CW: discussion of suicidal ideation, substance abuse, panic/anxiety, chronic illness, self-harm mentions

Dude, wake up. I see it now. 

What? Huh?

What I’m feeling. Why I hate life. Why everything is difficult. 

Okay, heavy shit. Lemme just put on my glasses. Here we go. So, had an epiphany?

Nothing like that, just took some time to meditate and really listen. 

You. Took time to meditate in the morning. With a day of chores ahead of you? That’s…new. 

Well, I had to quit junk food and sugar. 

Uf. That’s some hard shit. 

Yeah. So I thought hey, let’s replace all that crap and do some of the things you always say you’ll do some day, like jog, meditate, relax. You know, the shit you tell yourself in your 20s that you’ll have time for in your 30s, when you’re more settled. 

Gods, I miss that 20s optimism.

I know, right? Anyways, you know me, I’d never make a good decision for myself unless shit really hit the fan. 

Don’t be so hard on yourself. We all have our self-destructive habits. 

Yeah, sure, whatever. Unhealed trauma and all that. Doesn’t matter. 

How’d you mean shit hit the fan?

Went to the doctors, got the speech.

Which one?

You know, if you don’t change your ways, you’ll die before you’re 40, blablabla. 

Shit, that’s less than 2 years away. 

Impending doom shit, yeah. 

Is this for real?

Yeah yeah, it’s for real this time. Came with loads of needles, mri machines, hospitals, all that rave. 

Fucking great.

Yeah, but…I guess we kinda saw it coming anyway. 

One thing to feel it in your bones, another to actually get confirmation from professionals. 

Fair enough. Still not the point. 

Yeah, right. Meditating. Replacing noxious habits with …what do we call this? 

Fuck if I know. Boring shit that makes me question if that’s all there is, but everyone says it’s healthy?

Bit wordy.

Labels don’t fucking matter anyway. Matters that I finally fucking did it. Sit down, completely sober. Turned off my phone. In the morning. And I just…stayed with myself. My breath, my thoughts, my skin. 

Damn. 

I fucking saw it. This shit I keep running away from. Panic. Pure, utter terror. Constant, running alongside everything I do. 

What’d you mean you saw it?

Like… When there’s sunshine up somewhere but a blanket of stormy clouds beneath and you can’t see it. You’d have to get somehow higher above them. You know, like when you fly on a plane. 

Yeah, that makes sense. 

It’s like a blanket that covers you whole but you can’t get it off. And it’s been raining forever and it seeped into everything. Now there’s mold and sludge in my bones. 

Nasty.

And I can barely move,  I’m deep in mud and I trudge and trudge trying to get out of it, but there is no ‘out’. It’s in me, on me. My bones are cold, my skin is hot. I feel the energy evaporating from me like burning water. And I’m so cold all the time…

Fuck. 

But it all makes sense now. Why I can’t just goddamn be. Why I can’t just go and prepare a meal, or clean my bathroom or work. It’s all tainted in this terror. Everything terrifies me.

I mean…you seem okay when you read stuff or watch some shows. 

Yeah, cause I tune out of myself. But I gotta be present for the things I do to sustain myself. 

But you love a clean bathroom. 

I do, but making it clean makes me want to run up the walls. Right now, standing here, my mind tells me over and over ‘You gotta clean it. You know why. You need to do it. It’s healthy.’, while my body shakes, lights cigarette after cigarette, fidgets around the house, going from room to room, doing fuck all, cause it can’t sit still but it also can’t do the shit it’s suppossed to. And it’s all I can do to stop it from snorting a xanny. I am in a boxing match, fighting  for my life. 

Just because you have to clean a bathroom. 

Fucking yeah. But it’s not just that. It goes the same with all the shit I gotta do. All of it. I’m in the trenches, there’s a war, I have to be hypervigilant. 

How can I help?

I have no fucking clue. All I wanted was to say it out loud. To tell someone, I fucking see it. I know what I’m running away from. I know why I’m so tired all the time. I know why life is a chore I want to end. 

Panic. 

Yeah. 

What now?

I don’t know…maybe stop running and face the bitch?

Photo by Kevin Doran on Unsplash