Time and time again, I’ve proven to myself that I cannot sleep in.
Jolted awake at 5am in the morning over the same scars that hurt two years ago, except today the pain has drastically intensified. I’m guilty of carrying the burden of all my past guilts (how ironic) everywhere, but I don’t know how to let them go because I never stop feeling bad about them. My mind does an excellent job at randomly recollecting a past bad thought, flipping my entire day around and drowning me in an abyss of guilt and utter discomfort. I wish I knew where to draw the line between inhumanity and over sentimentality, but since I don’t, I’d much rather spend my time at the latter than the former. It’s just who I inevitably am.
I’ve wasted too much money this week, too. Especially when I could have avoided them. I spent close to $300 on medication this week because I failed to take care of my body during vigorous exercise. I’ve played badminton close to my entire life and this is the first time any injury has lasted so fucking long (it’s been nearly a full month) and it hurts where it matters the most to me—my fucking wrist. I have never felt so crippled my entire life playing badminton, stripped of the ability to do some of the shots that previously came so naturally, constantly having to take mental notes to take care of my ass so that I don’t aggravate. And people constantly asking me, how’s your wrist? And I wish I could cheerfully reply, it’s all good now, thanks! But I can’t, so instead I say, it’s getting better, but getting better it is at such a slow rate that sometimes I wonder if it’s getting better at all. Sure, it’s better than the initial stages where I couldn’t even rotate my wrist, but it seems that after a few weeks of recovery the pain has just stagnated there. It doesn’t hurt when I write anymore (which is good), but I still can’t lift heavy groceries for my mother, and still can’t play badminton like I used to. And it bothers me when I don’t do as well as I know I can. And this injury should have been avoided because my wrist was sending warning signals but I ignored it and overstrained, and now I pay the physical and emotional price.
University work feels like a constant marathon, the accumulation of short term inputs for a long term outcome. Sometimes this is good, because it means that I need not worry about a behemoth of an assignment that determines 400% of my grades, but it also means the constant, persistent need for consistency in hard work that frankly speaking, some days I just feel like I’m not up to. But I can’t stop there, it’s barely half the semester of my first semester of my first year, so I can’t stop because I can’t be a quitter. Everyone else is working hard, and the same I should like to believe for myself. I can’t give up because I’ve already come too far out, and I cannot afford to disappoint because then I will need to permanently carry this guilt for the rest of my life, and I’m having none of that. None.
I’m thankful for days like this where the words flow so naturally, because on days when I feel dry I cannot squeeze a single alphabet out. And writing has become so essential in my daily life, to the extent that it decides how well I graduate, how well I interact with others, and selfishly how I protect my own sanity. On average I’ve been writing 3000 words a day this week, it’s tiring, but it doesn’t stop there. Not when I have 3 writing assignments to fulfil, that requires constant refinement, drafting, and frankly speaking a whole lot of self doubt and uncertainty.
But this is what I have chosen, and this is what I will become.
So have mercy on me, my sleepless nights. Let me sleep in and temporarily escape this monstrosity.
; 