9 / 30 : letter from a doctor.

this is another part of me that i don't really discuss even with my closest friends.

i really don't give a fuck if it's the shittiest poem i have ever written in my entire life. 

and i've been sweating bullets and putting off writing even a semblance of what has been some of my most trying times for years so. this first step hopefully, will be the first of many.

letter from a doctor

dear ashley,

i'll never forget the first time we met.

you came into my office

with a cheerleading bag and pon poms shrugged

over your shoulder. mascara cast shadows

down your face. you looked around my room

carefully before you sat down. you said

with the confidence each seventeen-year-old

is assured that they have:

"there better not be any damn cameras in here"

as you crossed your legs and twitched

your face in disgust.

i assured you there were not.

"good. because i'm not fucking crazy. 

let's get this over with"

you snapped.

you dictated the our first session.

asked me more questions about the validity

of my degrees than my professors ever did.

but

anytime i mentioned the word

anxiety 

you would pull back from me like i had

slapped you across the mouth

wounded and vulnerable

embarrassed

"i don't have anxiety" you 

snapped. "i just happened to be

stressed out. i have an AP english test tomorrow

and unless you know shit about hemingway

i've go to go"

and you left. i hoped that you were one of those

who really meant what they said

that you didn't need the help

a stranger like me to talk to

and would never have to return but

the next day

your mother called and told me that 

you drove to the school parking lot 

like im sure you did any other day but you

were shrieking

immobilized 

swearing to God that you

were losing your mind that you

were about to die 

and if she didn't kill you

you would pull the trigger yourself

you passed out from exhaustion 

on your steering wheel and i 

steered your mother away from her own

personal breaking point 

"what had happened

to my perfect daughter" she asked as she

gasped for air. "when and why

did she become so scared 

to breathe"

i couldn't answer her. i held the phone like 

a lifeline.

it took you months of sessions

to finally lay back in my chair you were

too scared to relax 

but when you finally did that day in 

january you started to sob

it was the first time you had lain anywhere

in three months 

you told me you'd been sleeping in a fetal position

in your bed against the wall 

you'd wake up stiff and broken like

your spirit

you had a billion concerns

wrapped up in your small frame

"i'm going to have to go to community college"

you declared. "there is no way i will make it

alone. i'll be here forever and be a drain to my 

parents and i'll die a complete loser"

i told you to think rationally.

you told me you were.

after we had finally started making progress

your mother called and told me that 

your friend had passed away, unexpectedly 

i told her to keep a close eye on you

and to be there if you wanted to talk

but instead you tried to follow the leader

dance in her footsteps that lead straight

to heaven 

i never make house calls but your mother pleaded

it was 1 am on a monday night

i drove the 15 minutes between point a and b like 

a bat out of hell

you were hanging like a broken ornament

on the overpass to I 75 

with your family huddled by the forest

heralding me with songs of horror and grief

too scared to get close to your nearly lifeless body

too scared to leave you to plunge into oblivion

they teach you in textbooks

how to host an intervention

it usually involves a well lit room,

tea, 

comfy couches,

and caring individuals in on the secret.

they don't prepare you for 

coaxing an upper middle class black girl

with so much promise

with everything in the world 

in her grasp 

down from the ledge

i couldn't let you be a hood ornament

for an unsuspecting driver

i couldn't let your mother and father down 

who put 18 years of their heart and soul

into to their "perfect little girl"

who simply could not take the pressure

of being perfect anymore

i couldn't let you leave that way

body flung downward

soul flying upwards

they didn't teach me in my doctorate

but i'm sure you don't

get to heaven that way

i don't remember how we got you

back on solid ground. and i don't

remember what i said. and i don't

think any of my formal training was

put to use that night. i just remember

the next day you and your mother

sat in my office 

both wearing pearls and polos and pencil skirts

as if the night before hadn't happened

but i couldn't pretend

i told you that maybe you need to go somewhere

and get the help i couldn't offer

you looked to your mother who sat stoic

silent tears swam onto her blouse

you looked back at me and asked

with the most desolate face

i had ever seen

"will God forgive me because

I thought 

He was letting me 

drown"

for the rest of my life, ashley,

i will never forget that moment

when i set my profession

my degrees

and my title aside

the three of us sat and cried

grabbed hands and

prayed

-----------------------------------------

A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But He was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke Him up and said to Him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?”

Mark 4:37-40