Project Paper Birds

This was a drawing I did the day after August 29th, the night I had my first flashback. I was working at Ross at the time and scribbled it on the back of receipt paper in a desperate attempt to illustrate what that experience had felt like.

When I had my first flashback, I was sitting on my parents’ bed recounting how “the box” had come to appear in my head. As soon as I said the words “the box”, however, something very strange happened: I started shaking and crying uncontrollably. It felt like I was sucked inwards and my skin was screaming, my body expelling a strange kind of energy I’d never experienced before.  I lost complete body autonomy and could only say, “Mom, I don’t know what’s happening! Mom, I don’t know what’s happening!”

This drawing captures that night: the detachment of self I felt, and the uncontrollable expel of energy.