Borrowed Oxygen

I learned young how to smile through a panic attack

How to hold everybody else while my own soul cracked

I became the strong one, that was my role

But nobody asks what it costs to carry ghosts

I got scars that don’t show in the mirror at night

Just exhaustion behind every “I’m alright”

And I know I got love, I know I got people

But depression’ll convince you you’re less than equal

So I write like a man with his hands through glass

Trying not to bleed on everybody I have

I don’t need saving, I just need seen

Need somebody to notice what silence means

‘Cause I can fill a room and still feel gone

Still feel invisible with the lights all on

I’ve been breathing borrowed air

Holding weight that wasn’t fair

Screaming softly, no one hears

Drowning slow for all these years

And if I disappear tonight

Tell my son I really tried

Tell my wife I fought like hell

Even when I hated myself

There’s a war in my chest every morning I wake

Like my mind and my heart both refusing to break

So they bend instead

And I live half dead

Trying to outrun thoughts stuck inside my head

I’ve chased validation like oxygen tanks

Let desire define me, let praise be my strength

But attention fades and the room goes cold

Then I’m left with the version of me I don’t know

And that’s the part nobody claps for

The nights sitting numb on the bathroom floor

The fear that I’m loved for what I provide

Not for the exhausted man trapped inside

I don’t wanna die

I just wanna stop hurting

I just want peace

Without constantly searching

I just want someone to hear these words

And know this pain isn’t theirs alone

I’ve been breathing borrowed air

Running empty everywhere

Still somehow I’m standing here

Even shaking, even scared

So if this song outlives my voice

If somebody feels this noise

Promise me you’ll stay tonight

Please don’t fade into the night