A SOMATIC MEMORY

There are survival mechanisms within me, psychic disjunctions that the human body invents to keep from sinking when faced with the unbearable. For a long time, the idea of dying was familiar to me, almost comforting. Lacking the self-esteem necessary to simply tell myself "I deserve to breathe on this planet," I developed a detachment mechanism very early on. Through the eyes of a broken child, I have lived through twelve literal overlapping lives: from the raped child trying to save the raped child, to self-destruction, to lies, and eventually to redemption and helping others as a peer support worker. I am twenty years old, but my psyche feels sixty.

This accumulation led me to dizzying falls where depersonalization hit me with such violence that I observed myself from the outside, unable to recognize myself in my own reflection.

In December 2024, I reached what I call the breaking point. After a month of extreme polysubstance abuse — mixing grams of methamphetamine, heavy cannabis use (ten grams every three days), and a total absence of harm reduction — my body gave out.

Seeking refuge at my parents' house with the equivalent of two or three grams of ecstasy in my blood, I ingested fifteen 0.5 mg Alprazolam tablets and one gram of extended-release Tramadol. This massive chemical overload caused seizures and triggered severe serotonin syndrome. What I perceived as a crushing ball of energy, like an earthquake ravaging everything in its path, was actually my central nervous system collapsing. Struck by temporary paralysis while my brain boiled with warning signals, I survived at the cost of severe psychosis and total physical anesthesia, to the point of injuring myself seriously without feeling a thing.

I thought I had brushed against death and come out the other side. But the trauma had anchored itself in my nerves. For the next month and a half, every night at bedtime, my body relived that traumatic shock. Electrical surges shot through me, heralded by tinnitus acting as scouts for the pain, leaving me twisted and drenched in sweat.

Although medical exams claimed everything was physiologically fine, my suffering was excruciatingly real. What I interpreted then as near-death experiences were actually nocturnal panic attacks of incredible violence, symptoms of acute Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. My mind, terrified by death, was somatizing this fear, transforming my anguish into physical bruises. This destructive process translated everything I had repressed, exploding from within.

I thought this chapter was closed, until last week. Weakened by a double lung infection, I was using an anesthetic spray to soothe my throat so I could keep smoking my cannabis. One evening, while swallowing a piece of bread, my body suddenly dropped: vision went black, sweats, tremors.

It wasn't a return of death, but a violent vasovagal syncope. My esophagus, irritated but anesthetized, triggered an emergency response from my parasympathetic nervous system. However, my brain, deeply traumatized by the past, interpreted the sharp pain in my left arm as an imminent heart attack. The fight-or-flight response kicked in, triggering a lightning-fast panic attack that left me collapsed over the toilet.

Since that day, my brain associates mealtime with mortal danger. Anticipatory anxiety awakens somatic pain: my arm throbs, my heart races, panic sets in. This link between the phobia of death, the flashbacks of my trauma, and these very real psychosomatic pains creates a darkness I fight against every day.

But it is strong. And it endures.