So here it is…I am a shadow of NitaAnn – a shadow of my former self- the Nita most people know and love. Certain parts of me that are so lacking now…energy, drive, stamina… I am so tired all the time. I have spent the past 2 months thinking I can outrun it. But I cannot. I can hide it away from everyone else but I cannot outrun it.

I do not sleep anymore. The husband tells me I constantly whimper and cry in my sleep.  And I wake up multiple times a night in the middle of a panic attack. I cannot sleep without being terrorized - I get that it is irrational – and the logical side of my brain tells me that, but the paranoid side is tipping the scales these days…I am not in control really. All the drive and spirit and strength and determination that I used to have has been drained from me.

I feel crazy. I am paranoid. I am anxious. I am depressed. I am in the dark place every single night. I just need something to renew my courage and determination. But it just seems like everything is a temporary ray of sunshine in the darkness. Every night is scary...every night a potential set back into self injury hell.

I keep having these panic attacks...I feel dizzy and flushed – nausea that I try to breathe through so I do not *****. Sometimes it comes out of nowhere – and I have to stop in the middle of something, grab the wall and just try to breathe. It happens during the day to now not just at night, but I do not tell anyone. I know I need help – but I cannot ask for help...I am too embarrassed. This is not me. I do not know who this is...she has been around way too long – and that makes me scared that she is me forever.

                I cannot do this anymore tonight...the scary movies have  
                                            started....Where are you?