Triggers

 Triggers are extreme reactions to snapshots of disaster you’ve lived through before,

As if you’re walking through a dense jungle,

It’s a long journey, and you are

Enjoying the scenery of the exotic plants and the beauty of nature,

Feeling the intense humidity of the air around you,

Hearing the chirping of cicadas from the trees and the calling of strange birds,

And smelling the sweet, pure scent of jasmine on the breeze,

When suddenly the branches part in front of you and you are a witness to a massacre,

Your eyes behold countless dead bodies, gore, terror,

And then

Somebody starts shooting at you,

Your body kicks into survival mode,

And you have to run run run run run

 

You survive,

But barely,

And your entire being is now aware

That you almost died,

And how fragile your life really is.

It is now imprinted into the wiring of your brain

And into every single cell of your body

 

Also imprinted is everything that led up to that moment of the massacre,

For your mind and your body are brilliant,

They love you, and they want you to survive,

So to the triggers:

 

Sometimes they’re fine,

You can be at a swimming pool in the middle of July and the humidity can be intense,

You don’t even notice it,

May not even notice it at all,

But the next day, in the same humidity,

You cannot leave your house and the sweet air conditioning that keeps the humidity at bay,

For with it comes the feeling that you’re surely about to die,

Your heart starts pounding, and the sweat in your palms is not because of the temperature around you,

You shake, you can’t breathe, you can’t move

Even though you feel like you have to run, have to escape,

You have nowhere to go…

For the danger isn’t really right in front of you

And you have to convince yourself that it’s okay,

You’re safe, you’re here, and you’re not in the jungle anymore

 

Sometimes the trigger surprises you,

You’re going about your day and you hear the calling of a bird and the chirping of a bug

And suddenly you’re on the floor,

Reminding yourself that you actually can breathe,

And there is no reason to think

That you are about to die

 

The hardest triggers are the ones that happened multiple times over the course of the trauma,

For while you were in that jungle,

You also tasted exotic food,

Every morning, noon, and night for years,

You lived through trial and error of trying to find the food that was edible and the ones that were

going to hurt you,

Some flavors led to vomiting,

Some led to satisfaction and fulfillment,

Some led to enjoyment,

But they all led, ultimately,

To the massacre in the jungle and the days you won’t forget,

And so now, even the flavors that are reminiscent of the ones you ate then,

Cause you to shake for hours and wonder

If you can ever eat anything again,

If anything is survivable at all,

 

You need to eat to live,

But eating also kills,

And so every day you make a choice to take the risk of eating something

That could actually be deadly,

That might just remind you of a time when things were deadly,

Or that could satisfy you and lead to intense joy,

Because the other choice is starvation,

Which is certainly death

 

And oh things would be so much easier if your mind and body knew you were safe,

Knew that they didn’t need to tell you over and over again

That you were about to die,

But you can’t even logically tell them that this is so,

For the world is full of danger

And people choose to massacre others every day,

And you cannot control it

 

You can only choose to take the risk,

Endure the triggers and the shaking and the possibility of death

Because the alternative is dying anyway,

So you tell your body that you are safe,

And you whisper to your heart that it will be okay,

And you hope with all of your being that this is so,

That you are not lying to yourself,

And that you truly will survive.