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Description
I don’t remember much about waking up.

        Well that’s a lie, I can remember it all with vivid detail-but I don’t like to.

        The weeks that followed, those were truly a blur of sleepless nights, medical exams, worried faces, and big milestones.

        I was a medical marvel they told me.

        I could talk again, though that took a few days to manage.

        I could walk again, that took a little longer.

        No memory loss short of a few hours but that didn’t really bother the doctors, it was to be expected.

        That’s what bothered me the most because it really wasn’t just a few short hours, less than two most figured. I couldn’t remember the last three years but at the same time, supposedly there wasn’t anything to remember.

        I think they’re wrong about that as well. Even though they told me I’ve been asleep for three years, I still feel like there is something vital that I should remember from those three years. Something I should remember, but something I desperately don’t want to because I’m so frightened by it.

        I’m afraid of my dreams because I know that’s where the answer lies.

        I’m terrified I’ll never wake up again.

        So I don’t sleep.

        I know my parents know and that worries them but short of drugging me there isn’t much they can do- and I know they won’t, at least I hope they won’t. I barely survived waking up in a hospital; the horror of it had been so great. One of the first things I said when I got my voice back was demand a promise that they’d never bring me back here once I left.

        They promised but to this day I’m not sure if I believe them.

        So I don’t eat much, only things that I’ve handled from start to finish but I have little appetite anymore anyway so it’s ok.

        That worries them too.

        I sleep the limited amount I need, in short naps of half wakefulness and only in daylight.

        Normally in the pool.

        It makes sense when you think about it. I sleep on the raft and drift and if I fall asleep deeply enough I roll to my side-I’ve always slept on my side with the exception of the past three years- and when I do that I roll into the pool and wake up. That has yet to happen and I don’t worry about drowning. I don’t worry about a whole lot anymore. I know I should, but I just don’t.

        I hear about a lot of people who have near death experiences and then do as the song says and ‘live like you were dying’, getting the most out of every possible moment.

        I don’t do a whole lot these days and I think that worries people, it worries me.
       You see, I really should be making up for lost time. My first sixteen years weren’t all that spectacular and my last three were…rather uneventful. I was nineteen, living with my parents without a job, and wasn’t going to school.

       My train had come off the tracks at some point and I was pretty sure I knew when that point was, and it wasn’t the accident. It was the moment right before. Something happened then, I’m not sure what because I can’t remember it but I know it was then.

       Even though I don’t remember it I still know it and it happened moments before when that car hit me after I’d apparently run into the street. Witnesses don’t know what had caused me to suddenly run off the sidewalk when the car came careening around the corner, trying to catching a green arrow.

       One person swears I threw myself in front of the car; that I was obviously trying to kill myself.

       Another person thinks they saw me shove something out of the way, that something else was out in the street and I was going after it or trying to protect it, no one is sure.

       And still another person swears that there was someone with me and I was shoved.

       I don’t know what happened.

       My last memory is leaving the school after a horrible yearbook meeting in which I’d accidentally permanently deleted fifteen pages from the computer. That seemed to support the attempted suicide theory and the yearbook advisor was worried she’d caused it by yelling at me.

       I didn’t think that was true. I’d been more pissed than hurt that day, that I remember clearly enough.

       I think the majority of people in my situation would want to know what happened that day; would search the recesses of their mind or read all the papers on what was ruled an accident, interview the witnesses, and do whatever the doctors suggested, even see the useless therapist their parents were indiscreetly hinting at.

       But not me.

       I didn’t want to know.

       Call me a wuss but I feel like that is toeing a line that I don’t want to cross.

       Maybe I’m a coward but that’s my choice to make.

       Don’t rock the boat and all that jazz.

       I’ll get my back on my feet in time but for now my pool-naps were all the simulation I need.

       And that bothers a lot of people but for the first time in my life I don’t care about what others think. That’s not real true…but I don’t let it show. I don’t let my hurt or fear show… or my loneliness.

       I’m nineteen years old and going nowhere.

       My name is Dinah Kirwick and four months ago I woke up from a three year coma cause by an accident that most say should have killed me and would eventually.

       I’m a freaking medical marvel.

Description
I don’t remember much about waking up.

        Well that’s a lie, I can remember it all with vivid detail-but I don’t like to.

        The weeks that followed, those were truly a blur of sleepless nights, medical exams, worried faces, and big milestones.

        I was a medical marvel they told me.

        I could talk again, though that took a few days to manage.

        I could walk again, that took a little longer.

        No memory loss short of a few hours but that didn’t really bother the doctors, it was to be expected.

        That’s what bothered me the most because it really wasn’t just a few short hours, less than two most figured. I couldn’t remember the last three years but at the same time, supposedly there wasn’t anything to remember.

        I think they’re wrong about that as well. Even though they told me I’ve been asleep for three years, I still feel like there is something vital that I should remember from those three years. Something I should remember, but something I desperately don’t want to because I’m so frightened by it.

        I’m afraid of my dreams because I know that’s where the answer lies.

        I’m terrified I’ll never wake up again.

        So I don’t sleep.

        I know my parents know and that worries them but short of drugging me there isn’t much they can do- and I know they won’t, at least I hope they won’t. I barely survived waking up in a hospital; the horror of it had been so great. One of the first things I said when I got my voice back was demand a promise that they’d never bring me back here once I left.

        They promised but to this day I’m not sure if I believe them.

        So I don’t eat much, only things that I’ve handled from start to finish but I have little appetite anymore anyway so it’s ok.

        That worries them too.

        I sleep the limited amount I need, in short naps of half wakefulness and only in daylight.

        Normally in the pool.

        It makes sense when you think about it. I sleep on the raft and drift and if I fall asleep deeply enough I roll to my side-I’ve always slept on my side with the exception of the past three years- and when I do that I roll into the pool and wake up. That has yet to happen and I don’t worry about drowning. I don’t worry about a whole lot anymore. I know I should, but I just don’t.

        I hear about a lot of people who have near death experiences and then do as the song says and ‘live like you were dying’, getting the most out of every possible moment.

        I don’t do a whole lot these days and I think that worries people, it worries me.
       You see, I really should be making up for lost time. My first sixteen years weren’t all that spectacular and my last three were…rather uneventful. I was nineteen, living with my parents without a job, and wasn’t going to school.

       My train had come off the tracks at some point and I was pretty sure I knew when that point was, and it wasn’t the accident. It was the moment right before. Something happened then, I’m not sure what because I can’t remember it but I know it was then.

       Even though I don’t remember it I still know it and it happened moments before when that car hit me after I’d apparently run into the street. Witnesses don’t know what had caused me to suddenly run off the sidewalk when the car came careening around the corner, trying to catching a green arrow.

       One person swears I threw myself in front of the car; that I was obviously trying to kill myself.

       Another person thinks they saw me shove something out of the way, that something else was out in the street and I was going after it or trying to protect it, no one is sure.

       And still another person swears that there was someone with me and I was shoved.

       I don’t know what happened.

       My last memory is leaving the school after a horrible yearbook meeting in which I’d accidentally permanently deleted fifteen pages from the computer. That seemed to support the attempted suicide theory and the yearbook advisor was worried she’d caused it by yelling at me.

       I didn’t think that was true. I’d been more pissed than hurt that day, that I remember clearly enough.

       I think the majority of people in my situation would want to know what happened that day; would search the recesses of their mind or read all the papers on what was ruled an accident, interview the witnesses, and do whatever the doctors suggested, even see the useless therapist their parents were indiscreetly hinting at.

       But not me.

       I didn’t want to know.

       Call me a wuss but I feel like that is toeing a line that I don’t want to cross.

       Maybe I’m a coward but that’s my choice to make.

       Don’t rock the boat and all that jazz.

       I’ll get my back on my feet in time but for now my pool-naps were all the simulation I need.

       And that bothers a lot of people but for the first time in my life I don’t care about what others think. That’s not real true…but I don’t let it show. I don’t let my hurt or fear show… or my loneliness.

       I’m nineteen years old and going nowhere.

       My name is Dinah Kirwick and four months ago I woke up from a three year coma cause by an accident that most say should have killed me and would eventually.

       I’m a freaking medical marvel.