Category: Misc.

TW: Sexual Assault, Self-Harm, Stalking

I’ve been lied to. It was all fake. All that work for nothing.

This is what I say to myself when I wake up angry. I sit up in my bed and see that I failed again. I thought I was doing so well, and one bad day, a terrible night and a flooded mind and I’m right back where I started.

This is what it’s like trying to recover from a mental illness. This is what it’s like for me every few months. At the beginning of 2019, I was diagnosed with PTSD. A diagnosis I never thought would be applicable to someone like me, but I was wrong.

In 2017, I was assaulted, and spent the next couple years shoving it so far down because forgetting seemed like the only way to get better.

Those couple of years until my diagnosis was filled with denial and repressed memories, thoughts and feelings. It was filled with emptiness.

When I started to have flashbacks of what happened, that’s when I knew I wasn’t okay. I have been dealing with depression and anxiety from a young age, but this was different. This left me frozen. The flashbacks caused migraines and nausea so severe that I couldn’t get out of bed. I thought I was sick, but it was the PTSD.

Before researching the physical effects of PTSD, I believed and felt like my body was failing me. It left me tired and sick. I was, and sometimes still am, so exhausted that getting out of bed or brushing my teeth feel like it might be the last thing I do. My muscles would give and I dropped things, broke plates and cups just trying to load the dishwasher. I looked over my shoulder constantly, thinking he could be there at any moment. I was angry and sad and tired and I didn’t know why. I have fought depression for so long, but this was not the same. This was worse. This was more violent. It was sharp and cold, and so sudden.

I finally mentioned my trauma to my doctor, and instead of more tests and migraine medication, I began therapy.

Therapy always scared me. I only talked about my feelings and my experiences through writing, that was my way of unpacking these things. But it wasn’t enough. I needed to learn more about why I felt the way I did, I needed to learn how to help myself. I remember my first appointment. Walking into a waiting area with a long, curvy couch, signing in and describing my need for the appointment. I waited and waited until my new therapist came out and called my name.

She was younger. She was pretty. She was smart. She told me she specialized in trauma and sexual assault. I sat in her office, looking out the window at the view of The U, it was raining. I didn’t feel like I deserved to be there. The thought that I was a “survivor” was surreal. Then I began to speak.

It was like I was a shaken bottle. Every bubble ready to blow once that cap was twisted. Things I didn’t even know I remembered came out when I told this woman why I was there. This was the very first time I had ever described in detail what had happened to me. I told her about the threats of violence he promised if I told anyone. I told her about the time he sent me a video, captured from a distance of me leaving my apartment, getting into my car, with a target drawn on my head. The video ended with the sound of a gun. I told her about how that video plays in my head when I see someone in the grocery store that might look like him from behind. How when I hear loud noises, I feel like he’s there, watching me, ready to take his shot. I tell her about the fact that I wish I never remembered what had happened. That I wish I couldn’t still feel him behind me when I walk alone at night. That I’m scared to be alone outside in the dark because I feel like I’m running through his apartment complex parking lot again, scared, wanting to be home.

I told her I felt like I was being dramatic. I felt crazy that I couldn’t even remember what happened until almost two years later.

I went to therapy every week from March to July, and every other week from August to October, and it saved my life. Therapy allowed me to spill my guts, but only clean up the parts I still needed. I learned that I am not a burden, I am not crazy or pathetic, but that I was strong and I was here. I learned to use a container.

The container is a tactic my therapist used so I could talk about and process my trauma without taking that burden with me everywhere I go. During therapy, and times when I needed to talk, I would opened the container, pull out the trauma and assess it, then put it back in, and lock it away until next time. Although it was heavy, I did not have to carry it like I had been for the last two years.

My last regular therapy session was in October, 2019. I left that day feeling so powerful. My therapist moved my appointments to “as needed” and I had this new grip on my life that made me feel more in control than I think I ever had been. I was perfect. I had it handled.

Until recently.

I wasn’t fixed, but I really wanted to be. I wanted to go down that elevator and be done. I wanted to be strong for the rest of my life. But I was wrong. I underestimated how powerful trauma can be. I underestimated how dark and lonely PTSD can be. I caved.

I relapsed with old coping mechanisms. Starving myself. Hurting myself. Because the build up was so much, even screaming at the top of my lungs could not get it out.

I woke up after one of my worst breakdowns in a very long time, ashamed, regretful, and empty. I saw the marks on my body, I felt the soreness in my throat, and I felt the same panic I did before. I told myself that I ruined everything. I was doing so well, now I have to start all over. All that work for nothing.

But then I was reminded that this only shows that progress is happening. I was not lied to, I wasn’t tricked, I hadn’t failed. I had simply hit a speed bump. I left the container open for just a bit too long, but this did not mean I was still broken. I was doing better because I knew I needed to get back up the moment that I slipped.

This process of healing will take the rest of my life. I will never be fixed, because I don’t need to be fixed, I just need to rebuild the parts of myself that were taken from me without permission. PTSD does not disappear overnight, let alone 10 months. It does not stop just because you tell it to. It persists.

But so will I.

The thought of going back to therapy is scary. Walking into that office, sitting on that curvy couch, it makes me feel embarrassed. But it also reminds me of all the work that I have done, and I have done so much. The work that goes into something like this is tremendous. It is honestly so damn hard. I wish so many times that I could just stop, but that’s what will ruin it. Stopping will be a waste of the work, not the speed bumps.

There is a certain power that comes with making the decision to heal yourself. You must keep getting up, you must keep doing the mundane tasks that come with getting better. You must hit those speed bumps, but you also must enjoy the surprise of one day waking up and the load you carry is just slightly lighter. You must enjoy not hiding from your life because of your fear of losing it.

Carrying something so heavy causes so much pain. It causes heartbreak, misery, and loneliness. To be honest, healing does too. But it also carries light. And in the moments when you slip, it’s so dim, but it will be there every time you decide to get up.

I am not weak for needing help over and over again. I am not dramatic for looking over my shoulder when I thought I didn’t need to anymore. And I am not a failure for falling after marching on such slippery ice in the first place. I am healing.

And that is not a lie.

The lie is that there is no hope. The lie is that it will not get better. The lie is that I cannot be changed.

I have been changed. I am different from the girl I was ten years ago. I am different from the girl I was three years ago. Even one year ago. I am different. It’s because I decided I wanted to heal. The only way through it is the thick of it.

And that’s the truth that gets me up from each and every fall. That’s the truth that keeps me from going too deep into the dark that I dread. The fact that I persist is what overcomes the feeling of failure.

It persists. But so do I.

12:37 a.m.

He opened the rusting, black, metal gate with no hesitation. He didn’t care if it was loud enough to wake the neighbors, the bolts and hinges would grind and squeak together no matter how gently he pushed. He always meant to fix it, but never got around to it.

As he approached the cement steps of his porch, he noticed silhouettes of people from behind the curtains. The lights were dim so he guessed his roommate, Matt, was having a movie night. He didn’t mind, as long as they were quiet and didn’t try to make small talk.

He turned the knob on the white door with cracking paint and to his surprise it was still locked. Matt never locks the door, he thought. He shook his head and swung his bag from off his shoulder and rummaged for his key. After looking closely at three other keys in his hand, he found the right one, and turned the lock. The door was heavy, but opened with ease. After he hung his coat on the chipped wooden hook to the right of the doorway, he turned and stopped. All of Matt’s friends’ eyes were on him. They did not say hello, did not make small talk, it seemed like they weren’t even breathing. It was still.

He raised his eyebrows, gave a toothless grin–the kind you give a stranger on the train after accidentally looking them in the eye–and made his way past the guests. Their eyes followed him as he moved swiftly through the living room and into the main hallway. The house was cold and felt empty. The rental had always been old and creepy, but it was different this time.

He entered his room and shut the door, and immediately after, he heard hushed chit-chatting in the living room. He fell face first into his bed and thought about the guests in his home. They were old, not that there’s anything wrong with that, but why would his 23 year-old roommate be hanging out with a group of people old enough to be his grandparents? They all looked alert. Like they were expecting him. They knew he was coming but they were quiet, secretive. Their eyes were dark, and even the flickering flames from the fireplace were not enough to show the contrast between their pupils and irises. They sat in chairs, old wooden chairs from the basement, facing the door. There were perfectly good couches just feet away. They held their hands in their laps and crossed their feet under their chairs.

Their hands. They were so pail, almost translucent. Their veins, so visible. Like thick webs under the skin.

They weren’t surprised when he walked in, but they were waiting for someone else.

He couldn’t think about anything else. Despite being exhausted from his shift, he had to get one more look.

1:06 a.m.

He slowly opened his door, he didn’t want anyone to hear him this time. Trying his best to listen to the guests in his home, he leaned further out into the hallway. The guests were speaking so fast, he tried to make out what was being discussed, but no luck. It was harsh, hissed words back and forth, like no one bothered to take a breath in between. He then realized that what they were saying was not in English. Matt could barely spell out the word “restaurant” let alone have conversations with people speaking who knows what language that was. Who were these people?

He was out of his doorway and into the hallway by now, and took a step forward. He took another step and Matt interrupted his sneaking with a loud yawn behind him.

“What are you doing?” Matt moaned while rubbing his eyes.

“Who are these people? How do you know them?” He half laughed.

“What? Those people?”

“Yeah, the one’s in the living room. The old people.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, I just woke up cause I heard noise in the living room. I thought you brought people over.” Matt had been playing pranks ever since they moved in together, but when he said this, it wasn’t a joke.

“Who the hell is in our house?” Nate whispered back.

Matt disappeared into his doorway and emerged with his baseball bat in hand. He marched into the living room while Nate followed.

Only this time, the living room was empty. The guests were gone.

The fire was still going, lighting up the backs of the old wooden chairs. The guests left them facing the doorway, like they were waiting for something. This time, it wasn’t Nate, or Matt. Something else. Something important.

Matt went to the door and turned the knob, bat ready to swing. “What the hell?” He shook his head and backed towards the living room.

Nate was confused as he walked toward the entry way wondering what Matt had seen. He looked down at the knob on the exterior of the door to see a red key still in the lock. He looked closer and reached to pull it out, but something stopped him. The key was not red, it was covered in blood.

“Is it yours?” Matt asked. He had lost his key months ago, that’s why he never locks the door.

Nate reached into his back pocket and pulled out his key.

“No.”

1:13 a.m.

When I heard the distant sound of sirens,
when I saw the faint blue and red flicker
against the white sidewalks,
making the rooftops bleed,

When I was forced to peer out my window
and wonder what it was like
to see the night sky
for the last time,

I began to catch my breath.

I became silent enough
to hear the working parts inside of me
keep themselves alive.

I looked upward
and saw my breath leave my body
and I was there.
I was alive.

And I could see snow begin to fall
and I looked even closer
toward the home of each tiny flake that eventually
fell to the ground.

Each tiny piece of the sky fell onto my tired eyes
and I wondered if it was falling
so someone who would never see the sky again
could at least feel it one last time.

And I wondered if the pieces of the sky missed
being up that high,
watching everything below,
instead of turning red then blue.