Behind My Eyelids: Entry I

January 28, 2013.

It is strange how we revert back to our childhood selves when truly, deeply frightened. If there is one thing I have learned though this horrible experience, it’s that I am a cowardly, weak man. I used to wonder how I would react to a life-threatening situation, perhaps a natural disaster, an intruder, or a criminal holding me at gunpoint. It was important for me to believe that I would be brave in such a situation. I imagined I would’t hesitate to use force, that I wouldn’t go down without a fight. I now know that I was always incapable of such honorable behavior. For now that I am truly afraid for the first time in my sixty years of life, I cower at the tiniest sound, be it a rustle in the trees or creak in the house. I am in a constant state of fear, both day and night, and it is unbearable.

Dr. Fisk has instructed me to keep an audio journal to record my inner state since the accident. It has been four weeks now. Four weeks of complete and utter blindness. Every night I dream that I am blind, only to awake with a jolt to the realization that my nightmare is my reality. I cannot see. I cannot be alone out of fear that there is some malevolent person (or thing) standing but 2 feet from me. I had to learn the difficult way that blindness is my ultimate fear.

Yesterday I could have sworn that I heard the front door creak open. From behind my eyelids I saw a man with a black face and black curls smiling at me as he peeked around the door. I fell to the floor gasping, and once I could breath, managed to feel my way to the kitchen drawer where I kept my sharpest knives. (I swear the black-haired man hovered directly behind me the enter time). I then crawled to the bathroom, locked the door, and hid in the shower for God knows how long. I used to do the same thing as a child when my mother left me alone in the house. I sat there shaking and drenched in sweat, clutching the knife in front of my face. I sat like that for a few hours until I dozed off to sleep. To wake up and not be able to simultaneously see the sunlight, or any light for that matter, is the most horrific experience. I don’t know how much longer I can endure this world of darkness.