Things That I've Pondered

10/6/2020

Application Assignment 3 (PTSD, Anxiety, Insomnia, who knows what else)

September 27, 2018
The sun started peaking over the stadium about an hour ago. Its light is slicing through the blinds, casting mini mountain ranges of shadows along the constellations I'd been tracing in the popcorn ceiling as it poured the past three nights. Unfortunately, counting these made up constellations proved as ineffective as counting sheep. I can't bring myself to tell her the whole story, so my mom thinks I'm just imagining it. That it's all an elaborate excuse for my grades tanking. I just wish I had the words to portray this truly inexplicable feeling of being trapped in my own head as my anxious thoughts run circles around me at a dizzying speed, only pausing long enough every once in a while for me to force myself to eat something. Yet, never managing to stop for anything or anyone. I wish that I could just 'get out of my head' as easily as those words can flow from my fingertips. I wish I could tell her how his voice haunts me anytime it's quiet enough for me to think, or how much worse it gets when I can hear my breathing grow shakier and shakier until it finally matches the ragged, frantic gasps that left my lips that night. I wish I could tell her how each drop of rain that pounds against my window amplifies his whispers as they echo through my brain, instead of drowning him out like I prayed they would. I wish I could tell her that every time I close my eyes, I open them to find myself in the alleyway where any feeling of safety I may have had on this campus was torn away from me, leaving behind the shell of a girl who once thought that she could, and would conquer the world and any tribulation thrown at her. A girl who didn't think of three different ways her actions could cause her world to crumble at her feet before doing it. I wish I could've called her just to hear her voice all those times when I found myself curled into a ball in the middle of the night as my mind replayed his words on loop, scared of where I may find myself if I so much as opened my eyes. I wish I could tell her that the real reason I miss my classes isn't because I had a migraine or that I had accidentally slept through them, but that every time it rains I'm scared that he'll find me again. How as soon as it gets dark outside, I can feel his eyes burning into me anytime I pass a shadow that he could even possibly be hiding in. I wish I could tell her that I had found good friends to go out with, who I could trust to have my back, who would look out for me. I wish I could forget the feeling of utter helplessness and shame that consumed me as the cold, wet cement dug further and further into my back with each moment that passed. I used to love staring at the night sky until I saw how clear it was once he and the rain got bored of tormenting me. I wish I could tell my mom that I was a part of the smaller portion of the 3/5 statistic. Most of all I wish I could ask God what it is that I'm supposed to be learning from this. I wish that I could understand, so that I can help her understand why I came back so different. But saying any of these things would break her, so I can't. She would feel as if she failed to protect me and see the solution as pulling me from school and making me move back home. I really wish I had told absolutely anyone about this before I found myself sitting against the back wall of a party room for so long, that someone called my best friend to come get me and carry me home because I was too scared to move. This happened all because it had started storming outside, and I thought I was distracted enough to avoid being taken back to that place in my mind where the thunder blends into the muted bass of the music from the club that resided on the other side of the brick wall I had been thrown against, and each flash of lightning is mistaken for the headlights of a car passing by what, at that point, could've just looked like a couple arguing. My friend carried me out to their car, took me home, and all but guarded my door in an effort to make me feel safe again. Regardless of the many times I said "I'm fine. Really it's okay, you can go.", they refused to leave until I "got it off of my chest" and told them what just happened. 
How do you tell someone who you share most of your deepest thoughts with, that you just completely broke down because a rainstorm kicked up? If you're me and you haven't slept in days, you completely lose your words and just cry. Once I calmed down, I told them everything, and they finally convinced me that I should tell my mom. I still struggle with the aftereffects of that night, but I've learned how to deal with the anxiety and circular thought process that comes along with it because I survived, and I'm okay. Tomorrow, the sun will rise in the East just like every other morning passed, as well as every morning that's yet to come, and my life will continue.