Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"you will never be too much for someone who can't get enough of you."
⋆✧⋆✧⋆
TW: This chapter depicts scenes of anxiety and a panic attack. Please skip this if it triggers you or makes you feel uncomfortable, and reach out if you need anything at all.
I go in and out of sleep wrestling with my own thoughts. Finally, my anxiety wins and I wake up, yet, I still feel completely out of it. I feel my heart already beating out of my chest and my head dizzy from panic.
Shit, please not here. Not right now.
I look to my left and see Sterling sound asleep or as much of him as I can considering my view is blurry from my fear and tears forming.
Why does this have to happen to me?
I get out of bed, feeling the need to move and try to gain control. I stay quiet, not wanting to wake up Sterling or the other boys in the house.
I grab my phone from the nightstand and call Jemma.
She doesn't answer.
I try my mom next, but she doesn't answer either.
I think about calling the other girls or even Chase, after all, every one of them has been through this with me, but my body doesn't let me reach out.
You're weak, I think to myself.
Don't be a burden.
Just because you're awake doesn't mean you get the right to wake others up and bother them.
My thoughts beat me down.
So I chose to deal with this by myself.
A knot forms at the pit of my stomach and I get that all too familiar feeling of sickness brought on by this attack.
I think I know deep down I can't handle this on my own. My whole life dealing with this shit and I'm very rarely able to calm myself down. Yet still, my brain makes me feel like I have no choice. As if even on this one day I still can't put myself first. Like I'm not a good enough friend, sister, or daughter to balance out putting them through all my mess.
The other part of me knows that my friends and family love me and would drop whatever they're doing in a heartbeat to help me. I've seen it.
Chase has come home from parties early or left practice to come calm me down. Jemma has lost hundreds of hours worth of sleep over it. Aspen has sat in the hallways of school trying her best to distract me. Harper has driven hours to come find me and sit through it. Beth has stayed on FaceTime with me for multiple days in a row.
But they've been through enough. They can't keep suffering because of me.
And I know it's not my fault. This isn't my doing, because if it was, trust me, I'd have fixed it by now. However, I can't control it, this is how my brain works. I've been to therapists, taken medicine, and tried everything to stop feeling this way. But this is it, my reality.
