a laminated feelings wheel, two working pens, and a collective agreement not to trauma dump before snack time.

But we got to wear our own clothes, which meant the hallways were just endless parades of fuzzy socks, fraying hoodies, and the universal uniform of mental collapse: sweatpants with suspicious stains.

At any given moment, at least three people were crying, someone was trading graham crackers for extra TV time, and someone else was telling the group they were secretly an alien sent to study Earth’s emotional incompetence.
Maybe they weren’t wrong.

---

And then there was… him.

Dark hair.
Dark eyes.
The kind of jawline that made you briefly forget your trauma.

He had that look like he’d been through things. Sexy, brooding things.
Like childhood. And juvie.
And probably some light arson charges that got dropped.

He was from somewhere rainy and emotionally complex—Seattle, I think.
He had big Jacob-from-Twilight energy, if Jacob had anxiety, a nicotine patch, and a vague contempt for authority.

He was always getting the unit put on lockdown, which only added to his mysterious allure. I mean, if you’re into that sort of thing anyway.

He had the vibe of someone who would one hundred percent steal a golf cart and drive it into a koi pond, but like… for a cause.
Like dismantling capitalism.
Or protesting the group room’s broken DVD player.
Or fighting for more time with the ping-pong table.

We weren’t friends, but we had nodded at each other.
Maybe winked once. Maybe I imagined it.

Anyway, it was the kind of situation where you think, if this were a movie, we’d have one meaningful conversation near a vending machine and then never speak again, but in a really poignant way.

---

One day, I noticed he seemed a little off. Less chaotic energy, more existential dread. So I decided to offer a small act of kindness.
A note.

It was a torn corner from my Coping Skills Bingo sheet, where I had yet to win a single square.
I don’t exactly remember what I wrote.
Probably something like:
“You good?”
“You seem sad. You want my extra juice box?”
“Hang in there. Group was about radical acceptance again. I radically accept that I’m over it.”

---

I handed it to him like we were passing secrets in seventh grade homeroom.
He looked at me.
Then looked at the note.

And without opening it or saying a word…

He ate it.

Just popped it in his mouth like it was a Cool Ranch Dorito of despair.
Chewed it.
Swallowed.
Never broke eye contact.

---

Reader, I—
I didn’t know what to do.
I think I blinked in Morse code.

There are no training manuals for this kind of social interaction.
No worksheets titled What To Do When a Hot Guy Eats Paper in Front of You Like an Emotionally Tormented Goat.

You try to connect, and sometimes it goes beautifully.
And other times it gets digested.
C’est la vie

So I went back to crocheting, which had become my therapy.
Quiet. Repetitive.
And not in the habit of swallowing small, handwritten attempts at connection.

---

That was the end of our almost-friendship.
A blink, a bite, and silence.

We never spoke again.
I don’t know what happened to him.
Maybe he’s out there now, thriving.
Maybe he owns a food truck that only sells burnt toast.
But like… artistic burnt toast.
Maybe he still eats notes.
Who am I to say?

What I do know is if someone responds to your emotional outreach by consuming it, don’t take it personally.
They’re probably going through something.
Or they’re low on iron.

Either way, I wish him the best.

Some people journal.
Some people scream into pillows.
Some people eat correspondence like it’s high-fiber emotional roughage.

And me? I write about it on the internet.
So maybe we’re not that different after all.

---

Names have been omitted and details changed or blurred to protect privacy.
And also because memory is weird and trauma doesn’t come with timestamps.
This is my version of the story.