by Evangeline Uriyu

Created on: September 23, 2009

I'm afraid of living. I've been afraid of living for as long as I can remember, and that spans at least 49 years. I really can't say what inspired this fear, whether it was a single event or a gradual build up of events. I only know that at some point in early adolescence, I knew I needed a friend to help me bear the painful daily business of living.

My first friend was Scotch. I became acquainted with Scotch when I was about twelve or thirteen years old. My aunt was having a party and while the adults were gathered in the living room, the children were in the den watching TV. I remember going into the kitchen for a drink and noticing a half empty cocktail glass on the table. I got past the initial shudder with the first sip and emptied the glass. Not long after, I felt euphoric. That is when I knew I had to have alcohol in my life every day. Thus began a period in my young life when I started the day with a shot of Scotch, and also brought an empty aspirin bottle to school with another shot of Scotch for later. Around lunch time, I would enter into the girl's bathroom, go into one of the stalls and have my second drink of the day. I began to water down my parent's bottles of liquor so they wouldn't notice it slowly disappearing. That meant I had to take my quota from different liquor bottles equally. So I also became well acquainted with Gin, Vodka, and Brandy. The taste really didn't matter, it was the euphoria I was after, and it's numbing affect. What I really loved about drinking was how nothing mattered for awhile. There was a total absence of fear, worry, or anxiety.

At some point, I knew I couldn't keep up my little secret without discovery. Eventually the liquor bottles would be more water than liquor. Amazingly, I could stop drinking, but I plunged into a deep, murky pond of depression. Try to imagine a twelve year old child lost in depression. I had no friend to help me get through the day anymore.

I remember one day coming home from school and craving something sweet. Pulling open the cookie drawer, I saw a bag of shortbread cookies. I ate about six, but still didn't feel satiated. However, I knew I couldn't finish off the bag without facing consequences. So I had a great idea to bake a batch of cookies for myself. I was already a pretty good baker, and my mother wouldn't be home until five. I quickly whipped up a couple dozen sugar cookies, ate them all, cleaned up, and went downstairs to watch TV and fall asleep. While I was eating those cookies,

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