I'm not broken (RoyalChaos)

Chapter 24 - Let me be happy again

(TRIGGER WARNING: SELFHARM)

Chilled's perspective

(One week later)

One month. I managed to hold off for just one month. I had managed longer before, so it felt more like a failure than an accomplishment. Being quite honest, it never felt like an accomplishment to fall back. My depression was like a rollercoaster ride, just not as fun. You start on a normal level, the ride starts and you go uphill, you feel alright, maybe even happy. But as soon as you're up top there's this deep drop in front of you. And no matter what you do, you can't escape this drop. You drop down, down to the ground and maybe stay there for a while. After that it goes up again, but maybe there's an immediate drop right after again. There are loopings that symbolize you not knowing exactly how you feel. My depression was a rollercoaster ride and so was my life. And after the high called Christmas came the low.

I had been at the science center with Ze. It had been a lot of fun and just the sight of him being happy made me happy too. There was this weird ball thing that made your hair stick out when you touched it. Ze had wanted to know if it went through to other people's bodies and insisted on kissing me while holding onto the ball thing. Of course it didn't work and he was a bit upset but the next thing already got him back on track.

I didn't know why another low hit me, nothing particularly upsetting happened to me. I was still in love, I was still doing well in school - which had started this week again - and I overall felt okay. But one day I just woke up and felt empty again. I tried to deny it at first, I wanted to scream at myself that I was fine, that I didn't need this low. And then I started to feel comfortable in my emptiness again, just like I had every time. Ze noticed my mood change and asked me if he could help, but I didn't know what to tell him. 'It's just another low again' wouldn't satisfy him and 'You can't help me' would hurt him. So I just said I was a bit tired due to college stress, nothing to worry about. I would've felt terrible lying to him like that. If I could feel anything. But I couldn't. In my emptiness I didn't feel anything, not sadness, not happiness, just nothing. And just like many times before, the urge to feel something came flooding back, and I immediately knew what could bring me to that goal.

(Trigger warning: Self-harm. If you are easily triggered, please do not read the following paragraph.)

It happened on a day on which I had a free afternoon and Ze didn't. The entire morning I had thought about staying at school and doing some reading, but my mind didn't listen, my mind wanted to feel something and my mind won. As soon as I got home I threw my stuff into the bedroom and walked straight into the bathroom. I had hidden my last razor blade from Ze, I knew where he'd look and where he wouldn't. I took it out with caution, sat down and just looked at it for a moment. I wanted to feel repulsed, I wanted to feel ashamed and I wanted my mind to yell at me to just throw it away and be done with it. But of course mental illnesses didn't work that way.

I held my left arm out, my eyes tracing the pale scars, before I let my fingers do the same. My heart ached, it always did when I touched my scars. It was the beginning of the little ritual I did. First I touched my scars, then I made new ones and then I felt something again and cried my heart out. I swallowed hard and looked for a place to make the new scars. I found it easily and carefully rested the blade against the not yet hurt skin. I hesitated a moment and felt tears building up. I blinked them away and made a swift cut along the unhurt skin, the pain rushing through my body and the tears down my face. I didn't stop to look at the new cut, I immediately set the blade down on my arm again and created another cut. I did the same another three times before I let go of the blade as if it was steaming hot. It fell down with a quiet clank. I pulled my knees closer to my body, wrapped my right arm around them and continued to hold out my left one. I silently cried as I finally looked at what I had done to myself. Thin lines of blood were running down the side of my arm, running over old scars and eventually dropping down onto the floor. I was planning on staying like this until the bleeding stopped and until my tears did too. I needed this calming phase, I always did. I was sad and relieved at the same time, sad because I had fallen back, because I had failed again, but relieved because I finally felt something again. I closed my eyes and rested my head against the wall while I waited for myself to calm down.