Inaction

I sat before my keyboard, paralyzed with indecision. The cursor blinked at the end of the word document of the brief my manager had just sent through.

“Write about a negative experience you’ve had recently, how it impacted you, those around you, and what you did to resolve it.” The instructions were concise and clear, its goal achievable, but my mind remained stubbornly blank. I felt the familiar squeeze of anxiety in my stomach, and my breath quickened.

“I need a cigarette,” I thought suddenly.

I left my makeshift office and stepped outside to light up. As I stood watching two birds creating a nest in the cherry blossom tree in our backyard, I forced my mind to go blank and focus only on the birds. The fist in my abdomen refused to loosen, however, and my hands shook with the rush of nicotine. I flicked the cigarette away with disgust and went inside. Why did I think that would help? I felt worse, and I only had myself to blame.

My dog padded over, sensing something was amiss, and I felt a rush of unjustified irritation, immediately followed by guilt. I couldn’t deal with him right now. I picked him up and put him in the other room. He whined by the door and my face burned with shame. I couldn’t even handle having a pet. And my parents thought I should have a baby? This new thought brought with it another palpitation. What use was I to society at all if I couldn’t even raise a family?

I closed my eyes and started to breathe deliberately. In, two three…out two three. As the nicotine rush wore off, my mind began to clear and I shook off the darkness creeping into the corners of my consciousness.

“I must just need some food in my belly,” I thought logically. “Then I can distract myself with work. I’ll be fine.”

I walked to the kitchen and made myself a sandwich, trying to zone my mind into my actions one by one. Get the tomatoes out of the fridge. Spread the butter. Cut the crusts off.

There. I settled onto the couch to eat my meal. I chewed slowly, counting to thirty, and tried to notice all the flavours as they flooded my mouth. When I was finished, it occurred to me that I needed to clear the bench before getting back to work. I wiped down the surfaces, and decided to re-organise the plates. That drawer was a mess. An hour later, I sat down and brought up the page again.

Blink. Blink. Blink. The cursor was taunting me, daring me to make a move.

I quickly got up and began to pace. The thoughts began to race through my head again and that sense of dread settled over my shoulders. I’d wasted too much time having lunch. I didn’t really need to organize that drawer. My boss would be calling me any second now asking for an update, how could I tell her I hadn’t even started? There would be a talk and then my mental health would come up, and I’d have to tell her everything…

Two hours later, cradled in my partner’s arms, I felt the panic attack begin to pass. What had I even been worried about? It was just a stupid project. I’d done hundreds of them before. The next morning, I’d wake up bright and early after a good nights’ sleep, and dive in. I’d be done in a few hours.

But at 3am that night, my mind was whirling again, as I agonized over waking my sleeping boyfriend to talk me through yet another episode. What could he really do to help me anyway? My mind reeled through the possible outcomes. He tries to calm me; it won’t work. I was too wound up to be talked down, anyway. I take another pill; the last one hadn’t done anything. He takes me to the hospital; they just roll their eyes and hand me a paper bag. We go to an emergency psych ward again, and I end up in a padded room, alone with my thoughts, or drugged into a stupor.

When was he going to get sick of dealing with me? When was he going to realise that I wasn’t worth it?

Gasping and choking, I squeezed my wet eyes shut and begged for sleep to come.

Two weeks later, I began to slowly emerge from the foggy, half-real world I’d created for myself. I was laughing at my boyfriend’s jokes again, I could hold a train of thought for more than a few seconds, and I could think about work without a thousand thoughts immediately tumbling through my head and turning my insides to ice.

My memory of the last couple of weeks is fuzzy around the edges. Snapshots here and there filter through; me screaming curled up on the living room floor, my partner wrestling scissors from my clenched fists. The waiting room at the ED where a kind stranger tried to talk with me. Then, the sudden, horrifying thought had me leaping from my chair and whacking the side my scalp with my hand, as if I could bash the thought out. She didn’t know, no-one could understand. Nobody could help me. I was trapped in here, trapped in my head with something that didn't want me to ever be well again.

I remember muttering words compulsively to myself as I rocked back and forward on the edge of the bed, trying to relieve the crowding in my head by letting the endless stream of Bad Thoughts escape out my mouth.

I guess it’s my mind trying to protect itself: withdrawing from reality and erasing much of the data from the infected time. The trouble is, it makes each episode into a fresh hell, without having that clear memory of just how deep into myself I fall.

Now, with my thoughts passing at a manageable speed and the world clear and present around me, I sit in front of the computer once more and open up the offending word document.

Blink, blink, blink.

I drag in a deep, shaking breath and begin to type.