I’m not too prone to use the “c” word (which is different from the “C” word, by the way). I’ll say that I was having problems or issues or that I might be having problems “up there” or even use the phrase “unstable”… but never “c”.
Today, I was “c”. And I haven’t been for a long, long time. I wasn’t nearly ready to assume it would never happen again but I was hopeful. So much for hopeful.
I’ve heard voices – screaming in my ear. I’ve seen people that weren’t there. I’ve had anxiety attacks that made me want to run screaming.
And those weren’t fun.
But never before – never before – nothing like this.
It was about a half hour ago… maybe forty-five minutes.
I had just brought my car in to have a brake light fixed. Vicky insisted that I stop by Pep Boys on the way home and change my windshield wipers, too… and I even grumbled about what a pain in the butt she was. Vicky, thank you for being a pain in the butt. (Add another reason why I love my wife.)
If I hadn’t left the freeway to drive up Katella, I would have had the attack while I was driving on the freeway. No fun.
Don’t ask what set it off. Don’t ask me to tell you why it happened. It just did.
I was stopped at Batavia, waiting at the red light, and I noticed some static coming off of the book I was listening to… Actually, it’s hard for me to write this in the first person. (Put yourself in my shoes!)
Imagine yourself hearing this static and it’s buzzing in your right ear. It gets louder and louder until it’s deafening and then you realize that the buzzing is gigantic bugs, fierce bugs. And you know that they exist only in your head but you start swatting at them because you also know that, if you don’t, they’ll bite you. And your vision starts going all over the place – it’s like the world is on roller skates. So, you’re sitting in your car, swatting and screaming and deafened – fucking incomprehensible.
Now, imagine you were the lady at the light next to me! That poor woman. The look on her face.
Oh, it came and went in the time it took the light to change – crazy has its own schedule – and I realized what was going on, and the look on her face.
Granted, I was shaking and crying and out of breath and my face itched (don’t ask me why – I think it was the bugs), so I pulled my car off to the side.
I got the wipers, by the way, but I was shaking the whole time. I’m still shaking after driving home.
(I haven’t even called Vicky to tell her. Part of me doesn’t want to. Part of me wants to just shut this away. But that’s not me. I think it’s a part of my upbringing. Back when I was a kid, whenever I was sick, my mother would say I was doing it to get attention.)
Now, I know what you’re going to say – and if you’re Vicky you’re bound to call me and say it – I know I need help. Moreso than ever. But I need to get a job first. My rational mind is telling me that increased stress is pushing all my mental buttons and that’s what is causing this. (Trust me, this isn't the first bit of instability recently.)
But I promise you right now that once I get a job, I’ll seek help.
Sometimes crazy can be fun – the odd, hallucinatory visit can be enjoyable – This was neither. This was fucked up.
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