44 Cinnamon Toast
This piece is not about toast. It’s about how something absurd or trivial can become loaded with meaning when someone is under pressure to prove loyalty. I share this not to mock, but to show how alienation distorts ordinary life into a performance of survival. My hope is that readers see beyond the surface words to the unbearable weight behind them.
I thought I was protecting them. That was the belief I clung to. If I could carry the shortcomings on my own back, maybe they would grow up lighter. If I could shield them from the chaos, the lies, the recklessness, maybe they could still have the illusion of safety. My job was to absorb the damage in silence.
I see now how dangerous that silence became. What I thought was protection left them vulnerable. My restraint gave room for stories to be invented that explained my quiet. I was painted as the problem. The blanks were filled with distortions and half-truths until my silence itself became an indictment. What I carried for them was turned against me, and in time, against them too.
The cruelty was never random. Even when it looked sudden or absurd, even when the words themselves seemed flimsy and almost laughable, they carried a weight I could not name at the time. I did not fully understand it then. I understand now.
The pressure was relentless. A story took shape, and it seemed to need protecting no matter how fragile it was. To question it was dangerous. To resist it was unthinkable. The safer path was to join it. And joining it meant turning on me.
That is how the barbs began. They were not arguments, not really. They were sharp little bursts, preloaded and ready to be flung. Manufactured outrage over things that did not matter. The way I spread butter. The look on my face. The sound of my laugh. Petty grievances sharpened into weapons. And then one morning, a sentence landed in me with a strange mix of absurdity and cruelty.
I hate you and your cinnamon toast.
The words almost did not register. Cinnamon toast? It sounded silly, like something that should have come from a playground spat, not in my own kitchen. But the sting that followed was real. The absurdity made it sharper, because the cruelty had no anchor in reality. There was no fight to trace it to, no mistake I could correct, no logic I could meet with reason.
The sentence was ridiculous on the surface and brutal underneath. Ridiculous because toast is toast. Brutal because it was never really about toast at all. It was about demonstrating loyalty by showing cruelty. The toast was irrelevant. The hatred was not real. The words were a shield, a survival tactic.
Later I would hear it echoed in the voices of adults who had once been alienated themselves. They spoke of the unbearable pressure, the impossible choices. From one public testimony, an adult survivor explained it this way: “When we were withheld I became entrenched in the alienation process and I felt like it was all my fault but I was telling my alienating parent and stepparent what they wanted to hear. They wanted to hear really bad stuff about my other parent. They were questioning me intensely and bombarding me with suggestive negative input and it pushed me to my limits. I gave in, and I ended up lying to them, to please them, and hopefully take the pressure off me. I was only ten years old and the situation got much worse. I disconnected from my other parent because I felt so bad and ashamed for what I had done.”
I recognized the same mechanics in the toast line. It was not a spontaneous insult. It was a payment. A signal. Proof that the demanded script was being followed. To speak those words was to demonstrate allegiance. To turn the cruelty sideways toward me was to avoid the heavier pressure pressing down from above. It was a performance of betrayal, not a chosen betrayal, but one demanded and rehearsed.
That is the paradox of alienation. The cruelty never belongs to them, yet it came from their mouth. It wears their voice, their face, their body, and so it cuts twice. Once for the sting of the words themselves, and again for the knowledge that the words were not freely chosen. They were coerced, shaped, demanded.
The shame of repeating words that were never truly believed is unbearable. The guilt of pushing away love in order to stay safe is too much for anyone to hold. So outrage gets manufactured. Outrage covers the shame. Outrage disguises the guilt.
I hate you and your cinnamon toast.
That refrain carried the weight of captivity. On the surface it looked like rebellion, like independence. Beneath it was the exhaustion of survival. Each jab was not freedom, but proof of how little freedom there was. They learned that the only way to lighten the weight pressing down was to throw it at me instead.
What I thought was protection had left them exposed. Shielding them did not keep them safe. It meant they had no reference point to recognize what was being done to them. If I was painted as the problem, they had no evidence to the contrary. They only knew the pressure. They only knew the demand to perform loyalty by rejecting me.
The cruelty that landed on me was never theirs. It was the echo of someone else’s story, spoken through their mouths, heavy and unnatural. The absurdity of cinnamon toast made sense only in that light. It was not about food, or breakfast, or anything in the visible world. It was about survival in an invisible one.
The guilt never belonged to them. The shame never belonged to them. They were planted, watered, and pressed down until they spilled outward in words that seemed senseless but carried the whole burden of survival.
I did not fully understand it then. I understand now.
-- Disclaimer
This work is a personal narrative based on the author’s lived experiences, memories, and perspectives. While it draws on real events, conversations, and relationships, some names, identifying details, and circumstances have been altered to protect privacy.
The content of this publication is provided for informational and expressive purposes only. It is not intended to malign, defame, or harm any individual, group, organization, or institution. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, beyond those explicitly identified as such, is purely coincidental.
The views and opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not represent those of any current or former employers, family members, or associated organizations. The author makes no claim to absolute accuracy of events described, as memories and interpretations can differ. Readers are encouraged to understand this work as a personal account rather than an objective record.
Nothing in this publication should be construed as legal, medical, or psychological advice. Readers should consult qualified professionals for guidance in those areas.
By reading this work, you acknowledge that the author is exercising their right to free expression and that no part of this publication constitutes a factual assertion of criminal, civil, or unlawful conduct by any individual unless such information is already publicly documented and verifiable.