Silencing the Dysphoria | #MindOverMatterContest

Silencing the Dysphoria

The remnants of your childhood should give you a sense of nostalgia and sentimentality. Upbringing is a significant epoch in all of our lives, and most of what transpires during that period of life impacts us in adolescence and adulthood. I yearn to reminisce a point in my childhood where I was utterly nonchalant, but when I attempt, I seemingly draw a blank.

I witnessed many ordeals early on in my life that no child should even be thinking about. But I saw it with my own oblivious eyes, and it brought me to a state in which I couldn't erase it from my recollection, even to this day.

Within my household, a lot of physical abuse occurred. I would listen to my parents bellow at each other downstairs and fall asleep to it every night; like a twisted lullaby. My father had a short temper, especially towards the end of my parents' marriage. He was constantly irate, and none of us could tolerate it. Every day I would wake up from a restless sleep, feeling dreary and fatigued despite having a full slumber. It was as if their screams were echoing in my head and I was subconsciously listening.

I saw the abuse. I watched every person in my family grow more and more agonized until The Night happened.

The Night.

My father had ultimately snapped, and he let it out on my mother. She has undergone multiple procedures due to broken bones, and I was still stuck in the moment when he finally lost control over his actions. The opiates in his system conquered.

I will never forget The Night. I glanced worriedly over my shoulder just to see the back window of my father's vehicle, hazed with fog from the downpour a couple hours prior. I was sitting in the passenger seat of the car that had struck my mother so forcibly that she had broken seven bones in her face. I didn't know any better—I was eight, after all. My father had hoisted me into the car before I could protest.

I was traumatized. While my mother had been recovering from the innumerable surgeries she endured, I was having sessions with a few psychiatrists over the years. I was so mentally wounded from The Night that it took me over two and a half years to be okay again.

I was stuck in the abyss for a long time. I was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, and I couldn't find the light at the end of the tunnel. But eventually, after countless therapy sessions and prescriptions and the support of my family, I was able to silence my demons once and for all.

Now, it's almost seven years later, and I'm going on with my life surrounded by family. I live with my mother, and my brother is off to college, on the path to his career. Of course, I will never forget The Night, but I've learned to cope.

We all have.