I wish I could just make a complete break from my past, but the memories and the flashbacks: it isn’t easy to put the past behind you when every day forces you to relive it.

Even if I didn’t have the flashbacks, how can I ignore the experiences I’ve had? How can I start my life over, fresh? Only forgetting can help me, but I believe the pain would remain nevertheless. Back when I was in denial, back when I didn’t remember a thing, I still suffered. I still cried every day. I just didn’t know why I was crying, and that made the pain worse.

It’s not just the memories. It’s the lesson you learn, the broken image of control.

With no sense of control, I become convinced the bad things that happened to me could happen again at any moment. So, I become hypervigilant, hyperaware. In the face of that, no amount of human reasoning about statistics and civilization can completely quell the animal instinct to cower from perceived predators: in this case, men.

In short, your logic is right: our minds make us. But your proposition is problematic.  I desperately wish to leave the past where it belongs, but it won’t leave me alone.

Just like Andy wouldn’t.

I hate these cycles, these themes and motifs.  Every day, time repeats.