Side Effects
Monday, 7:30 AM
Pop! The cylinder pops open and I stare at its insides.
Click! The small pills fight their way out, clicking as they hit the sides and each other.
Pop. I pop the pills, knowing they could save my life and knowing the pain they'll cause me that I just can't explain.
Monday, 8:00 AM
The battle has begun.
I fight the way my mind wants nothing more than to sleep because it knows its the only way to stop the oncoming carnage.
I fight the way I want to sleep because I know if I do then I won't have to pretend I'm okay, that nothing is wrong with me when nothing is right, everything is wrong.
I prepare for the oncoming fight which I know I have no chance of winning.
Monday, 8:10 AM
It's started.
My vision has been taken captive by the medicine. It's confusing me, knowing there's nothing I can do. Knowing that there's nothing I can say.
My vision is blurry? No, that isn't right, because my vision isn't blurry, just wrong.
It's like looking through someone else's glasses? No, that's not right either. It's close, but that doesn't explain the confusion I feel.
It's just not right. Of course, that's the best answer, it's the best description. But no one else understands what I mean, so it's hardly of any use.
So I just push through, hoping, praying that no one will notice.
Monday, 8:12 AM
It's mocking me now.
It has my vision, so it wants to play with it, knowing there's nothing I can do.
Why won't it just let me read? Does it enjoy when I am forced to ask whoever is next to me what the math problems before me say?
Does it enjoy when the person asks me if I'm okay? Or maybe when I smile and say, "Yes, everything's fine," when nothing is fine at all?
Or maybe it feels confident because it knows that it's all its fault?
Why won't my eyes stay still? Why does it move my gaze up so I have to keep looking down?
Why can't it just leave me alone?
Monday, 8:15 AM
Apparently moving my eyes was tiring, because the movement was replaced by water torture.
It pours water into my vision, drowning it, making words and numbers swim on the page. Making me from a confused student into a desperate fisherman whose fish keep slipping away.
My vision is drowning,
drowning,
drowning...
And there's no force on the planet that will stop it.
The water keeps coming, and coming, and coming.
Monday, 8:20 AM
The torture must've gotten boring, because the medicine has switched tactics again. It has no conscience to speak of, so there's no way it feels sorry for the struggle it's caused me.
No, it's decided to strap leaden weights to my shoes and drop me into a vast ocean of nothingness. A dead sea. I know it well.
My vision puts up a good fight. The medicine makes the words fall off the page and into the dead ocean, but my vision always pulls through and breaks the surface, bringing the words with it.
But it's only so strong.
I have a split second of clarity, a split second of the air that makes my vision work normally.
But the leaden weights always pull it back down.
And the cycle repeats again. And again. And again. And again...
Monday, 8:17 AM
The medicine is sick of my resistance. It pulls out its biggest weapon, the one I dread the most.
It shakes my vision around in all directions, it tortures my vision by drowning it again and again, it somehow manages to do all this while it straps the lead to my shoes and drops me into the deepest part of the dead ocean.
I'm beyond confused. My brain slowly loses ground. Wait, someone is sleeping to me. I heard the sillibles, but what did you say? I don't under stand. May be if I act like I get it thay'll think I know wat their talking about.
I wanna be sick. But it just. Won't. Happen.
I wanna cry. But the tears don't come. Someone would thay to suckit up.
Why wouldn't my meds just go away?
Monday, 8:40 AM
When it happens I almost sob in relief. It's gone. It's finally gone. Maybe it got bored, maybe it got tired from pulling out all its guns. Who really cares? Certainly not me.
Thank God for whatever the reason was.
I'm just happy that it's finally letting me move on for the day.
Thank God the battle was short today.
Monday, 7:05 PM
Time to tell my parents about my battles. Though I don't expect them to understand. Maybe they'll save me from the evil I have to face.
They're asking me if I've experienced any of the effects of my illness. Well, no, but--
Then I guess I can suffer through it.
They say it calmly, like its the simplest answer. But it's not. I fight a futile fight every day, over and over and over again. One I know I can never win.
I say I guess I can.
I knew they wouldn't understand. I know it.
So on the battle goes.
Tuesday, 7:30 AM
Pop! The cylinder pops open and I stare at its insides.
Click! The small pills fight their way out, clicking as they hit the sides and each other.
Pop. I pop the pills, knowing they could save my life and knowing the pain they'll cause me that I just can't explain.
