When I was 6 and a half years old, I nearly drowned.

It wasn't because I couldn't swim. It wasn't because of an accident.

I simply filled the tub, lay on my back, let my head sink underwater, and stayed there.

I did not feel anything. I did not hear, I did not feel, or see, or smell. I did not breathe or even think.

It was not like sleeping. I didn't dream.

I didn't exist.


I don't know how long I stayed under the water. I was almost unconscious when my mother pulled me out. She started crying, and I cried too.

Not because I'd nearly died. Not because I was scared.

I was angry that those moments of absolute nothingness had been ripped away from me.

I nearly drowned three more times in the following years. I never learned to swim. Never wanted to.

I never go near the water now.



You are drowning me. I feel nothing, do not exist.

You are the water, pulling me under, and I cannot breathe.

You are drowning me.


If I am drowning,

And you are the water,

Who will pull me out?