apathy

I’ve been trying to avoid talking about the accident, I’ve been trying to avoid thinking about the accident and how it made me feel mentally, because the physical pain was enough for me. The sad part? The physical pain was bearable, it was the mental aspect that was overwhelming. Like did that just happen? Am I really living this right now, why is everybody telling me how lucky all of us were, how lucky i am to be alive... but why don’t i feel lucky? 

I remember the feelings leading to the accident, I knew something was coming and I knew there was nothing in my control that I could do to stop what was about to happen. One minute we were on the road and we were all talking, we were all laughing and then the next minute there was this feeling of panic, panic that spread throughout the entire cab of that truck like a goddamn wildfire. I remember looking at my boyfriend, I could see it in his eyes that he couldn’t control it either. He was trying to turn the truck back onto the road harder than I’ve seen him try for anything in his life, harder than I could even imagine trying to do something but the truck wasn’t going anywhere, but off the road. I remember hearing the words “Oh Fuck” as he looked to his right and saw the tree, and I remember flashing my eyes to the tree and then back at him, because no matter what happened from there, I wasn’t alone. I had my person right by my side, and that was enough for me to hold my composure for a few seconds, but I didn’t get those few seconds. Everything happened so fast. Within a minute of me hearing Michael say, “ of fuck “, there was a harsh crash into the side of my body and i could feel the truck flip, i felt the truck get air and flip onto it’s roof and that’s where everything goes black. I remember the feeling of my head hitting the roof of the truck as it slammed onto the pavement, but from there it’s just black until I was cold, my body was cold and I woke up. I woke up and there were two bodies within feet of me, laying on the pavement surrounded by glass, by all of the fluids a truck requires to run properly, surrounded by nothing but cold. I was alone, trapped and unable to move my legs, unable to get out of the truck. There was gasoline pouring out of the truck and I could hear it and I could smell it, but that didn’t matter. “Where’s Michael?”, I thought to myself. My heart began to race, and not out of shock or out of adrenaline, but out of fear. Fear that the only person I have ever loved more than I knew was humanly possible, wasn’t in my sight and I couldn’t hear his voice. So where was he? 

As many of you know, I lost my Mother 3 years ago on October 16th and because of the time of year, I was struggling mentally. I was struggling enough where for a quick minute of fear and panic, I gave up. I didn’t try to move, I didn’t try to fight to get my legs free and I didn’t fight to get yourself unstuck. I stopped. I shut my eyes and I laid there and accepted that one of two things were going to happen, I was going to get out of the truck with the help of the first responders, or I was going to die. I was going to die alone, in a smashed truck surrounded by glass and cold. And there’s this emptiness that comes with that kind of feeling, and empty feeling that I haven’t been able to shake. By the time that my brain had calmed down and accepted my two options, I heard Michael. I heard his voice and I began to scream. I wasn’t going to give up and I wasn’t accepting anything. Michael came over to me and realized I was stuck, and he wanted me to stay there because if I was injured and moved wrong, it could’ve been a lot worse, but I argued with him and he stopped and fought with my body to free me. And there was this kick of adrenaline that came with him helping me get free, enough that I didn’t realize that I was in fact hurt. I remember the weight of getting free lifting off my shoulders, I couldn’t stop crying and I couldn’t let go of Michael, but help was coming. There was a woman there, a woman there who was calling for help and was just as scared as I was, or at least I like to think so. You roll up to a car accident and there's a truck completely crushed and four kids bleeding, wouldn’t you be petrified? The scene is a mess, my brain can’t even process what’s going on, but I know I need to find my cell phone and call my family, but it was lost in the truck. The woman who came to help was nice enough to let me use her cell phone and call my stepmother, and nice enough to allow me to use her flashlight and look for my phone. I didn’t realize I was panicking, I didn’t realize I wasn’t breathing normally, but she did and she forced me to sit in the back of her car and stay warm until the medics got there, and that’s when I touched my face. I touched my face and my left eye was swollen, swollen out enough that my eye was practically shut. I remember freaking out about my face so much that I tried to stand up, and that’s when I realized it was very difficult for me to control my breathing, it was either frantic, or it was too calm, almost like I wasn’t breathing at all. And there was this significant sharp pain in my lower right side, a pain that was familiar. Long story short, it was a traumatic event, one that will probably sit in my brain for the rest of my life. 

There’s these feelings that I haven’t been able to shake, feelings that are chilling down to my bones and paralyzing my body. The most significant feeling is the feeling of loneliness. The loneliness of being stuck in a vehicle, unsure of what’s going on, but aware of what had happened. The loneliness of closing your eyes with 3 other people around you, and waking up with nobody near you and being unable to move an inch of your body and getting out of where you are. It’s like you’re stuck in your body, you can see and hear what’s going on around you, you can comprehend what has happened to you, and you can see your body, but you can’t move it. Almost like you’re paralyzed from the neck down. Your brain is so goddamn loud, but your body is useless. When I’m trying to sleep, when I’m trying to sit on the couch, when I’m trying to take a shower… all I feel is loneliness, even with people around me. My mouth is paralyzed, I can’t say anything, I can’t talk, but I’m interacting with people around me like I’m okay. There’s this panic in my body anytime I realize I'm in a room by myself. A panic that I’m alone and I’m not safe. And then there’s the flashes, the flashes of seeing myself stuck inside the truck, unable to move and screaming for help internally, but externally giving up on myself. 

I’ve been depressed, I’ve had anxiety and I’ve lived with PTSD for the last three years without my mother. But I was doing okay, I had the job that I never thought I would go for, I was applying to colleges to further my career path and I was in love with a boy that I needed next to my soul for years. But when I was alone in that truck for those few minutes, none of the good stuff mattered, nothing about my life mattered to me. I was finally in a position where I had the choice, the choice to give up or the choice to fight, and that might sound dramatic, but at that point in my life I wasn’t really sure if anybody else had survived, let alone if I would. So I chose to give up, and for those few minutes, the racing heartbeat, the loud thoughts and the pain of everyday life left, it left my body and I was able to breathe. I could go home to my mother. So that’s what I was going to do. And that’s what scares me the most. I didn’t even think about it twice, I didn’t care what was about to happen to me, I just knew that I was finally able to see my mother again if I wanted to. But the relief I felt when Michael came for me, made all of that fly out of the window until the next morning. 

Everyday since the accident, I have felt the walls inside my head slowly break themselves down. The walls I spent years rebuilding, because I didn’t want to disappear anymore, I wanted to live. I wanted to make something out of myself, But something has changed, something inside my head has changed. Everybody keeps saying that we are lucky, lucky to be alive and lucky we walked out alive, and not fatally injured. But am I lucky?