I often wonder,
when my mind wanders
what could've been.

Without my surgeries
would I be stronger,
or just as emotionally weak?

Would I still be naïve to the outside world,
or would I have learned through daily life
the bounds of mortality?

If I hadn't 'gone under the knife',
Would I have had a longer childhood?
Would I have strived more?
Would I have proved to myself that I can...

be anything that I wish?
be of use?

If I hadn't gone through all of that,
Would I feel any more secure?
Would I worry any less?
Would I make more sense of little high school distress?

Wait a moment...

Did the surgeries not help me to grow?

Perhaps in the end they are friends, and not foes.
Despite it all, did I not learn?
Did I not gain wisdom?
Do I not know?

How far is necessary to go,
How to be perceptive;
to see beyond the surface.

Perhaps,
I am better for it.
Perhaps,
I'm not as weak as I'd thought.

It's all in the past now,
But the past is what makes me, me.

As my mind wanders,
this way and that,
I began to think that without the surgeries
I would've been more weak.

In my own way I had been strong then,
I'd had to be?
And now, since I have my emotions under control,
I realize,
That great strength I'd had then
Is still inside of me.