This is her and I, just a couple of months ago. I'd had an awful panic/anxiety attack the night before this. I'd been reading the birthday card she'd given me. One of the lines was something like "we walk this bridge over the chasm of life together" and I couldn't stop the thought yes, but one of us will finish the walk first. And suddenly my mind was assaulted with pictures that I can still see in my minds eye.
A funeral. Seeing her, laying in a casket, unmoving. Just like my mother before her.
I jstarted panicking. I remembered something she'd said a while back about what she wanted done after she died. I started bawling.
I was crying, shaking, and I couldn't stop. For twenty minutes I laid on my floor, and then under the covers in my bed, crying.
Before this picture was taken, I'd hugged her and heard her heartbeat. A re-assuring sound to go with the feeling of security I had while in her arms.
Before I let go, a friend popped her head out the door to the porch of my sisters house, and said "Don't move. I'll be right back with my camera."
Well...I was happy to comply. After all, it gave me an excuse to hold on just a little while longer.
I first met her in January of 2012. We think it was the 29th, though I am not positive on the date.
We became friends. I began to trust her with things that I wouldn't trust anyone else with, and even asked a couple of questions which proved to be quite embarrassing for me. Lol
It was April, I think, when the thought "I love her" first crossed my mind. Not a weird "I love her" but an "I love her like a mom"
And this thought shook me to my core, because before this...that phrase had been used to convey emotion to only a select handful outside of my family. And all too late I realized that I had let another person I to my heart. And this...this is what scared me the most.
We became close, celebrating birthdays and girls night, and we-er, I-thought that we couldn't be closer. I was wrong.
Camp 2012: One day of that week is a day I will hopefully remember for the rest of my life.
It was an emotional week, and one night I had to talk with a counselor. I knew Cheryl had seen me go back, she'd have had to since she was sitting near the back, but when I looked up to see her waiting for me...
Until this night I had never seen her cry. I'd heard her cry, and I'd had the feeling she was crying before, but I'd never seen her. And when I did, it was like an emotional dam inside me broke. I walked over to her, and she wrapped her arms around me. I did the same. We both sobbed.
She asked what was wrong and I told her, and I relished the feeling of being in her arms. I'd so been longing for my mothers arms, and having Cheryl's around me...I felt like a little girl. I felt more safe and secure than I had in a while. And i know that mom was looking down on us and smiling.
That year was one that we grew closer. So much closer, that we'd never even imagined being able to have the hole in each of out hearts filled so.
A year-and many heart to hearts, tears, and emotional conversations later-it's a day before I have to leave for camp.
It's the day that marked five years since my mothers death. And I am terrified.
I'm always scared to go to camp, with my anxiety...I never knew what could happen. But to leave for camp on what was one of the hardest and most emotional days of the year for me...I actually vomited the Saturday before we left.
That day, June 2nd, I was crying. I was at home, bawling, and I couldn't stop. I'd been texting Cheryl and she asked if I wanted to walk. Her way of asking if I needed her there.
I said yes.
We walked around the block one time before ending up in the steps to the entrance to a church. We sat and talked. She listened, gave encouragement, held me while I wept and wiped away tears as they fell. I didn't know how to thank her. I still don't.
The fact that she was there was enough to make me cry again.
She has held my hand through panic attacks. Calmed me during times of anxiousness.
The first time I had a major attack while with her, I was at her house with several other friends for an all night marathon of a TV show we are all hooked on.
I don't know what time it was, but all of a sudden I got hot. I felt sick. And I couldn't sit still. I stood up and began to casually find excuses to walk around. Taking something to the kitchen, that kind of thing. Well, my older sister caught on quick and asked if I was ok. When I said no, she suggested I go outside.
I did.
The cool air instantly felt wonderful, but it didn't do much to calm my stomach or mind. As another wave washed over me all I remember thinking-as I gripped the porch railing-was I will not throw up in her bushes. I will not throw up on her porch. I will not throw up right now.
As I'm thinking this, and the wave is dissipating, Cheryl comes out and stands next to me.
"Are you alright?" She asks.
I nodd.
"I can call your dad if you want. It's not too late and it's only a few minutes away."
I shook my head "No" I said. The last thing I wanted to do was skipp another fun night that year due to a panic attack. It wasn't going to happen.
She put her arm around me and we stepped back to sit on the bench. I leaned into her embrace and clenched my eyes shut as another wave of sickness hit.
She sat with me until it all passed and I falsely assured her I was alright. I didn't feel sick anymore, but I still didn't feel great. But soon, all signs of attack vanished, and I was able to enjoy a night with some of my best friends.
And, later that night, something happened that I'll never forget.
She thought I was asleep-I'm sure-on the floor a few feet between her and Jalinn. She got up to put dishes away, but reached over to me. She tucked my hair, which had ended up everywhere after she brushed it, behind my ear and kissed the top of my head.
I say all I've said, to say this.
She is exactly like a mother to me, in nearly every sense of the word. I wouldn't trade our time together for anything in the world. God has blessed us in ways we never dreamed possible.
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