Heavy

I lay awake, gripping my blanket tight around my shoulders with one hand and holding my pillow close with the other. My eyes are closed, but I can't sleep. I've been like this for hours, shifting restlessly, longing for the sweet release of sleep. But it just won't come. I am fully aware that each restless toss and turn drives me further from my goal, but the movements come unbidden.

The memories don't help.

Memories of my closest friends, urging me onward. Telling me to fight, to value every step forward I've taken. They say to me, "Your life has value, it has meaning. Don't throw that away. Take pride in yourself and the things you've accomplished. You have so much life ahead of you, so much more to achieve!"

But for all the encouragement that they give me, there is always just as much despair. How can a failure like me ever live up to their expectations? When I think about the last few years, I can only see the failures. Six failing grades in college. Two jobs quit. Friends lost, family shunned. The rejections, the employers who never called me back. The panic attacks.

The attempted suicide.

The bitter irony of it pulls a smile across my lips. I couldn't even kill myself.

So many people are a part of my life, all of them telling me that they care for me, that they will always be there when I need them. But when the weight of my emotions is this heavy, when I need them the most, I can't find them. The darkness is so stifling that when I call out, I can't hear the replies that they try so desperately to send me.

Why was it so easy for me to be pulled back from that bridge? Was it the numbness in my legs and arms that caused me to collapse to the ground? Was it the woman who had dashed across the bridge to my aid? Her kind voice, assuring me that everything was going to be okay? Was it the terror that had overcome me when leaning over the rail, staring down at the construction below? Was it because I was too scared to die? Was it because I was meant to live, to find new people to laugh with, new things to love?

Since that day, I've gone on almost as though it never happened. Watching videos, playing games, riding horses. The only times it returns to my thoughts are during my therapy sessions, and at times like these.

When the darkness becomes to heavy to bear, and before the sleep that eventually, inevitably, pulls me into its sweet embrace.