“Nooo!”

I screamed as I awakened startled from a terrifying dream, for the third night in a row.

“Another dream?”, he said groggily.

“Yeah, I think I’m just going to get up”, I sighed out of desperation—walking to the kitchen to prep a 3 AM tea.

Three months post-shooting brought its physical advancements. Time to heal, the faint appearance of green bruising on my arm due to bullet fragment lead poisoning, and the ability to work-out again.

Despite my body’s healing progression, the headspace sound of gunfire plagued my psyche—eroding my nightly dreams. Blind to the faces of the individuals responsible for my wounds, sound was my body’s only sensory sponge—agitating my fight or flight hormonal levels with each unconscious reminder.

PTSD acts as a hidden cloth on your surroundings. A secret club of hyper-alertness plaguing, the micro-unconscious. To pinpoint these frequencies becomes a fearful game you didn’t sign-up for, often with no clear idea of how the agitation arrives without intentional patterning.

The volume of sound as a stimulus, created waves of uncertainty in my day:

Honking cars passing me with their windows down…

Children screaming at parks…

Men shouting…

People at the gym dropping weights and cheering each other in fitness classes...

To coil into my body during these public moments of panic became a required coping mechanism.

Shoulders lowering, under bowed head–caving into my collarbone to temporarily alleviate the bottled fear contained within my being.

Each soundbite inflection requiring a full surveillance of internal and external safety evaluation. A creep of shadow began to hover over my reality, sending such heightened shivers through my mind—the only thing I could do in these moments of trauma, to manage the terror, was to go quiet until effects of the stimulus passed.

These protective mechanisms have become my nervous system’s shield to my perpetrator’s harm; silently leaking over into my emotional connection with others. Creating deeper walls—with higher emotional guardrails. Becoming less present in daily interactions. Consumed in analyzing surrounding stimuli to prevent the personal embarrassment of a potentially public panic episode.

Homecoming 2018 was a sweet affair. A time to revisit my college Alma Mater, reconnect with Sorority sisters, and a moment to reflect on the memories of our youth.

**From Jasmine’s personal images**: 2018 photo from Jasmine’s Alma Mater Purdue University—West Lafayette, IN

**From Jasmine’s personal images**: Bark from “The Tree” on Purdue’s campus. A space annually claimed by Sororities and Fraternities. Each organization painting the tree with their honorary colors during their week of events.

**From Jasmine’s personal images**: Homecoming 2018 weekend celebration with Sorority Sisters.

The step show

Showing up fashionably late, my Sorority sisters and I entered the room, in posse. Colors on, hair laid—hugs on site. The normal parade of welcoming greetings.

We were in high spirits to see the step show, in the ‘same-ol-same-ol’ room on our college campus. A familiar room for Greek life, providing the perfect reverberation of sound due to its intimate walls, low ceilings, and high pitch wood floors.

Hyper-alertness consumed me upon entry.

Boisterous hoots from roll-calls…
The rumble of feet stomping…
Sporatic full-hand claps from the cheers of audience members…

“What’s. WRONG?”, a Sorority sister asked me, snapping me out of my silent room analysis.

My internal fear showed on my face, clear as day.

“Let’s get out of here. Let’s GO”, she demanded.

Grabbing my hand with the grip of a mother to a toddler, jolting me out of my frozen composure. I was ushered through the crowd processing an emotional wave of fear and sadness for being teary-eyed at such a celebratory event.

Deeply confused by what it all meant. Troubled by my mind and ears’ inability to distinguish one sound stimulus from the other. I began to detach from my body with each passing question through the crowd:

“What’s going on with Jasmine?” asked one Sorority sister.

“What do you need?”, asked another.

Breaking the mushroom of sound swelling from the doors of the performance space, my feet seemed to float by guided hand through the dimly lit familiar hallways of the performance hall. Emotionally stumbling down two flights of stairs—pushing through the first-floor double crash bar doors in exhaustion.

Stillness. Silence. Space.

My two Sorority sisters hovered over me on the stoop steps as unfiltered tears poured from my spirit. Tears of relief from the outside breeze’s welcoming removal of the built-up heat, pressure, and physical overload felt within the room. Tears of anger at the realization that I was no longer in control of my nervous system’s response to its surroundings.

“Breathe”, they chimed together.

With a deep breath in…and out, I began to take stock of my surroundings under the night sky.

An amber-tint lit light post to my left.
A patch of round green shrubs across the broken sidewalk.
My two Sorority sisters shaking hands touching my shoulders.