I push my palms into my ears and squeeze my eyes shut. My thoughts are locked away somewhere deep: all of me is trapped in my aching chest, pressing against the inside of my ribcage, heavy against my bones. I’m coiled tightly into myself, knees pulled against my body to keep my chest from bursting. All of my muscles squeeze and stretch and curl. Inside, deep inside, deeper than the contorted appendages and strained muscles, fragments of thoughts echo as if in an empty room. It’s safe here, in this place wholly separate from the incredible gravity pulling all of me inward. Nothing can escape, but it’s safe.

The shower curtain sent me here. Shadows had dropped into the creases of the white fabric, painting eyes and a gaping mouth. The mouth screamed, but inward, pulling my vision through its lips and down its throat. The water, the bathtub, the light from the window outside all faded into black as they slipped into the deep, dark mouth. Nothing escaped: even if my eyes could’ve looked away, my mind was caught: trapped in the foggy, endless tunnel. Existence made simple.

Occasionally a voice – a real voice – drapes itself over my hands, settling into the creases between my fingers. When it reaches the safety of my empty room – my cavern – it’s muffled, and partially lost. I respond, but my voice catches in the walls and echoes back to me. I want desperately to reply, but I can’t. I’m too deep.

I’m too deep, and I don’t know how long it’ll be before I’m released. I’m too deep.

***

“Panic attack,” “hallucination,” “dissociation” – over twenty years, countless doctors and lists of symptoms, endless research – the words of the Prescriber never described my experience. The clinical labeling of my reality never captured the weight and depth of it. The completeness of it. How could it? And how could I identify with the incompleteness of those concepts?

I’m grateful for the Prescribers who saved my life, but for your sake – for our sake – I hope that we can begin to describe our realities. I hope that we can save each other from the insecurity of an incomplete label. I hope that we can understand and be understood.