I Don't Want to Be Crazy Read online

  of the waiting room in Health Services.

  I’ve been in a bunch of times

  for back pain, sinus pressure, dizziness,

  a hemorrhoid that I thought was ass cancer.

  I like how the blood pressure cuff feels

  tight around my arm,

  the way the nurses put the cold stethoscope

  to my chest and listen,

  listen,

  listen.

  Rebecca, her friends, and I

  hang out a lot now,

  but I’m pretty sure they think I’m crazy.

  One minute I’m fine, talking about homework,

  eating lasagna in the dining hall,

  and the next I’m complaining

  about how dim the lighting is

  and running out the door

  to get back to my room

  and under the covers.

  We go to Freshman Seminar together,

  but sitting with half the freshman class

  crammed into the theater is more than I can take.

  Sometimes I go to the bathroom

  and don’t come back.

  I have moved from the front row

  of all my classes to the back.

  I can’t take the feeling of people

  looking at me, burning holes in my back.

  Back here I can hide

  my shaking hands and feet.

  I have resigned myself

  to the fact that I have gone insane.

  I am too tired

  to keep fighting

  the empty feeling in my stomach

  and the buzzing in my head.

  This was not supposed to be how things turned out.

  There were steps taken, expectations—

  a specialized kindergarten and elementary school,

  a prestigious private high school

  complete with a kilt and knee socks,

  summer study programs disguised as camp.

  This is not

  how things are supposed to be.

  Sitting in class has become dangerous.

  If I’m not worried about my arms or legs twitching,

  I’m worried about screaming out

  embarrassing things about myself.

  I feel like a marionette—

  like someone else is pulling the strings

  and I have no choice but to comply.

  I’ve started telling my teachers,

  the ones who look like they care

  and the ones I care about,

  that I am claustrophobic,

  because some problems

  are easier to talk about than others.

  I tell them, “Sometimes I need to leave, get some air.”

  And when I say, “Don’t worry, it isn’t your lecture,”

  we share a laugh

  and I am thankful for my half-truth

  because it feels good to confess something.

  Not long after I tell one of my English teachers,

  there is a note on our door.

  Class has been moved across campus to a bigger room.

  He never says it was because of me,

  but I like to think it was.

  Still, it doesn’t take long

  before I have to leave class,

  get some water, sit on the toilet,

  and stare at the tiles on the floor

  until it is safe to return.

  I am in Health Services again,

  waiting for the nurse to look me over

  with her heavily shadowed eyes,

  to take my temperature,

  measure my pressure,

  listen to my heart and lungs,

  to tell me with her sticky pink lips

  that I am okay,

  when I see a poster on the wall

  that says, Having Panic Attacks?

  For the first time in weeks

  things make sense.

  It is surprisingly easy.

  I walk across the hall to the Counseling Center

  and make an appointment.

  Two days later I’m at the therapist’s office

  and I’m not sure when to begin.

  I sit down in a deep, comfortable chair

  facing a picture window with a view

  of the snow that has come too early.

  Jean is sitting in an identical chair across from me.

  She asks, “What brings you here today, Samantha?”

  and there is something about the way she says my name

  that sounds empty.

  It is a simple question,

  but I don’t have a simple answer.

  I tell her I’ve been freaking out,

  but she wants to know what that means.

  I say, sometimes I feel out of control,

  like I am going crazy when I’m in class,

  or the dining hall, and sometimes when I get stoned.

  And I start crying, just like that.

  All I can think is,

  she doesn’t know me.

  I am sweating a lot, and I wonder if she can tell.

  We go on like that for a while.

  She asks me questions

  about my friends and family

  and where I’m from

  and I answer, sweat, and blow my nose.

  I don’t tell her everything.

  A lot of it is embarrassing

  and she is a stranger,

  but I tell her enough to feel lighter.

  The psychiatrist’s office

  is smaller, darker.

  There is a regular chair next to his desk for me.

  He has already talked to my therapist

  but wants to hear from me what I have

  been feeling and how long I have been feeling it.

  After fifteen minutes I

  leave with a prescription.

  The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders says

  anxiety disorders include:

  panic disorder with and without agoraphobia,

  agoraphobia with and without panic disorder,

  generalized anxiety disorder,

  specific phobia,

  obsessive-compulsive disorder,

  post-traumatic stress disorder.

  I am

  panic disorder

  without agoraphobia.

  I qualify because I have experienced

  more than two

  unexpected panic attacks

  in six months

  and have persistent concern

  about having other attacks.

  Sometimes I have five a day.

  Panic attacks are

  intense periods of fear or discomfort

  with at least four symptoms including:

  palpitations,

  sweating,

  trembling,

  shortness of breath,

  sensations of choking or smothering,

  chest pain,

  nausea,

  gastrointestinal distress,

  dizziness,

  light-headedness,

  tingling sensations,

  chills,

  blushing

  hot flashes.

  I have all of them

  except for chest pains.

  I report feelings of

  dying,

  going crazy,

  losing control of emotions and behavior.

  I have the urge to

  escape or flee

  the place where the attack began.

  This is my life.

  The next time I see Jean she explains

  that panic attacks

  are part of “fight or flight,”

  the body’s natural reaction to danger,

  only I get confused.

  I think there’s danger when there isn’t.

  I want to run.

  I want to scream.

  She says it’s like a switch—

  a big red PANIC switch—

  gets flipped in my head
<
br />   and I can’t turn it off.

  She says we’re going to figure out

  how to turn it off.

  Things I hate:

  Dimly lit rooms

  Music that is so loud I can’t hear anything else

  Letting doors close in front of me

  Walking across the dining hall

  Sitting in front rows

  Having diarrhea all the time

  Crowded rooms

  Falling asleep in front of anyone

  The weight I’ve gained since September

  People staring at me

  Feeling like I am going to faint

  The sound of a CD skipping

  Facing a wall at a restaurant

  Sleeping with the pattern on my comforter upside down

  Klonopin 0.5 mg.

  I take one in the morning

  and one at night.

  It makes me sleep,

  makes me get drunk from one drink,

  makes the panic a voice in the distance—

  loud enough to hear,

  but quiet enough to ignore.

  I talk to Jean a lot about my family.

  There are four of us:

  Me, my dad, my mom, and sister.

  That’s it.

  We are alone—

  flanked by dysfunction on all sides.

  All four grandparents are dead.

  My father’s sisters are strangers to us

  and maybe to him too.

  My mother’s sister

  forbids all contact

  and her children are too old to care.

  I could walk past all six of my cousins on the street

  and never know it.

  I hear stories from my mom

  about why things are the way they are

  and take them with a grain of salt,

  knowing we can’t be completely without blame.

  I wonder

  what’s so wrong with us

  that we have no family?

  I am on my way home for Thanksgiving.

  I’ll be there in a few minutes

  and I am scared

  that there will be a DO NOT ENTER sign on the door.

  I am scared that this is not my home anymore,

  that it is just a place with a spare bed.

  The moment I drove away in September

  I felt like someone was following our car

  with an eraser, rubbing out my old life.

  Only what was ahead meant anything.

  All I want to do is see Jason.

  Being here in my room,

  where we were together so many times, is hard.

  My foundation is in this house, in this neighborhood,

  but I feel it crumbling—

  it cannot hold this weight.

  I hate this.

  I hate that I want to hold Jason again.

  I hate that I am desperate

  and predictable.

  I feel guilty sitting across the dining room table

  and not telling my parents

  that I have a therapist,

  that I am on medication,

  and that things are such a mess.

  But I don’t want them to worry.

  I don’t want them to think

  that I can’t handle things.

  Because I can.

  I am.

  Things may be bad

  but I am trying to make them better.

  We go around the Thanksgiving table

  saying what we are thankful for.

  I don’t want it to be my turn.

  I don’t want to say something generic

  like, I am thankful to have my family together,

  when we’re not all here.

  What I want to say is,

  I am thankful for Rebecca’s support,

  for Klonopin,

  for Jean.

  Being back home is wonderful

  and awful.

  I’m glad to see my friends,

  glad to not have to do work,

  but being back in this house,

  being treated like a child

  and given a curfew

  after I’ve been on my own

  is unbearable.

  Audrey is having some kids over.

  Her parents don’t seem to care what we do.

  We make a weak attempt to blow smoke out the cellar door,

  but the basement still stinks like cigarettes

  and the sound of beers clinking is unmistakable.

  Jason doesn’t show and this feeling

  of being alone is familiar.

  When a joint gets passed around

  there’s no reason to say no.

  I spend most of the night on the couch

  talking to Nate, Jason’s best friend.

  I don’t think I ever realized

  how Nate’s eyes are crisp blue

  and that he speaks softly, like he’s whispering,

  like he’s afraid someone will hear.

  Matt comes over and sits on the other side of me,

  interrupts, starts flirting,

  tells me how good it is to see me, how good I look.

  Nate can’t compete and I can’t resist.

  When Matt makes his move

  all three of us know what’s happening.

  I can see the hurt in Nate’s eyes,

  but I need to be with someone.

  The next night I am in Jason’s car.

  I am staring at the bay

  through his windshield,

  protected from the wind and cold.

  I wonder if he knows I was with Matt

  and I can’t decide which would be worse:

  him knowing or not.

  I think my love for Jason

  was really envy.

  He’s careless, reckless, irresponsible,

  and at the same time irresistible.

  Two days later I’m back at Audrey’s.

  There are just a few of us.

  I am on the couch, sandwiched tightly between Abe,

  the first boy I ever kissed, and Nate.

  We are talking about kissing.

  I say Abe bites when he kisses

  and Nate smiles, says he is gentle.

  They have a drunken debate over who is a better kisser

  and decide the only way to settle it

  is to elect me judge.

  Abe and I kiss first

  and I am smiling so wide

  it is difficult to kiss.

  Abe still bites, but this time he is more careful—

  only lightly tugs on my lower lip.

  I can feel Nate watching us.

  I think, this is ridiculous,

  but I like that they are fighting for my attention.

  Abe smiles, like it’s a job well done,

  and I turn to Nate and lean in.

  All I can think is, I’ve never been this near to him

  and he smells like clean laundry and deodorant.

  His mouth is soft, his kiss

  is barely there,

  and my chest aches.

  It is no contest.

  My parents and I are in the car

  on the way to a post-Thanksgiving party.

  They talk about what they are going to say

  if someone asks why my sister is not in school.

  I don’t understand why saying she’s taking time off

  isn’t good enough.

  I swear to them

  if they make anything up,

  I will tell the truth

  and everyone at the party will know

  that they are liars

  and that we aren’t perfect.

  They don’t say a word at the party

  and maybe to prove how imperfect I am

  I tell them in the car on the way home

  that I have panic disorder,

  that I had a panic attack at the party,

  that I have a therapist

  and a ps
ychiatrist,

  that I am on medication.

  They want information.

  They want to understand.

  My mother cries, says she should have seen it.

  When I tell them about the stress

  and the pressure they put on me, they say

  not to take everything they say so seriously.

  The next morning

  Amanda comes to drive me back to school.

  My mother has not spoken to me since last night.

  When I hear Amanda pull into the driveway

  I hug my father good-bye.

  He instructs me to say good-bye to my mother

  as if I wouldn’t.

  When I kiss her on the cheek and turn to leave

  she is silent.

  My stomach turns inside out.

  I am going to puke,

  but not here,

  not in this house.

  I am on my way home,

  but I don’t know where home is.

  Is it my parents’ house?

  Is it school?

  I am too tired.

  It hurts to think.

  It hurts to care.

  My eyes won’t stay open.

  My hands keep shaking.

  I can’t think—

  too much noise,

  too much clutter.

  At my next appointment with Jean

  I tell her what happened with my parents.

  I wear my mother’s silence like a badge—

  like an I told you so.

  My mother must think I’m blaming them,

  but that’s not what I tried to say.

  I wanted them to understand

  that their words have weight—

  that the things they do and say

  contribute to my anxiety.

  Only she didn’t hear it that way.

  She must have been thinking,

  How could you have problems?

  Your grandmother grew up poor

  and she never complained.

  We have given you everything

  you ever needed, ever wanted.

  We have created a stable home life for you.

  Your father and I are not divorced.

  We are not alcoholics or drug addicts.

  Your father doesn’t beat me.

  What could possibly be so wrong with your life?

  iv.

  The deeper we get into winter

  the quieter things become.

  I don’t have as much anxiety

  as I did in September.

  In its place is exhaustion

  and a different kind of fear.

  I am scared

  that the only reason I am getting better

  is because of these little yellow pills,

  that nothing has really changed