Editors: Ashley Yeung and Alloe Mak

Rock bottom is a state of pure desperation, inescapable fear, and intense longing:
The ceiling caves in, lungs flex and release, and the jarring disconnect tone rings continuously as life hangs up on you.

How do you come back from the lowest point in your life?
How do you pick up the pieces?
How do you heal?

We always hear about rock bottom, but what comes next?

It begins with the morning after.

Sun spills through sheer curtains past any piece of broken glass, any curtain, any wilted rose, any particle of dust.
My back aches, sourness lingers in my mouth, and I smell like sleep. It all weighs me down, pinning me to my bed.
I’m awake but refuse to open my eyes, hoping I’ll wander back to sleep,
but it’s been sixteen hours, so I force my sight.

The morning after is always the hardest.
While your world has stopped, the rest of the world continues to spin.
Life goes on.

The early morning sun only gets brighter, hurting my eyes.
It angers me.
The sun angers me.
Because the brightness inflicts false hope, I pull the covers over my face, and darkness returns at last.

The seasons change unforgivingly—winds will blow, and trees will crash. You will only be able to focus on simply surviving each second.

But, the thing about rock bottom, is that you can only go up.
Before you know it, you’ll survive the night and it will have been sixteen hours.
Sixteen will turn into seventeen, then eighteen, twenty-four, forty-eight. A week will turn into a month, then six.
And suddenly,
It all seems so far away.

Here I sit
in my comfy wool sweater.
Arms crossed, legs crossed, eyes squinting from the morning sun. I look out into the distance
at the soft green hills that run for miles, the blue stones’ jagged edges, and the little villas scattered amongst the blooming flowers.
In this moment of early spring, the soft wind caresses me, carrying me through the seasons.
The birds chirp again.

The truth is that there is no proper way to heal. The disconnect tone of life suddenly failing you will become white noise, until you find yourself there one day.

There, where the birds chirp again.