As I wake up, I’m on the floor in my room. I can’t remember how I got there. There’s a slight pain in my back so maybe I fell somehow off my bed. Another panic-attack; no memory of what I did before, or during it. Somewhere in my mind I find I’m happy I’m alone. Fumbling for my bed for support I realize I can’t get up.
I quite enjoy the view from the floor. There’s frames to look at with the “kind-notes”, a piece of paper were people are supposed to write nice things about you. Even from here I can see the writings. “Always happy!”, “Spreads joy!”, “Beautiful smile!”, “I love your laugh!”, Absolutely wonderful!”
I laugh to myself.
My eyes travel to my medicine box. Anti-depressants, anxiolytic-pills, benzo-like pills for emergencies. I curse my ability to laugh easily. What’s the happy girl to do when she’s not spreading joy, but waking up from a panic attack?
Also, what is she to do when she has been isolating herself for the past months, losing a close friend because of it, because she can’t fulfill the requirements she has now set up for herself? Because when she’s not the happy, joy-spreading person she used to be (or she really is, she doesn’t know), she hides. She doesn’t answer the messages from the people she loves. She doesn’t answer when they call. She doesn’t do what she loves.
She writes in third person because it is painful to apply this to herself.
The wall to my right is the wall of important things; souvenirs from Romania, post-its I have gotten, flight-tickets. The picture of us. The one I received after Christmas and never thanked you for. We look happy. Actually happy. (I can’t tell whether you really were happy or not. We never talked about such things.) Somewhere inside my head it clicked. I do not understand “the concept of being happy”, but I remember I was happy there with you.
“Is there anybody in here who has someone they look up to?”
My hand is lifted up somehow.
The lecturer points at me. “Yes! You at the back! What is her or his name?”
I clear my throat. “Maria”
“And what makes her someone you look up to?”
“She’s real.”
He nods.
“She’s genuine. She’s caring. If she is mad at God, she is, and that’s okay. She’s one of my favorite people in this world.”
I guess what I am trying to say is that I am sorry for not writing you. And thank you for that picture. I called a friend when everything had clicked, and I asked for help. He got me stable, got me to sit on my bed. Talked to me until I was calm. Because apparently, I don’t always have to be happy, Maria.
Just know that I still think about you a lot and that I love you.
All my love, Sara
Little Pocket Journal 