i live in a saltwater lake: a second of what it is like to live with anxiety.

I live in a saltwater lake and I cannot breathe. I look up to the surface and see the wind trying to grasp my aching fingertips and I cannot breathe. My lungs are lined with salt, seaweed, and algae and my feet are thrashing against water that feels like nothing and hope that feels like anchors weighing everything down. I live in a saltwater lake and I cannot think of how much I miss doorways that open to the sun and windows that open to the moon. I remember someone holding my hand once and I wish there was warmth that transcended memories and lived permanently in the lines on my palm. There is uneasiness in the way my heart settles against my ribcage with every breath and there is brain static that now lives in every single inch of me. I live in a saltwater lake and none of this makes sense to me.

I scratched poems against the white walls and I scribbled love notes to myself whenever the sun found its way under my skin. I etched ‘you are going to be okay’ on my desk and I sew my fears into curtains overlapping around my house. I tell them my chest hurts and they tell me to exercise, I tell them an ache has settled in my spine and they tell me to stop working so much. How do I explain that the saltwater I drown in every day is now a permanent resident of my bones and the algae I took time to unwind from my arms found its way to root in my eyes. I dream in vivid colors and dull sounds and I live in vivid sounds and dull colors. It gets old sometimes, living in saltwater lakes and having to breathe through the sting.

I was 13. I remember I was 13 and I was hurting. I was 14. I remember I was 14 and then 15 and then 8 and 12 and 10 and 17 and 4 and 9 and 20 and I am 21 now and there is no chronological order to suffocation and there is no chronological order to how much your thoughts weigh against your heart sometimes. I have lost the sense of time and space and time again. They ask me if I’m okay and I tell them I’m worried. They ask me if I’m okay and I tell them I’m scared. They ask me if I’m okay and I tell them I don’t know what they mean by that. I am alive and I am conscious and I am aware of what is happening around me. They ask me if I’m okay again and I want to tell them I think I may be drowning again. Instead, I tell them I’m worried.

They ask me what I worry about. I live in a saltwater lake and there’s too much water and there’s too much hope. I worry about the stove burning down my house when I’m asleep. I worry about falling asleep and not waking up. I worry about my fingertips being too cold and my feet burning on the ground. I worry about my spine snapping in half and my heart bursting out of my chest sometimes. I worry that when I wake up one day, I might not see anything. I worry that I hug my friends, they’d refuse to put their arms around me. I worry that when I rest my head tonight, I will be 12 again and I will be on the bridge again. I worry that this saltwater lake is all I have left and nobody will get me out.

I am trapped in this saltwater lake.