The Mask

Pretence plays a huge roll in my life now. Maybe if I can convince others that all is well then I'll, subliminally, unlock a path to calm and 'normality', what ever that is.
Even if that does not work for me, it's a roll I have to adopt for my family. My nightmare has become their nightmare and they need respite as much as me.
I can't find my own inner peace, but by stealth, false smiles, hidden tears and pretence I'm praying I can restore some normality to their lives. They don't deserve this. How long can I expect them to live a life of stress, worry and uncertainty?
They want the husband and father that led from the front and coped to re-emerge. Can roll-playing convince them (and me)...unlikely, but what's the alternative?
The mornings are the worse. The routine the same.
I awake to a morning cocktail of crushing chest palpitations, horrible, nervous stomach cramps (exam tummy) and a feeling of total dread. 
I know it's coming but it still frightens me. Every morning...every bloody morning. If my wife is beside me, I control the tears. If she's not,,,down they come.
Tears and me have become well acquainted since July 2008. Strange, before then we had barely acknowledged one another for the previous 35 years. We said hi big-time when my beautiful daughter was born 15 years ago and have been on nodding terms throughout her life, but nothing like the intensity of this current relationship.
Hiding in the dark calms me, but that reveals my state of mind to my wife and upsets her. I have let her down so badly, dismantled her life and dreams.  I have to put on the mask and try and convince her that I am on the mend. 
When my life was turned upside down back in 2008, I fell to pieces. That's not a particularly eloquent or scientifically medical term, but it's how I felt.
In a matter of hours, the confident, happy, energised, achiever who I looked at in the mirror each morning was gone. He hasn't been back since.
For six months I hid. The darkened room became my sanctuary, a foetal position my calm.
My wife saw all this every day, my daughter fleetingly. The mask was fixed in position whenever she returned from school, but she's no fool. She wanted her dad back and I couldn't find him for her.
They have both been so loving, giving and selfless it beggars belief...
But they are tired. I can see it in their eyes. They need me back and I want to be back. But fear is winning right now.
Fear wins when I awake.
Fear wins when I need to leave the bedroom to begin the day.
Fear wins when my family leave the house and I am consumed once again.
Fear wins when I turn my back on the day, pull the curtains and try to withdraw into TV movies that somehow offer me respite, albeit for a few hours. I need that calm, I need that rest.
Fear wins on finding a future. I am petrified that if I don't get myself well we will be crippled financially for ever. But that same fear is stopping me from finding a job, finding a future.
The ultimate Catch 22.

Why a thousand promises?

Fear has been an un-welcomed visitor to my life for three and half years now. July 25th 2008 was the day it grabbed me by the throat. It's now February 13th 2012 and it's suffocating grip is as strong as ever.
It controls me, it frightens me and it demands my full attention every single day. No respite, no day off...every single day.
Gut-wrenching anxiety, fear of the day, tears and terrors...they are serious players in my daily life, and I hate them all.
I need to trust this forum before explaining why, but for now please please know that they are not imagined, exaggerated or a serious threat to my well-bring. I'm writing this to find answers and an escape. If it works, then it will be a story that could educate us both. For now, though, it'll be small, delicate steps...hopefully along a path leading to safety.
So why a thousand promises?
I've had professional advice plus loving help from family and friends in trying to beat these demons. By definition of writing today, it hasn't worked, but their efforts and support leave me humbled and thankful that I'm not alone in this.
Advice and support sometimes arrives from the most unexpected of sources, and one remarkable man (a stranger, an alcoholic, a petty criminal) found a set of words that answered a lot of the questions that I hadn't even been able to formulate in the first place.

Fear, he said, will make you a thousand promises...because it never intends to keep any of them.

Bang. There you have it. Fear will make you a thousand promises. Well, it has certainly played its games and had its fun with me. A thousand promises...it feels like ten times that. But a thousand is enough to blow your mind... I'll vouch for that.
Does he keep his promises? Not really. Is Fear a serial liar? Yeah, 100 per cent. Can I recognise that and dismiss his threats and challenges...sadly, NO.
So here we are. Heading towards 2000 days, and nights, of terror and no end in sight.