Do you ever feel like something or someone is missing from your life? I do. Its hard to ignore the pulling, gnawing, wrenching, cavernous feeling where my heart used to be. Its as though my organs have been harvested, or a piece of me amputated, or my whole left side has been sliced clear off. My other half. Something should be there but it isnt. This makes basic tasks so complex. Even just waking up can induce the most unbearable ache, literally wanting something so much that it hurts. Nothing i do feels right anymore. In a way, it reminds me of The Telltale Heart, except its a lack of heartbeat thats driving me crazy.

I spend the majority of my time in another world. Daydreaming, floating, trapped, smothered, half dead. I can see people, i can touch them, hear them......but im not really here. I often wonder what happened to my heart. Where did it go? Does somebody have it? Is it buried somewhere within reach? Most importantly, will i ever get it back?

It's been a year. 365 days since my world melted to sludge around me. I remember the exact moment my soul left my body. I was sitting on an unforgiving wooden bench overlooking a plot of daffodils. I hated those ridiculous daffodils VENOMOUSLY. The cold wind whipped around me, slapping my hair into my face. I was shivering. Not from the cold, but from the anger, the hurt, the humiliation. The shock set in. I began to feel an unbearable agony in my chest, like a stake had been plunged through my heart and lungs and was being twisted and twisted and twisted.

I could no longer breathe. Tears streamed down my face and passers by became blurs.

I begged myself to wake up from this nightmare. Then i died. Nothing felt real....my life fell from beneath me and i slipped into purgatory. It was like a warped Alice In Wonderland.

Nobody could reach me, and i became a machine. I went through the motions. I had to keep moving. I kept walking. I would rise from disturbed sleep and run run run. If i stopped for a significant period of time i would question everything....what was wrong with me? was i not pretty enough, smart enough, funny enough, good enough? what did i do wrong? was it all a lie? I began to feel utterly worthless. I couldnt stand anybody looking at me. I have never felt so ugly, disgusting and insignificant in my life. I felt like i had no friends, like nobody cared whether or not i existed. I became frail and shrunken, and then came my descent into the swirling abyss of depression. It's swallowing, drowning, abusive, murderous....light doesnt exist. Joy doesnt exist. I felt absolutely empty and tormented.

I was determined to erase myself. Hidden away from the intimidating and daunting social scene, i could protect myself from seeing things i didnt want to see. I would save up pills and chase them with straight vodka. I had to get away from my head, from the gutpunchy feeling i had all day every day. My dreams were in grey and sepia, and the twisting, fiery pain in my chest never eased. Mornings were like a conscious autopsy.....the pain of realising this was my life was beyond agony. I sought relief in cutting, in drawing blood....it was a strange kind of comfort. I lost complete control of my life and had no sense of reality. I was a ghost, a zombie, literally a shell of my former self. Kate's body was there, but Kate wasn't there anymore.

...i was worth nothing and nobody was going to convince me otherwise.