In one of my dreams, I was swinging from the railing of a terrace. Now I take medicines to “calm my limbic system when I sleep”. What clerical words for something so emotionally jarring!
I was also sent to learn ‘muscle relaxation’ to “decouple my emotions from the 6-year-old Prachi’s”. More clerical words that cause panic no one prepares you for. She calm-voiced me through “we will recreate a small anxiety situation & I will help you calm down” into a panic attack. Like a tiny needle hole on a balloon surface. How else do I describe a panic attack? Mine makes my chest feel like it is being stabbed over & over, there is a buzzing in my head, there is too much light & too little oxygen. The only thing my body seems capable of is curling up & crying “make it stop”.
So I sat on her couch- in papa’s operation theatre, mummy’s shock chamber, crying in a school’s bathroom stall- through the relaxation. Maybe we’ll relax some other day I told her, you had one job & walked away. When I left her clinic, I was still crying, without sobbing. Again on the footpath, standing in tears, like my life’s cassette was stuck on a song. But I couldn’t get myself to feel bad about it, the panic, no matter how much it made me cry, didn’t feel real, unlike the one I had 2 weeks ago. I was in an auto when mummy called asking me to save her. I couldn’t, lights flashed, lungs gave up. I called H. She stayed with me from Canada, got me off the street, and into a cafe. She made sure I got water & didn’t smoke. Here, on the footpath was better than in that cafe. I put on me ‘Don’t panic’ playlist, & listened to La Bamba till I could stop crying.
I hate my body for betraying me. How does one learn to trust, ‘long term’ & permanence living in a body that betrays you without as much as a Calendar Invite? Periods came 2 weeks earlier than they were due. But I have become good at faking sanity, putting up masks, the new therapist calls it, with jokes up my sleeve “At my age when women are making babies, I am the opposite of pregnant, flushing eggs at twice the rate”, a change of topic when eyes threaten to leak because
para Bailar la Bamba
se necessita una poca de gracia
para mi, para ti