IPanic | 2019
My heart is racing. I can’t catch my breath. I’m going to be sick. I try to focus, but the panic is hard to fight. I can’t think, the manic pace of my thoughts race across the landscape of my consciousness. Numbness creeps over my body as though my soul and body are out of harmony. I know the signs. It’s coming. I must get away. Everyone will see. I must hide. I find the nearest bathroom and lock myself there. Frozen in place, muscles tense as I wait for the symptoms to abate. What is this life I must live? Am I broken? I must be broken.
The above excerpt is merely a snapshot of what was a common occurrence during much of my youth. Sometimes these episodes would last for days. Causing everyday tasks to become impossible. Unable to eat. Impossible to get out of bed. It wasn’t until 2009, when I was diagnosed with Anxiety and Depression, that I finally knew what to call it. I became so overjoyed by the diagnosis, I actually hugged my psychiatrist. You see, this condition overwhelmed my twenties. My Family, being the few who knew of these episodes, prior to my diagnosis, told me they were merely the “Symptoms of Al-Ayn/Hasad” or the Evil Eye. It is mentioned in the Quran and we must believe in, and be wary of it. Prayer and ritual were ordained to fight against it. My mother began an endless retinue of Islamic rituals to stave off the Hasad. I bounced from Shaikh after Shaikh searching for relief. These are difficult memories I wish to leave in the past. The ineffectiveness of these actions led me to take the blame upon myself for these feelings. I believed I was the problem. I lived my life trapped between an ever-present fear of having an episode and desperately hiding the shame when I did. As time went on it became harder to hide and cope. Until that fateful day in 2009.
Life changed dramatically for the better after my diagnosis. My affliction has a name. I am now equipped with the tools to defeat it. I do not fear the symptoms. I do not fear to feel and I trust in myself to win over the course of time. My road towards mental health was a long arduous journey. Now I stand, one with the cycle.
This is my story and these are my photos.