Overwhelmed

         
        Overwhelmed, the word I found that can best describe my state after she left me.  Overwhelmed with emotion, terror, loneliness, loss, change, and fear, questions raced across my mind, how could this happen, why did she not love me anymore, what can I do to make her change her mind, was life worth living anymore? As hard as I tried, I could not focus on anything, images and memories played at random on the back of my eyes, smiles and kisses mixed with screams and stabs of jealousy. I could do nothing but soak in the pain, the dread and the doubt, until I was saturated with complete sadness. It was exhausting and angering, I lost control, resorting to desperation, calling, crying, and reaching out for a magic word or phase that could somehow right my capsizing ship, my sinking sense of self. But the more I tried to think it through, the more depressed I became. I forgot, temporarily what really made me happy, acting, working, moving, learning, and sharing. The drugs did nothing to help either, weed forced me to forget all inhibitions and just think, sit and think. I was overwhelmed and I couldn't handle it. For my entire life I have been able to stand above it all. Literally look down at my life, detached, logical, devoid of real emotion. But with three words she slammed me down, I am in love she told me, not with me but with another. It took me about 30 seconds to fully realize the impact of her muttered words. All of a sudden, a thousand mistakes revealed themselves to me, hidden for years beneath my self cultivated immortality. I was invincible until that moment, and then suddenly I realized that my decisions were my own and they had real and lasting affects. I was overwhelmed. I have been overwhelmed before all this, with wonder, aspiration, joy, fear, ecstasy, but loss was completely new to me.

          I used to cringe when I pondered about the nothingness of death, seemingly sucked into a dark hole of despair, my eyes would glaze over and I would sink into a tar pit of sadness, falling deeper and deeper, until I lost all will and desire for anything. I would ask myself over and over again, what's the point? My life will not amount to anything permanent, so why try, why not sit here and wait for this blackness to become reality? However, I never was consumed for long, as I was surrounded by loved ones and friends who were always doing something. And anyway death was too far away to worry about today. I was merely a child and I wanted to live and play. That same collapsing pain hit me like a train after she said those three words, and to this day when her face flashes on the wall of my skull I cringe. No one can see my pain, but it is right at the center of me, a knot that I keep pulling on, tightening, desperately trying to unwind, a terrible combination of despair and love spinning me like a top, churning a sickness I am unable to puke out. I loved her and I was unable to get her off my mind, yet the mere thought of her brought about a gut wrenching sense of loss. It was debilitating. It continues to be debilitating.

         At least I can now identify the pain; it no longer sucks me into a vortex of despair. Now the pain just stings until I find some way to block or redirect my thoughts. But in no way am I whole again. I still battle everyday. My mind is self healing, he is trying to forget her, to move on, but I do not want to. I want to remember, to hold onto the happiness that once pulled me along by the pocket and danced with me in the moonlight. I do not want to forget her, to forget the moments we lived together. Those moments are relics of my past, the stones that build my temple, the threads weaving the fabric of my identity. Who am I with out them, without her? So for now I prolong my suffering until I can experience new things on my own, until me and my mind agree to move on, to forget. To be happy again, I must keep myself in check. I must have patience and reserve. I can no longer say fuck it and do what is easiest, or what makes everyone pleased. My decisions have an impact, on myself and on the people closest to me. So for me and them, I will not give up, not be satisfied with my past victories. From now on I will do what is best, for the sake of my sanity. So I am determined to continue to hope... no, believe... that one day I will once again know love's sizzling heat. Only then, will true joy dive into my turbulent seas, calming the waves and tides to be.