Posted 1/9/2016 5:28 PM (GMT 0)
I've been staying at my mom's house, to take care of it and her pets while she's away on vacation. I've been alone since sunday and will be for at least another 9 days. On monday, something straight out of my worst nightmares happened. While I was alone, there was a thunderstorm outside and as usual I was told to unplug most valuable things. I don't like thunderstorms but I can generally stand them. Not this one, though.
At about 6 pm, I start hearing a loud sound coming from the street and can smell something burning. I see some neighbors a bit agitated and I see the lights start flickering, so panicking, I use the circuit breaker to cut the power off (which calmed me down a little bit). Then I hear firemen and policemen outside, and not long after, a big explosion. It was the transformer at the end of my street. It exploded again a bit later, while they were trying to fix it.
Maybe for a lot of you it's a stupid and common thing. It isn't that odd of a thing to happen, at least where I live. But I can't describe how afraid I was. I was curled up in a ball hugging my dog and crying, not knowing what the hell to do or what was happening. Specially since it was my first day alone and I was a bit stressed per se and still adapting. I didn't know if I should stay or run, but what about the pets?
I feel like a crybaby for feeling this way, but ever since I've been extremely nervous, and I have no one to share it with. Every time I hear a noise outside I think it's the transformer again. Every time I smell the slightest burning scent (from neighbors cooking sometimes) I get anxious and start unplugging things. I have to get a lot of strenght to plug things back on.
Every time I rest my head on the pillow to try and get some sleep, because I've been sleeping 4 hours a night to say a lot, a noise outside will startle me awake. Someone closing a door, or walking by, or a car, or a darn fly, anything. I can feel the exhaustion is starting to wear me off, and I'm crying now. Using the washing machine was a challenge for me, and now I can't sleep while I know it's working and plugged.
Sometimes people make comments that make me feel even more anxious. Like "uh, be careful when you plug it back in, I don't want to find you dead." For me, that's the worst thing you could tell me. I have no one to be with other than the occasional visit to my aunt (the one who made the comment), and I have a lot of days left until it's over.
Now I'm constantly checking the weather, already stressed at the thunderstorms coming next week. I can't live like this. I don't want to tell mom because she'd feel bad and I'd ruin her vacations, that I think she more than deserves. I feel like this isn't normal, this level of anxiety and fear. And I feel really alone in this, so I just wanted to share this with someone out there. Thanks a lot for reading me if you are.