It all just stopped all of a sudden. Merged in and out of sight, action moving and then not moving. You could hear it morphing in and out, fast and low, soft to loud...no rhyme or reason...or, actually, tons. A sine curve.

Life is sinusoidal. So many people have said it. I think it got into my subconsicous, the fiber of my being...my mind.

The power of the mind, to take over the body. Alanis Morrissette wasn't joking about psychosomatic symptoms.

Suddenly it seized me. I felt it creeping up. I tried to run away from it, but the more I did the faster it came for me. And the more I looked behind, the more I knew it would catch me. But I couldn't stop looking.

My heart was pounding faster than I had ever thought it could in my life. Every moment felt like hours. My reactions were comedic, extreme...I would react...then see myself react as an outerbodied being. Snap in and out of reality. Know I could beat this, but then know it would overtake me. Hopeful because I was despairing. Despairing because I knew this.

Then I let it take ahold of me. I felt my heart race, putter, skip...and then, like in those cartoons, felt like it was going to jump out of my heart.

Hours upon hours...

I thought I was going to die.

I knew I was going to die.

All the symptoms were there.

Faster...faster...faster...Heart conditions run in my family. Oh yes they do. In fact, they once wanted to hook me up to a monitor, they succeeded another time, but temporarily.

I don't like doctors.

My breathing was labored. My chest felt like a cement block that was hardening...and each pulse of my heart was exacerbated in sound by the drag to my breathe.

I found out I had exercised-induced asthma after running years of cross-country. It was rather ironic. That explained a lot. In fact, after an appointment a couple semesters ago, our school's medical center still tries calling me, to get me in there for inhalers and stuff.

I'm not too fond of doctors. Or medicine, actually.

Millisecond upon millisecond filled up the hours. I didn't know where I'd end up on the sine curve. +1, -1, 0? I knew I just wanted it to end. With me alive. Oh please with me alive.

I was hysterical.

Seizure, stroke, heart attack. Those symptoms all merged into one spasmodic/psychotic reaction.

"* raging heartbeat
* difficulty breathing, feeling as though you 'can't get enough air
* terror that is almost paralyzing
* nervous, shaking, stress
* heart palpitation, feeling of dread
* dizziness, lightheadedness or nausea
* trembling, sweating, shaking
* choking, chest pains, distress
* fear, fright, afraid, anxious
* hot flashes, or sudden chills
* tingling in fingers or toes ('pins and needles')
* fearful that you're going to go crazy or are about to die"

Me. Verbatim.

It still hurts.

I haven't slept for a night. I'm scared to sleep.

I've learned a lot about myself. I am too young to die.