The summer of 1994

My mother was throwing a birthday party on her front porch. I was expected to come, of course. The party was for my niece’s first birthday. A lot of people spent time preparing for that party, but I doubt that anyone prepared in the same way that I did.

You see, something had happened to me the Halloween prior, and I was never to be the same again. I remember the exact moment. I was asleep on the living room floor, my son beside me. A key turned the deadbolt in my front door. As I looked up, I saw my boyfriend enter the room. “You know River Phoenix?” he asked. “Yeah”, I answered, still half asleep. “He’s dead. He OD’d on a speedball.” He said, and then for a reason still unknown, laughed. The reality of what he had said hit me, and I asked him if he was serious. He was.

I was never a big fan or anything. I had seen “Stand By Me” and “Dogfight” and enjoyed both movies.  Maybe it was the thought of someone so close to my age dying or maybe it was the realization of my own dumb luck at having gotten out of my drug addiction alive.  I still can’t say, but at that moment, a panic attack so fierce and determined to rattle rose up inside of me that I literally couldn’t breathe. I gasped for breathe and found none. My heart beat with such intensity that I believed that I was dying. I splashed cold water on my face and stuck it out the window trying to calm myself down. Nothing worked.

So it began, my slide into the depths of panic disorder, a disease that I had never even heard of let alone been diagnosed with. I spent the days inside of my apartment riding a wave of panic that only deviated between bad and worse. I soon abandoned the idea of leaving the house as I met panic’s friend, agoraphobia. I would look out the window sometimes and notice the little changes. The neighbors across the street got a new car. Someone else put up Christmas lights. I tried using mantras to calm myself, and ended up reciting the alphabet in my head over and over to no avail. I would sit stiff and silent, gripped by a fear that came from out of nowhere and pray to a god that I had long before abandoned. I recited the Our Father and Hail Mary. I apologized to God for only coming to him in my time of need, instead of being grateful at the times when I should have been giving thanks.

My mother dragged me to my doctor in desperation, and she said that it was most likely post partum depression, and smiled as she left the room. I cried there on the little bed covered with paper that they rolled out like a window shade. My son was twenty months old. I knew that they would just discard me, just as they would discard the paper that covered the bed. I went home convinced that this was indeed what it was like to lose one’s mind. My family told me that those who were going insane didn’t realize that they were going crazy, so they surmised that I was just fine. “Just a bit of cabin fever,” they whispered.

I began a ritual of daily patterns that brought me no relief, but seemed to be necessities in and of themselves. I had to wash my hands seven times. I had to check the locks on the doors and windows repeatedly, and the stove valves.

When the following July rolled around it was time to take the walk down the stairs out of my apartment that led to my mother’s front porch. I knew that both strangers and friends and family would be there. I had dressed in a long dark skirt and a T-shirt. I wore no stockings and although I had been without shoes on my feet for some time, I decided to wear sandals. I brushed my long hair out and pinned it back. My face had long since forgotten that it had ever donned makeup, and so it was bare.

I remember staring into the mirror for a long time. I wondered if people would be able to tell that I was crazy just by looking at me. In my mind, I envisioned that I was going to panic at the party and create a huge scene, ruining things for everyone. I tried to remember to breathe. I reminded myself that the second that I felt a wave of panic I could just grab my son, excuse myself, and head back to my safety zone.

With my son in my arms, I arrived late. I so wanted to hold onto my baby for security, but he was up and running around, visiting people and playing with cousins. My mom offered me punch, and I numbly nodded my head yes. I tried to get it myself, but my hands were shaking so badly that my mom took the ladle from me and served my drink. As she handed the cup to me, I imagined her eyes telling me not to dare screw this one up for her.

During the introductions and the greetings, I was able to nod, smile, and find the voice to say hello. I soon sat down, and watched my son play and eat cake. “I’m doing alright,” I thought to myself. Sometime after that moment, I saw a woman lean over to my mother and say in a loud whisper, “So what is wrong with your youngest daughter?” I was all at once horrified and amused, as if I was watching a bad movie on a large screen.  I sat poised for the reply without turning my head. “ Tammy”, my mother replied, “has never been the same since her daddy died.” I couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t true, and besides, I was sitting not even ten feet away. Why were they talking about me as if I wasn’t there?

The urge to scream out the whole truth, which at that time consisted of not much more than my presumption of my own insanity, was overwhelming. I then saw with my own eyes my beautiful sister Maria lean over and say to the woman, “There’s nothing wrong with Tammy, she just sees things more clearly than the rest of us.” I almost laughed aloud as I stood up, took my son by the hand and walked back up the stairs to my apartment.