I steal small things because it feels easier than admitting how bad things really are.

I don’t look like someone who’s struggling. I shower. I go to work. I blend in just fine. From the outside, nothing looks wrong.

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But financially, I’m barely holding it together.

Over the past year, I’ve started taking little things. Food at self checkout when I know no one is paying attention. A phone charger left behind at a café. Toilet paper from work. Nothing flashy. Nothing that would obviously hurt anyone.

At first I told myself it was temporary. Just until things stabilized. Then it stopped feeling like a last resort and started feeling normal.

That’s the part that scares me.

I justify it by calling it survival. I tell myself big companies expect losses like this. I tell myself I would stop the moment I could breathe again.

But if I’m honest, what bothers me most isn’t the stealing. It’s how routine it’s become. How little resistance I feel now.

I’m more ashamed of the idea of asking for help than I am of quietly taking what I need to get through the week.

And I don’t really know what that says about me anymore.

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