On the good days I fear that I’ll get sucked back under, churned wild under the waves, like a spin cycle set to run too long agitating me this way and that. I feared it when I was jubilant and every good thing was like low hanging fruit, so ripe and easy to pluck from the branches, heavy with worth and promise. I fear the fall. Sometimes hope terrifies me. I’m not supposed to say that. It seems contrary to all the good things like faith and promise and trusting God. Here’s the funny thing. I …
anxiety
When I Am Still Unfine
My breath comes in short bursts of white smoke. My heaving chest is an engine blowing exhaust into the frost. I lean over the porch hyperventilating, watching my tears hit the snow beneath my feet making tiny indentations, pinhole hollows searing the purity of a fresh snowfall. I feel a hand on my shoulder and my son pushes a cloth towards me to wipe my nose and eyes and the vomit from my lips. I squeeze my eyes shut tight causing tears to spill harder down my cheeks and puncture the pristine …
When You Feel Hunted by Anxiety
Light breaks in through the window and draws a slanted square on the floor. I dip my bare toes in it and stand facing our back porch. The pines swoon under the blush of evening as the sky blossoms in lavender and pink. I don’t know how long I stand there but my toes are soon planted in darkness again. And this is when the thundering begins, the trampling like hooves against my ribcage, extinguishing my breath. One moment I am taking in the beauty of the blazing sunset, the next I am a stampede …
