The Aftereffects

Trigger Warning: mass shootings, feelings being validated, emotional rambling on triggering topic
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nose clogging.

Throat throbbing.

Eyes watering.

Head aching.

And yet, its the latest news about a mass shooting in a California bar that is making it hard for me to breath. Guys, I don't know where this naive thought came from, but for whatever reason, I thought that once I came to Korea, I'd stop hearing about shootings.

No more heart stopping news.

No more breath quickening to painful levels.

No more.

Joke's on me, I guess.

I'm recovering from a fever right now, not having the most comfortable of week, and it pales in comparison to how I feel.

I am well aware that the topic of mass shootings is a sensitive topic for me. The fact that a fellow Fulbrighter had asked how to broach the topic of mass shootings in America for their Korean students had me tensing, sweating, and breath quickening. It was hint enough that this was a topic that triggered me.

And here's what I recognize.

This is something I need to work through, but I'm not ready to talk nor do I know where to begin. Do I start with the school drills I learned in school for whenever there was a shooter on campus? Or do I start with the attempted mass shooting at my university during my undergrad days? Or the false alarm during grad school? What about Pulse? Parkland?

I keep having to stop typing. My fingers keep stalling.

During the recovery in Orlando after Pulse, I heard from various sources that it's okay to feel what you feel. That your feelings are valid.

That my feelings are valid.

But...maybe its because I'm not surrounded by the community that knew what it was like, or because I've been lulled into a bubble of safety since moving here, but its been getting harder to stay steady whenever I hear about a shooting.

Of all the things to have to prepare myself for with my move, finding support for moments like these was not something I thought I had to do.

I'm working through these emotions, I am.

But it's not easy....hell, writing this post was not easy. I mentioned that I had to stop typing many times. My fingers were literally tensing and causing me to hit the wrong keys. It doesn't help that my thoughts are all over the place and stringing one thought together was so hard.

Partly because of the fever, but mostly because of this topic.

This post was/is more for me than it was for you, I admit. An attempt at putting it all down. Granted, I'm doing better now than I did when I first started this post.

If only it were that easy to move past this.

#SaveOurToya