I think I’ve struggled with this actualization since I woke up in September of ’04. It took me more than a handful of years to put it all together and when it seemed to make  more sense, I had to let everything marinate for a couple more years. I’ve only recently started admitting it though. I find it easier to admit it whilst talking to someone who never knew the first Ashley and can’t compare me to her or vice versa. I don’t think I will understand everything that happened though. I won’t ever know what it was like to live like that Ashley. She’s gone now and will never be back. I’m not her and she’s not me. Sometimes I think I might miss her but I can’t imagine how it was to live like or as her. That Ashley died on August 12, 2004.

I didn’t know what happened to me, where I was, who I was, why I couldn’t do anything or move the way I used to. I didn’t know what building my room inhabited. I didn’t know what city the building stood. I was a blank slate. Numerous time, I was told all of those answers but nothing made sense. “You were involved in a bad car accident.” I didn’t think I was, in fact, no, I never remembered driving so I knew that wasn’t possible. I remained stiff, lying in my new bed under the pink blanket Mimi crocheted me when I was a little girl trying to remember if it happened. I didn’t know what this lady wearing blue was talking about.

The room had a chilly gray presence. There was no sunlight outside to shine through the window next to my bed. Noise was being made outside of my door but my ears only heard silence.  I didn’t remember where I lived or where I belonged. I must be lost I thought so I asked the lady in blue where I was again. This time I was too tired to raise my voice so I whispered. The woman stopped what she was doing and turned to face me. She was folding clothes and placing them in a closet located in front of my bed. “What happened to me?” Silence. “Where am I?” Silence. She turned around and stepped to the foot of my bed, looking me straight in the eye. “You’re in Moss Rehab Hospital because you were hurt in a really bad car accident.”

11 years later, I still cry. I don’t know what I cry about though. As I’m writing this, I feel like I can cry. Can you mourn someone if you don’t remember them or their life? Sometimes I want to be the old Ashley but I don’t know her. When I think I remember something she did, I get all nostalgic over the memory. I second-guess my memory though. You know how people say “You don’t know what you don’t have” I don’t know what it’s like to remember accurately. I have to let go of her and I wish others would too. She’s not me. She died and I morphed out in her body. The body that was just about lifeless for a month. It’s as weird for me as it is for you to read that. It’s strange shit. I’m still analyzing and trying to figure out who I am since she vanished.