The first time you experience shame, it’s an
all-consuming fire. The cold sweat beads on the nape of your neck, the sickly
warmth flows through your forehead and the heaving breaths squeeze through a
hollow chest. No I’m not describing a panic attack or fever, but the after
effects of doing committing an unimaginably abject crime. Not it doesn’t need
to be something terrible, per say, it’s just the unfathomability of having done
something even remotely like that. You feel the ringing in your ears. The deed
is done… you can’t go back now. You
can’t even walk without letting your head hang. You can’t face the world. You
can’t.
So you go back home and you resort to some fastidious
little job or immerse yourself in an almost perfunctory job. You crave
normalcy. You crave an escape from the sardonic voices in your head.
And then, bit by bit, day by day, the feeling of shame
lessens, however painfully. With this decreasing shame comes a sense of
acceptance. Yes, I picked up that piece of jewelry without paying for it. So I
just slept with that guy who’s my boyfriend’s friend. Big deal. Yeah, I took a
little cash from my friend’s wallet. Screw it, you say, it’s all okay. I’ve
done it once so what’s the harm in doing it again. I never got caught.
And then you wake up one day having no clue about how
you ended up that way. And you look back and see a different life. If the old
you met the new you, recognizing yourself would be an impossibility. Your life
lies in shambles as you look around you and fail to realize how things spiraled
this out of control. And then shame returns, for one final visit.
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