"Drowning is the only way to describe it. It's like you're underwater looking up and you're breathing… You're breathing but the water is getting into your lungs and it burns. It burns and you just want the water to fill your lungs to capacity and kill you, but you know it'll never quite get there. You'll forever be laying under it, waiting, but it'll just crush you under its weight." Karalyna's eyes shut tightly as a hot pressure began to build behind them. She hugged herself tightly and rocked in the tiny chair. Blood seeped down her arms as she pressed her nails into her skin, the pain kept her grounded in reality. Not that she wanted to be there anyways. "And I just want to drown."

Silence greeted her as it so often did. She could only trust herself, right? The walls in the room were sparsely decorated. A few motivational posters, bland white walls. And a bed and simple dresser were all that occupied it other than her. She hated being here. It reminded her of how much of a failure she was. She couldn't get a grip on her mind, so her boyfriend threw her in the hospital. He hadn't been to visit her in the month she'd been here. Whether or not that was intentional, she didn't know. In the back of her mind, she knew he did it because he cared.

In about an hour she would be in some therapist's office. They would ask her what was bothering her, give her a lecture on how suicide wasn't the answer, and the session would be over without any real improvements. The only real therapy she got was her conversations in this room, when she aired all her real dirty laundry out. Maybe they have cameras in here, she thought. It certainly would make them understand her a little better. Being on a steady diet of Prozac sure wasn't helping. Slowly, she moved her arms down to her side and stood up. They wouldn't let her out of the room, something about being a danger to herself, until therapy came around. When it did, she would be escorted by two orderlies, and then left in the office with the therapist, Dr. Woods, for the next hour and then be taken to eat and socialize for the next two. Today she would ask why Mark hadn't been allowed to visit.

She paced around until the orderlies came to pick her up. They came, escorted her (it made her feel like a child), and left her in the office. It was a nice office. It was decorated with degrees in medicine, accolades for excellence in psychiatry, and random pictures that made no sense together. She slowly sat on the couch and made herself comfortable. It always took the doc ten minutes to show up. But what kind of stupid could she get herself into here? Soon enough the respected doctor walked into the room looking as sleek as always. She was in her late thirties, in excellent shape, and judgmental to the core.

"So Kara," she started. Karalyna had asked the doctor to shorten her name. If there was one thing she couldn't stand it was the constant mispronunciation of her name. It was pronounced like the state "Carolina", not like the model, "Karolina". "How are you today?"

"Alive. My heart is beating." She replied with her usual response. At least it was honest. She was alive no matter how much she didn't want to be. Dr. Woods sighed.

"Kara, you need to help yourself." Kara sat unmoving. She had no intention of talking to this woman. None at all. "You understand your diagnoses, right?"

This always got to Kara. Did she understand what was wrong with her? Of course she did. "What more is there to understand than I'm crazy?"

"You're not crazy. You need help, there is a difference. Kara, you have major problems. Do you want to get better?"

"Honestly?"

"Of course." Dr. Woods was tapping a pen against her notepad. This was usually the tell all for 'I'm annoyed and pissed off, just get on with it'.

"No. I don't want to get better. I was perfectly fine with how I was. With how I am."

"You're okay with being suicidal?"

"Being suicidal and having suicidal thoughts are completely different." Kara uncrossed her legs and stood up. Pacing sometimes helped distract her from this hour of torture. She didn't even want to be alone in her own head, much less have someone else parading around in it. Maybe she should just give the good doctor her drowning speech. Maybe then she could go back to her room and be in peace. Was it worth a shot?

"You understand why Mark hasn't come around?"

"Of course I do. I'm borderline and you don't want me using my fiancé as a crutch." Kara was more than irritated now. This woman liked to shove Mark in her face every chance she got.

"Kara, you know that's not it." Dr. Woods lowered her voice. Sympathy and concern filled it. "Mark isn't your fiancé."

"Just shut up, okay." Tears were threatening to fall again. The last time she saw him would truly be the last time she saw him. Tangled in bed with her best friend, and mental breakdowns followed. He had dropped her off at the hospital, said his goodbyes and left. Left her crying and alone as if the last six years of their relationship had been absolutely nothing.

"Kara, once again, do you understand your diagnoses?"

"I'm depressed. I have borderline personality disorder. I daydream way too much, and I'm delusional. Basically I'm crazy."

"Why don't we go back to your childhood. Start with the last happy memory you have."

"You're kidding, right? A happy memory in my childhood?"

"There has to be one."

"When it ended. When Mark found me and took me out of my parent's house." Kara stopped at the edge of the couch and put her hands on the arm to steady herself. The betrayal was ripping through her, it hurt so much that it threatened to tear her apart. A sob slipped through her mouth. "I gave him everything."

"I can imagine that this is hard for you."

"You imagine? Obviously you know. I'm sitting in a psych ward. I've been here for two months. Obviously. You. Know." The fabric on the couch indented as Karalyna dug her fingers into it. "Why won't you just let me get on with my life, doc? Why won't you let me do with my life as I please? You all act like suicide is such a selfish and immoral thing, but what about what makes ME happy? It's my life. I don't live to please anyone but myself. I want control, but you continue to take it away from me. You continue to tell me that my efforts aren't enough, that what I want for myself isn't okay. Why can't I do something for me for once?"

"Kara, you know the answer to that."

"Because someone would miss me? I'm supposed to think of everyone in this world but myself. I'm not allowed to be myself. I always have to please everyone else. Depression.. It's kind of like drowning sometimes…" She trailed off.

"Drowning?" Dr. Woods sounded confused.

"Yes drowning. You're underwater breathing, and you want to die because it hurts so bad. But the process is so slow, so, so slow, because the water is filling your lungs. But it fills it to just where it hurts, then you're above the water, then shoved back down only to start the entire process over again. Every. Single. Day."

"Kara…" the doctor trailed off. She was probably as flabbergasted as Karalyna was at that point. Kara was staring off in space, trying to remove herself from the situation. She wanted out. She wanted to find her own way. She wanted to be back home. Back in her bed, with her pillow and her stuff.

"I want out of here. I want out of this place. I want to be with people so I don't go even more crazy. I want to take control of my life and not have you tell me how I should be living it. I think I'm done for the day."

"We still have thirty minutes."

"I don't care. I'm done for the day." Kara leaned over the couch and tried to maintain her composure. She walked to the doors and knocked, signaling the end of the session. The two orderlies opened the door and waited for her to walk out. As soon as they had shut the door behind her, tears made their way down Kara's face. Nothing was fair, and the most unfair thing was this hand she had been dealt. She wanted so badly to change it, to stop seeming so needy. To stop coming off as a terrible person, but that would never happen for her, would it?