OLD POST: March 5, 2019 @ 10:55 pm

I lay there, feeling my heart ache. I roll over to my right to find the clock shining the time. Shit. It’s 2 a.m.

I’m not one to sleep. Sleep, as peaceful as it should be, doesn’t come easy. Upon falling asleep, I am followed by nightmares I can’t recall. Sometimes I try so hard to wake myself. “Mackenzie, wake up. You’re panicking. Please, do something.” My body jolts awake, not wanting to fall back asleep. But, I find myself drifting off, only to be woken by the “what ifs” lingering in my mind. What if I one day I never woke up? Life would be simple. I would finally stand still; no thoughts to ponder, no anxieties, and no more sleepless nights.

Yet, everyday I seem to wake up. I wake the same person I was the night before. Full of sorrow and self-pity, I continue my day. My thoughts race around like wild animals: uncontrollable. The “what ifs” continue through the day along with the ever-so-exhausting anxiety. I can never escape it.

My mind works in mysterious ways. I appear to be too happy from the outside to be experiencing the floods of emotions on the inside. The truth is, I am drowning. Not sleeping at night is catching up to me. The constant anxiety is catching up to me. The depression that follows, it’s all catching up to me. I wish I could yell out, “someone, please see me!”. But they would only see a bright blonde-haired girl, with a fake smile pressed against her face. They wouldn’t see the water- the emotion- surrounding me. What if someone could see it? What if someone could see inside my mind?

Seeing inside my mind could give someone the nightmares I have every night. Seeing inside my mind, they would question if this was the right person. I have two halves. One half is a chaotic room. Everything is on fire, people are screaming bloody murder, and I stand in the middle. I am in a panic. On the other half, I stand alone. A room so quiet that I can hear my blood move through my body surrounds me. I begin to go crazy; my thoughts consume me. My mind searches for a middle ground, but nothing is found. I am either with panic or chaos, and from the smile on my face you’ll never be able to tell witch one.

So, what if someone took a look into my mind? Would they be terrified? That’s a guarantee. I am terrified of my own mind because it always wins. No matter how strong I was or how strong I am, my mind is more powerful. I am unable to win this battle. Come the end of the day, I’ll decide to sleep. Actually, I’ll decide to try to sleep, begging for someone to notice that I am drowning.

And at 2 a.m., my mind shuts off…only for me to wake again at 3.