MENTAL HEALTH

The Suffocation

A Poem

Panic gripped her on most days, just like asps squeeze and suffocate their caught-unawares-prized-preys and pulverize them.

and

the prized prey instantly get rid of their suffocation as soon as they’re pulverized by the asps, and there’s no trail of what happened — only the asps know that they won.

But

panic never consumed her, and suffocated her off and on. There was no getting away from the intense fear, the sudden pain, the difficult breathing, the feeling of dying, the feeling of losing control, the feeling of a danger lurking around even though nothing was lurking around.

She was just like the prized preys — caught unawares every time — no reason, no warning, nothing. No awareness — The world laughing at her or telling her she’s pretending and letting her do all the pretending and not coming to her rescue.

Yet,

she dealt with it head-on with the help from her dedicated husband by her side, some awareness, some treatments, and lived her life, whilst bringing up her children with love and care, imparting good values to them.

She lived her life — a life with decades of popping all those high-dose pills — and told to “pop those high-dose pills till you die” — a fact she would boast to me and I would wonder about it — as a child, as an adult — and would secretly pray that she should not die any time soon and keep popping those high-dose pills.

A gentle soul, a wonderful daughter, wife, and mother, a woman bereft of negativity, loving towards one and all I’m sure she must be smiling at me from the alluring heavens, finally, finally, having gotten rid of her devastating suffocation!

— Dedicated to my Mother, a woman who went through hell in her initial years dealing with panic attacks and anxiety, and as a child, I couldn’t make sense of it. By the time (though very early in life) I realized what this was all about, I had taken over from my father as her primary caregiver for her mental and physical health issues. She was normal and only was dealing with her panic attacks, but was looked down upon and considered as having severe mental health issues, which was not the case. For me, mental health was never a stigma. Yet, for some sections of society, by and large, it still is. She was the bravest and the most patient woman I ever came across in life. If I could be even a little bit of what she was as a person, I would consider my life worth living. It has been a year since her passing away last April, and I look back with a painful and continuing regret of losing her just like that, on that one horrible night.

© A.H. Mehr — April 2022 (All Rights Reserved)

In response to Dr. Fatima Imam’s amazing poem, Hellish on mental health, very beautiful and vulnerable, with a positive message at the end. Please read the poem here.

Her poem was in response to Sahil Patel’s April prompt, again with a positive message and some tips on dealing with mental health issues. Please read his article here.

I appreciate them for spreading awareness on this important topic. Thanks, Dr. Fatima and Sahil.