I do not remember when I first realized raccoons were weird. Perhaps in Pocahontas. Meeko was kind of my hero. Him and Mushu.
Maybe it was the tiny masked face. Maybe it was the suspicious little hands. Maybe it was the way they appear in the world with the confidence of a creature that knows exactly what it is doing, even when it is absolutely unclear to the rest of us.
Raccoons look like they know something.
And because humans are humans, we immediately begin filling in the blanks.
We call them clever. Mischievous. Adorable. Annoying. Little forest bandits.
But here is the strange part:
The raccoon did not change.
Our perception of the raccoon did.
I know, I know. Just follow me here in good faith.
The world around us is constantly offering information, but we do not experience it like a security camera. We sort it. Translate it. Attach stories to it. Decide what matters and what gets shoved into the background.
I once went to an estate sale and came home convinced an inanimate object had a story to tell me.
We’ll come back to that.
And apparently, we start doing this before we even know we’re doing it.
Light enters the eye and hits the retina, and somewhere between light exists and oh, that’s a raccoon, your visual system has already started sorting.
The retina is not just sitting back there taking pictures.
It notices things.
Edges. Contrast. Movement. Changes in light.
Which means that before your conscious brain gets the memo, some part of you is already asking:
What is this?
Have I seen this before?
Does this matter?
Should I remember it?
This is why, after learning a new word, suddenly you seem to see it everywhere. Why a song you have not heard in years appears three times in one week. Why you can recognize a friend’s walk from across a parking lot before you can see their face.
The world did not suddenly become full of that thing.
Your attention changed.
And this is where the raccoon problem begins.
Because the same human system that allows us to find patterns can also create illusions.
We see faces in clouds. We find shapes in shadows. We connect moments together and create stories.
Sometimes those stories are wrong.
But sometimes?
Sometimes that same ability is what allows us to create art, recognize kindness, build relationships, and notice what others overlook.
The human brain is not only a machine for survival.
It is a machine for meaning.
Which is inconvenient, because now we have a new problem.
If we are always interpreting what we see, then how do we know when we are noticing something real and when we are simply noticing ourselves?
I do not think the answer is to stop looking for patterns.
That sounds healthy and reasonable.
Yes
And probably impossible.
Maybe the better question is whether we can stay curious about what we notice without immediately turning it into certainty.
Because there is a difference between:
That meant something to me.
and
That means something.
A small difference in language.
A massive difference in posture.
And honestly, I am still learning it.
The raccoon is still there.
The little masked creature, standing in the dark, looking like it knows a secret.
They say it is better to have “loved and lost” than to never have loved at all.
I disagree.
I lost myself in you.
I almost lost myself TO you, literally.
You killed me once.
The problem, you see, is that I followed faithfully in your footsteps.
I chose to stay.
I chose to retell, repeat, and relive the tormenting narrative you created for me.
I chose to kill myself, slowly—arduously—painfully—every single day—for decades.
Until now.
For as long as I can remember–my life, both figuratively and literally, has been in your hands.
As I sit here, sifting through the decades of dejection, I can wholeheartedly tell you that no person is worth sacrificing your sanity.
Day one or “one day…”?
Its finally day one.
Today is the day I finally let go.
I am shakily, and finally choosing differently.
& do you know the most pathetic part?
I am so scared.
Believing the delusion that your violence might have been “love” is far easier than accepting the fact that the “love” I romanticized was never there at all.
I am so deathly afraid to let you go—
—even though you have been the most toxic, unhelpful relationship in my life…
I feel fear.
& it’s not because of the alternating black eyes, hushed bruises, or broken bones…
Those heal.
I’ve watched too many of them fade from my body like mirages on a hot day.
I trace my fingers over the ever-so-familiar, black-blue spots I’ve, now, come to find disturbing comfort in.
But they’re gone—
All that remains is the eerie echoes of your query whispers.
“If you looked like (her) _____, or carried yourself like (her)_______, then I wouldn’t be beating you…” you echo menacingly through time, “the reason I’m doing this is because there is something INHERENTLY wrong with you. You deserve this.”
Your words ring in my brain– taunting me, haunting me— till the singular motivation becomes about escape—
I must outrun the crippling hatred erupting relentlessly within me.
And over decades of deterioration…I have tried to “escape”.
But I have no room to talk. You were right–
I couldn’t even succeed at the one thing you’ve told me I should have always done.
The truth is, as you say, I am a coward.
I am spineless, identity-less, and lower than the scum on the bottom of the pond..
I couldn’t do it successfully. I came very close.
But “almost” doesn’t cut it.
Who expected a service dog to lounging silently on a neighbor’s porch on a freezing December night?
2020—
I ran 5 miles at my fastest pace–
My avid runners–ya’ll would be so proud of my splits!!!
I even beat my PR (personal [best] record)
& after approaching fatigue…I looked around to double check that no one was within sight.
& in the deafening silence of the night…
I carefully wrapped the ankle weights I use for strength training around my weary legs…
And I….jumped…into the deepest pond I had scouted out a few weeks before.
The clock had struck midnight—it was finally my birth “day”…December 4th.
The paralyzing pressure of the water, the languish in my legs, and the curling coldness enveloped me as I was unable to swim to the surface.
And the last thought I remember thinking, as I sank slowly to the bottom
—was tragically about you.
I thought about your cruel words.
“If you want to do the world a favor, Maham…”, you snarled in my slowing brain “just go ahead and do what is needed to be done”
And…. I couldn’t do it.
But I tried.
That damn service dog had alerted his owner with his incessant barking–causing a complete stranger to walk out–and see what was happening. 911.
“Just do it! kill yourself.” I heard under the murky, dark water.
My arms, naturally, fought to try to get to the surface.
But I couldn’t.
It was getting harder and harder to breathe.
I could feel my my lungs give out.
…and I fought—when it came down to it–I FOUGHT to try to get back up to the surface….
Until I heard the final echo of your voice that night….
“Everything you touch turns to misery anyway.”
I heard those last demeaning words…and I stopped fighting.
In that moment, I made the decision to let go.
I let flailing arms fall to my side and closed my eyes as I sunk towards the bottom.
& that was my last thought before losing consciousness.
The next thing I remember is waking up on the grass, on a stretcher, surrounded by EMTs pressing on me—and there it was—OUCH!!!!
All of a sudden, I was yanked back into reality—
–I was choking on the water that was, then, fervently flooding out of my mouth and nose at an unbearable pressure.
I have a momentary snapshot of me wrapped in a bright silver insulating blanket.
& I lost consciousness again…
I was struggling with hypothermia…[as I would come to find out later’
And finally…
I awoke in the ER..
I looked around, absolutely bewildered and puzzled.
& before I could fully become aware of what had happened, a deeper realization struck a chord so deep in my heart.
‘I am a failure’–I thought to myself. And I was. And I may still be. I was a failure in every sense of the word—.
I couldn’t even kill myself “right”.
But neither could YOU.
“I wish he had taken away your life when he ‘allegedly’ took your virginity,” I hear you screaming in my mind.
If anything, you have made it painfully clear that your life (and the lives of many others) would be a lot “bit brighter” without my presence.
“If you weren’t such a whore…then maybe you wouldn’t have gotten raped,”…
–at 14 years old—-with a knife–
Yes. The knife was utilized to “pop” my cherry.
To you, however, that’s irrelevant. It’s impertinent.
It is always my fault.
It has to be.
If I want to keep you in my life, I must always “dim” my light so you can shine brighter.
and so it begins…yet again…
An assortment of your agonizing remarks cycle through my head—at a merciless speed—
—over and over again—
My brain gets stuck on repeat like a broken record playing the same few tunes repetitively.
The tunes of my record are the stuff of nightmares.
The torment of your insidious insults continues till I want to rip my own head out of my body.
HELP!!!!!!
No human can stay immune to the missiles of such fiery self-hatred forever…
So what does one do when that unrelenting, merciless abuse starts to come from their own brain?
& just like that–
—I find myself thrust into the 9th circle of hell from Dante’s Inferno.
& so…I do what I’ve always done…
I dissociate.
I leave my body.
and for a few fleeting moments, everything…feels… a little bit ‘lighter’—a little bit further.
As your ridiculing remarks become more muffled and harder to decipher,
the ominous panic boiling inside of me steadily slows to a soft, sufferable simmer.
and there “I” am…soaring…above it “all”.
There I am– simply watching a homosapien named “Maham” go through some not-so-cute stuff.
I watch my body curiously as it floats above me—
and “I” become lifeless.
& just like that—
All the pieces of my fragile psyche shatter into sharp, serrated fragments once again–
Ever walked into the middle of a movie—no clue as to what was happening prior to you seeing it. Why is that guy trying to kill the other one? Who is she, and why is she carrying a baby alligator around? Huh?
Our very existence is like watching a movie from the middle. We woke up in this world one day, with no recollection of where we were before—no recollection of where we came from, how we got here, and why we’re here.
If we’re lucky, we awoke to two “somewhat functioning” adults holding us, and helping us. And perhaps along the way, they decided to bring some other equally confused little aliens into this world. We begin to call these people “family.” Who are they? And why does it seem like they have our whole lives planned before we even can form our first words?
“What am I doing here?” Slowly, we begin to learn how to produce certain sounds that we associate with abstract objects—we call this language. We begin to communicate about things that are happening; in fact, we become so well-versed, that, some of us begin to spin poetic metaphors and literary allusions into masterpieces, which serve to capture the essence of this confounding life. These will be known as our greatest writers.
However, no matter how many literary tactics we employ to mystify and obscure the concept of human existence, we cannot, with full certainty, pinpoint the answer to the ultimate question: why are we here?
Some of us decide to gain some certainty through pulling on teachings of age-old religions, and others simply turn to testaments of our own experiences. Regardless of where we find our illusion of “certainty”, the inherent perplexity of human existence remains glaring.
As a therapist-in-training, I have some awareness of the unfortunate prevalence of addictions in our world. Yes there are the evident ones such as alcoholism, eating disorders, substance abuse, and self-harm. But then, there are also those faint addictions—the addictions that tend to get “normalized”, as they are more accepted by society. These are the addictions to other people, the addiction to things, the addiction to abstract concepts such as success and accomplishment.
I would go as far as saying that, to some degree, every single one of us is an addict. Workaholics, workoutaholics, codependents, hoarders, sex addicts, money addicts. We become addicted to our partners, to our children, to “best friends.” That’s not the end of it. Some of us suffer from addictions that are intangible—we become addicted to attaining fame, beauty, success.
Why is human existence marked with coming in and out of different addictions? I truly and wholeheartedly believe that it is because our very existence has been out of control. All the preceding addictions are mechanisms that we use to deal with the lack of control we had in our very own existence. No entity asked for my permission before I was born. I don’t recall me signing a document instating my birth. Out of the millions of choices, why did that specific sperm have to fertilize that specific egg to create ME?
This brings me to the point of this blog: CHOICES.
They are beautiful burdensome trinkets. Regardless of circumstances, everything comes down to choice. They say “10% of what happens to you is life, and 90% is how you choose to deal with it.” I am in complete agreement with that statement. The world could be crumbling outside, but I will possess have a choice in how to react to it. Every single thing comes down to choice. “Not making a choice” is also a choice.
Let me tell you about an interesting experience. 19 years into my life, I realized that I had not yet made the active choice to live. HUH? I had become a passive bystander in my life—just letting life do whatever it wanted. “The greatest choice you will ever make is the one to live. Most people simply just exist.” And that’s exactly what it came down to.
It wasn’t so much that I “gave up” on life, as “giving up”, in itself, is an active choice. It was more like I had, simply, chosen not to choose when it came to matters of my own being. I didn’t wake up and DECIDE to be happy. Instead, I let the day’s events dictate whether or not I would feel happy. It was as if, i was (and still am (to some extent)), a leaf that was just blowing around in the wind—untethered to a stable source. For 19 years, I remained unanchored to the robust, secure tree of personal choice. Circumstances dictated my mood, my self-worth, my ambition, my energy—my life.
For 19 whole years. I didn’t even once affirm “regardless of what this day brings, I choose to act in a manner that increases inner peace and happiness.”
And then, I met my husband.
Needless to say, he found me scattered at my most vulnerable, confused state of being. In a lot ways, I was undergoing an identity crisis. “Which parts of my life are truly “mine”? I questioned “Which parts are the ones that I actually chose?”
I never did find the answers to those questions. I stopped looking for them. Instead, I made the very first choice I consciously remember making.
I chose him. I chose my husband.
It’s ironic because our marriage was arranged in nature. I remember the day I chose as clearly as if it were yesterday. I remember, sitting in my blue summer dress, on the sidewalk, barefooted. My husband and his family had just left my house, after seeing me for the very first time. I was 19. I was frightened, uncertain, unprepared, shaking.
A picture of me in my blue dress FROM that very day
I liked him. It felt right. I think. Maybe? What if it isn’t right? What if he’s not the one? What if this is going to be the biggest mistake of my life? Oh my goodness, it is isn’t it? I will regret this forever. Don’t do it. Do it. Don’t do it. Do it.
My dashing thoughts were rudely interrupted by the chirping of a bird. Annoyed, I snapped back to glare at him. And there he was–eating some seeds off the middle of the road, completely at ease, unaware of his agitating chirps. In the distance, I heard a car approaching–it came closer. Closer. Closer.
My heart jumped into my throat as I fretted fearfully for the bird’s life. “WHY ISN’T IT FLYING AWAY!? Is it DEAF!?” I winced, as the car came within touching distance of the bird, and boom. There he went. He flew towards the sky. A few moments after the car passed, the bird swiftly returned to the ground and began picking at his seeds, completely at ease–completely unaware that his life had just been in danger.
I exhaled loudly and stared with wonder and perplexity at this seemingly “unintelligent” creature. And, as it’s beady black eyes met mine, a bizarre thought crossed my mind. “What if I’M the unintelligent creature?”
As human beings, we spend all day and night fretting about what could go wrong. We approach every scenario as if it is one of life and death. For some of us, it is. Many of us are truly brought to “life or death” circumstances, in which we’re spared right at the nick of time. However, so few of us ever focus on the fact that we were spared. WE ARE ALIVE. Instead, we stay inside, worried, afraid to ever go back out “on the road” because we are afraid of the next car that will drive by.
I remember laughing at my fearful thoughts regarding the encounter, and I clearly recall looking up to the sun gently setting in the sky. “In this moment, I CHOOSE to be with this man!” I declared assertively, hoping to convince any higher power that may have resided up there.
I wasn’t going to let life happen to me. In that moment, I chose my husband, and in choosing him, I took an oath to doing all that I could do to make it work. I took an oath to not giving up when things got hard, and above all, I took an oath to go into the marriage FEARLESSLY.
This brings us back to the familiar concept of fear. So many of you may question things that I have questioned before Should I even “fight” for my life? Am I worth fighting for? Do I want to take charge of my life? “Um. Maham. Duh. Shut up. OF course.” These may be answers that seem simple and easy on the surface, but how many of us can honestly say “yes” to them in a manner that is as fierce as a racehorse running, full throttle, out of the starting gate?
Oh honey! Courage is not the absence of fear. It is simply the presence of something MORE powerful than fear. So, the horse passionately runs. It does what it would naturally do, no knowledge of what comes next; he courageously gallops out of the gate, no preoccupation with what’s ahead. He does what he loves to do.
My sweet friend, this is about life being ahead of you, and you making the choice to run towards it courageously! Will you do something for me?
I want for you to figure out what you desire—it could be anything, big or small. Figure it out. Verbalize it. Write it out, and declare your intention to the universe, as I did 4 beautiful years ago.
And now, think of the racehorse. There is no going back. You can only move forwards. Just RUN towards what you want fearlessly—no doubts, no preoccupation with what could go wrong, no energy wasted in thinking about “how hard it’s going to be” or “how long its going to take.” Nobody ever accomplished anything by fretting about how “impossible” it was going to be. You’ve done harder things, and the time will pass anyway. Just run. Run towards it, with arms wide open, and a heart brimming with excitement! Get ready to catch your dream, because, the entire universe and it’s cosmos is running back, towards YOU—the world is so excited for you two to finally meet. Your dream is not a separate entity from you. It was yours. It is yours. It has always been yours.
abidmaham 