As the claps get closer, I feel the panic rising, my heart races, and my body revolts. With each new clap, I’m dragged backward in time. I try to stop the fall. I kick and scream, flailing my arms out, but I’m not able to hold on to the here and now. I don’t want to go back there.

This transformation in me probably makes no sense to some, is hard to fathom, and goes against our very human nature. I truly do understand that and the difficulty of reading what I am writing about.

It took away my right to feel what happened to me, to acknowledge it for what it did to me, and to understand how it still affects.