Yesterday, I realized that I had not slept in three days. 7 am was creeping up and my dog was stalking the squirrel outside my window. I rolled over and pulled the covers over my head, and shut my eyes tight. My breath was heavy as the dog walked over from the window and nestled herself against my back. I had to get up. I had class to go to. Things to do.

Last night, midnight, I was watching a documentary about the sphinx in Egypt. I start bawling. I’m clawing at myself, shaking, on fire. I can’t stop the thoughts from flooding around me, overwhelming me. I cried for hours.

I spent hours fiddling with my guitar, painting my nails, planning grandiose trips to Chicago. I consider grabbing a few things and running off. I don’t want to sit here anymore. I’m bored. It’s 4 a.m.

Wouldn’t it be perfect? I could just sleep on floors until I got a job waiting tables and I could finally start that band. You know, the one where I become a cult hit and I have my own line of shoes at Macy’s? Nothing could stop me from being happy.

I talk myself out of it, I have responsibilities. I’ve have school in three hours. I need to sleep.

I lurk Reddit, learning about economics and a litany of useless talents. It’s 5 a.m., I wonder if I should just get up and make breakfast.

I think this is a great idea. I’ll make bacon,eggs , toast, waffles, omelettes, and a strawberry banana shake. Of course I have to go to the store first but it’s only 5, I have plenty of time.

I look back at the clock. It’s 6 a.m.. I guess I’ll just lay in bed some more. I don’t like pancakes anyway.

I roll around for another hour, listening to the christian evangelical station on the radio. Apparently they need me to buy their audio cassettes so they can send shoes to Uruguay.

It’s 7 a.m.. I get out of bed. I walk over to my mom and tell her that she needs to drive me to school, I haven’t slept in three days and the vicodin on top of that makes me unsure of my general road safety.

She has appointments she says.

I ask her, what should I do? My hands are trembling, my mouth is dry, and I pace around the house while she gets ready for her day.

I tell her i’m tired of this. I don’t know what to do with myself. I’m scared.

She takes me to the hospital.

Conveniently, it’s the same hospital her own appointments are. We walk in, do paperwork, and wait for triage. My mom leaves. The nurse calls me in and takes my vitals.

My right arm is brown and purple from the IV I had on Friday. The nurse eyes it, I bet she thinks I’m a junkie. She asks the usual questions; who are you, why are you here.

I tell her, who really knows right? Like, existentially, no one knows. Who am I really? She didn’t appreciate my humor.

I tell her how I haven’t slept, I panic, I see things, I’m inconsolable. She asks if I’m suicidal. I tell her no, just overly existential.

I sit some more. Apparently mondays are the worst days for ER visits. They see 100 more patients on mondays than any other day. I have no sense of time. This doesn’t bother me.

They move me into a room eventually. They make me put on scrubs and take all of my stuff. I don’t know why they do this on account of there being all sorts of fun things in the room I could hang myself on. I make a mental note of the different materials at my disposal.

I pace around the room, look at all the odd colored dials and levers. I sit on a stool and spin around for a bit. I watch the shopping channel and make a note of how badly I wanted to smack the host’s face. Headphones are not life changing technology and Beats by Dre are not something you need for audiobooks you cunt.

The first professional comes in to see me. It’s a middle aged russian RN. He reminds me of Nico from GTA. He’s nice to me. He asks about my affliction and such, and walks out. He eventually brings me some water.

The next person to see me was this old woman. She was my assigned doctor. She didn’t ask me many questions asside from, are you wanting to kill yourself. In fact, that’s the only question any of these people have asked so far. I keep telling them no but I guess they assume at one point i’ll change my answer.

She wasn’t much help. She just tells me she deals with medicine so she’ll have a councilor see me.

Another hour passes. I’ve been in this room for maybe 3 hours now.

A councilor shows up at just about the same time my mother decides to pop back in. This woman was mousey and was missing teeth. She kept smiling and made me nervous. She wanted to know if it was ok to talk in front of my mom. I told her no and sent my mom to wait in the hall. My mom was not happy about this.

The lady asked me the same questions, do I want to die and all that. I told her no, I just don’t understand the meaning of existence and ya know, what’s it matter. I don’t want to die, I just want answers.

She nods and giggles and writes down more notes. I furrow my brow and wonder what she’s noting about me.

She asks if I drink or do drugs, I tell her no more than usual. I tell her how I don’t sleep for days, I cry for hours unable to move, I put myself in stupid situations, I interact with people in an unladylike fashion. I tell her I see things in my periphery that I can’t explain sometimes and how I put the milk carton in the cabinet sometimes. She doesn’t seem to be concerned with this. After all, I don’t want to kill myself.

Another hour passes and I finally manage to get a vicodin for my tooth. The last one I took had worn off hours ago and the pain was getting unbearable.

The councilor came back in another hour later with a piece of paper telling me about an intensive out patient program.

I start bawling. I had been sitting in the hospital for six hours for them to decide that it’s not their problem and they can’t do anything for me. They couldn’t give me this paper six hours ago and tell me to go else where? Nope. I didn’t want to kill myself so there’s nothing they can do.

I’m hysterical. I’m pulling my hair out. I’m convulsing in my chair. I’m screaming and wailing. MY mother is arguing with the councilor. She leaves. I continue to meltdown. The world doesn’t exist to me at this point. All I can focus on is this feeling of overwhelming sadness and hopelessness. I feel like i’m disintegrating. I can’t help but to howl and claw at myself.

The doctor comes back in and my mom argues with her. The doctor says I wasn’t like this when she saw me. My mom says, no shit. They argue some more, I don’t remember what was said so much. I was face down in my own lap on the stretcher while Jerry Springer was blaring from the television.

I’m still trembling and muttering and bawling. The doctor says she can’t deal with this, puts up her hands, and says she has to leave the room. I scream, I have to want to kill myself to get help? I don’t want to die, I don’t want to feel like this anymore!

The ER doctor leaves without saying anything else.

I’m hyperventilating, choking on my own breath.

My mom yells at the nurse to get my clothes, we’re leaving.

She tells me to calm down before they admit me.

I can’t.

I put my clothes on while sobbing. I can’t believe how utterly on my own I am in this. Even in my darkest hour, when I felt it was bad enough that I needed immediate medical attention, no one could do anything for me. I’ve never felt more hopeless in my life.

We walk out the front door after begging the RN to give me something to calm me down. My mom making a scene the whole way through the lobby, “We’re leaving worse than when we came in, how does that work?”. She’s screaming and freaking out too now.

I get a doctors note excusing me for a week so I can go to this outpatient thing. I don’t know if talking to strangers while eating boxed lunches will really do anything for me. I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do to get better. I cry the rest of the ride home from the hospital.

In typical mom fashion, we don’t go straight home. We go get lunch, we go to walmart, and we go to off the rack. I’m high as balls walking through walmart while my mom picks up her prescriptions. I almost fall into a rack of clothes while looking at something. I nodded out in the pharmacy waiting area. My mom had to retrieve me.

I got home at about 8 pm, 12 hours after this had started and I was no better. My mom insists that out patient counselling is bullshit.

I’ve got some numbers for a psychiatrist but who knows when they’ll have time to see me.

I talked to my professors, I might have to take incompletes for my classes.

I don’t know what to do. This is the worst I’ve ever felt. I feel like my life is collapsing and there’s no way to keep back this terror I feel. I can’t function. I’m scared.

I’ve talked to a lot of my friends in the past few days and they have been the most loving and supportive people I have ever met. Without their support, who knows if I would have had the strength to continue forward. Even if they don’t really understand, they offer their words of encouragement and love. They have no idea what that means to me when I feel like i’m tearing apart at the seams.

To have people in my life that I know I can come to when things get bad is something I’m not entirely used to but I am so incredibly thankful for that.

I don’t know if I would have the strength on my own to keep going.

Just being able to vent and get perspective allows me to see how crazy I am and let’s me get out of the delusions a bit.

I don’t really know what my next move is. I just want to be happy and feel normal. I’m sick of this crippling feeling. I still just want to run away but I know that’s not a real option. I guess I’ll continue to sit here and paint my nails and hope for the future.