Why am I losing the words that used to be mine?

Let us name what is actually happening, for shame thrives on vague language. Every school, every workplace, every government has quietly told you which tongue is useful and which is merely sentimental. You obeyed, because survival required it. Now the bill has arrived, and it is a word you cannot find. This is not a personal failing. It is what happens to any skill starved of practice — the mind is efficient, not sentimental. But knowing the mechanism does not erase the grief. The word that will not come is also the voice of a grandmother, a street, a self you were before the world asked you to translate yourself into something smaller. You are not choosing between mourning and rebuilding. You can do both. Grief clears the throat; practice fills it again.