Buried Alive
One of our aims when we entangle you is to cause the equivalent of you feeling as if you are being buried alive. Doing this keeps you in our grip and under our control. For some people, the thought of being buried alive causes them considerable terror. The concept of being bound and dropped into a prepared hole in the ground, lying against the cold, damp earth as the first shovel load of earth lands on you, dirt cascading over your face as you blink frantically trying to avoid it going in your eyes. A second shovel load lands, this time more compact and it hits your torso with the equivalent of a moderate punch to the ribs. You shout out but your unknown assailant does not respond as more earth cascades down on to you. You kick and wriggle but soon the earth begins to heap around you, your movements are constrained and you are trying to back up so you can keep your head as high as possible, just as you might do during our devaluation of you, trying desperately to retain some dignity. You continue to shout and scream and you begin to wonder whether you are making any sound at all as there is no response. Your legs are now covered and you are unable to move them now, the weight of the earth on them pinning them into place. Someone else has now taken control of how much you can move and they have deemed that there is to be no movement, at least from the waist down. Still that steady and rhythmic motion can just about be heard above you as the dirt continues to fall, a steady curtain of earth which is creating your tomb. The encroaching earth has moved over your chest and you look down, arms tied in front of you as you lift them up and down breaking the layer of earth for a little longer.
On it continues as more and more dirt tumbles onto you now making it seem as if the ground is swallowing you. How many times had you wished that would happen when you were on the receiving end of one our vicious tirades? You try to move your arms but the weight is too great and now the terror has taken your voice so that your once hearty yells and piercing screams are replaced by a strange strangulated rasp as the cries for help become lodged in your throat, just like the earth will do so very soon. Your pleas to be spared, your bid for clemency and begging for mercy has gone unheeded as the earth continues to rise and you shake your head from side to side, trying to fight off the onslaught. The whole of your body, save for your head, is now paralysed, trapped by the significant load of earth which has been dropped on to you. You can feel your lungs being squashed as your breathing becomes harder. You wish you were dead. A gun shot to the head, quick and instant. That would be better than this lingering, slow and crushing descent into suffocation. Sounds suddenly become muffled and you realise that the earth has now begun to cover your ears. You still twist your head but the room for movement has become even more reduced. Your eyes are shut now otherwise they would be filled with grit and crumbs of dirt. You spit and blow away the earth which lands across your mouth as just an oval of your face breaks the surface of the soil.Your terror and panic is at its zenith and then there is a cessation in the onslaught. You cannot feel anything dropping onto you any more. There is a spark of hope. Is this it? Have you been spared at the last moment? Have you perhaps been rescued, your tormentor now pinned to the ground by the timely arrival of law enforcement? Will it be only a matter of moments before the shovel tentatively digs around you to free you? You blink furiously and open your eyes hoping to see the glare of a flashlight.
Your vision sharpens into focus and you see the silhouette of somebody leaning over the edge of the pit, shovel in hand, peering down at you as if scrutinising you for the last time. You cannot make out any of their features against the darkening sky behind them as they stand and then the earthen rain begins again. You manage to muster a final scream of defiant protestation as the soil begins to gather over your face, covering your eyes, blocking your nose and sealing your mouth as a thousand thoughts flash through your mind, mixing with the terror as you wonder how long you have left?
Such a thought of being buried alive by an unknown aggressor or waking in a coffin having been mistakenly thought dead and thus buried alive, hands scrabbling at the smooth wood, yells and shouts unheard through the coffin lid and heaped earth above, causes considerable anxiety in many people. Such an imagined experience is akin to the way we treat our victims. We control them and restrict them, steadily and effectively, through the always used slice, slice, slice technique as we little by little reduce their movement, just as if we were heaping soil onto them. We create that sense of rising panic as there remains some movement but it is insufficient to escape the looming threat. Through our manipulations we keep you rooted to the spot with nowhere to escape to, nowhere to turn,just as if you are lying helpless in the bottom of a pit.
The steady and repeated accumulation of our manipulations make you feel as if you are being slowly suffocated. You cannot speak without approval or reprimand, your thoughts no longer feel your own as you are left to second guess what we want in order to try to avoid a further consequence. You close your eyes hoping it will all end and then your heart sinks as it does not. Each day you feel the air being drawn from your body, your strength sapping away, the will to fight back being diminished and stolen from you. The walls seems to close in on you, the air becoming stale and foul from you being kept indoors for so such long periods of time, prevented from seeing other people and leaving our sphere of influence. We invade your spaces, reading your messages, your e-mails and post. You have nowhere to go to in order to escape our incessant and all-consuming presence. We are like a weight on your chest, around your neck and about your heart.Your identity is steadily squeezed from you as we impress our thoughts, needs, desires and demands on you. Every day the pressure increases, just like the weight of the earth piling on your chest. You beg and plead for relief from this incessant pressure but just like the silent and unresponsive wielder of the shovel, you receive no respite from us either. The panic rises and the anxiety robs the breath from your lungs, forcing you to gasp as the panic attack takes you in its grip. You are suffocating. You cannot breathe. We are all around you, pressing against you, holding you, pressurising you, leaning on you, invading your space and driving the breath from your body. Being with us is just like being buried alive.
28 thoughts on “Buried Alive”
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I’m looking for answers to help with my adult kids. He has triangulated my daughter against me and groomed knothole my son and daughter against me. They do not see the truth. What can I do. In the past if anything positive happens he ruins it
This made me inwardly cringe just remembering the crippling claustrophobia I often felt when I was around him. Feeling zombified and hollowed out, yet completely alert to any change in his demeanour. It felt like there was an oppressive fog that enveloped the house. It always amazed me that no-one else could sense it, it was so all-encompassing. When I went back to collect my furniture after two months it was even more overwhelming, it made my skin literally itch and my head feel like it would burst.
The morning when I woke up after my discard, the very first emotion I felt was one of pure, unbridled relief. I actually smiled as I looked at the sun shining through the window. And no matter how he or his friends have hoovered me, smeared me or hurt me since and continue to do so, he can never make me feel like this again. I am alive to my thoughts and feelings once more.
Beautifully written HG. Very evocative and a definite jolt to the senses. I am claustrophobic and it gave me palpitations!
Thank you.
You know how to pull your readers into a story, HG. 🙂 Very well written!
It reminds me of the C.S.I. double-episode ‘Grave Danger’. An abducted CSI team member is lying in a glass coffin… air supply is limited… fire ants are attacking him… he is clutching his gun, pressing it firmly under his chin… will they find him before it’s too late? Heart-stopping!
Thank you Matilda, but you’ve stopped your tale!
On purpose, HG! 😀 Would not want to spoil it for those who have not seen it!
There is a bomb underneath the coffin, linked to his body weight. So, if they find him and pull him out at last… BOOM! Hmm, not looking good for the poor fellow… will they be able to save him?!
!!! Best double episode ever!! Directed by Quentin Tarantino no less!
Yes! 😀 … I held my breath when he coiled his finger around the trigger… as the air was running low and they were digging desperately. What a story line! 😀
And let’s not forget – George Eads – totally hot!
He’s very good looking, indeed! 🙂
But no one, no one, compares to Alan Rickman… I want a clone of Alan! Now! 😀
The closest I came to this would be the first few silent treatments doled out after having had a great time together thinking we had connected and we’re getting closer. ST’s make you feel completely drowned out with no voice worth being heard and turning invisible.
Excellent analogy.
I really ‘felt’ this article as I was reading it.
Made me hold my breath.
A real trigger and so very accurate.
Thank you HG.
You are welcome.
Dark yet beautifully written. Mine has always been sensation of suffocating. A noose around my neck tightening. In fact, that was exactly the feeling I had when I had a panic attack a few months back. It came out of nowhere.
As I was reading, I wondered to myself – does the tormentor punish his victims using his own worst nightmares? Does his torture somehow assuage his own fears?
Anyhoo, too much darkness.
I’m going to take a walk in the light now. You know you are always welcome to join me. You belong there. ❤☀❤
Love. Even tho it is over a year later I think I will join you on that walk
Few years ago I was sitting in my parent’s living room. It was a beautiful morning of June and I was looking outside, watching my mother taking care of the flowers. She was so proud of her beautiful garden and delighted as she was assessing the growth and health of her plants. I noticed how good she was in keeping her smile and confidence while ignoring the screams coming from somebody buried alive under the hydrangeas.
It has taken me a while to see this, too. She left me to survive on my own in a country I had never lived in before at 21. But later, she would show up, shake her head at how I was faiing in life, and walk away. Meanwhile, I was to listen to her trials aroud installing a jacuzzi tub (she doesnt like baths!) and the mural an artist was painting in the bathroom… So many examples of how she just smiled through our intense suffering.
It is sad you do this to your victims HG. I am really feeling sad for them.
I wrote this in my journal on 3/23/14 and want to share here, if I may….
This was over 3 years ago, before reading this blog today by HG:
“I have this sensation of I feel like I’m drowning in your chaos, choking and can’t breath”
Chilling….
I always likened it to slow suffocation.
Chilling indeed and why it’s an excellent analogy.
This also reminded me of alfred hitchcock! A def favorite! Creepy, dark yet it really describes that feeling of being stuck in a narc relationship being smothered alive
Not too long before my ex moved out, I was in bed and I was exhausted but I couldn’t sleep. Thankfully, The Devil was sleeping on the living room couch at this point, and I thought: He wants me dead and he is trying to kill me by breaking my heart. Can a person die from a broken heart? Yes, they can.
The light was being sucked out of me even though he was in another room. He was gone within the month and, then, I began to pick up all the pieces of my broken heart and put it back together again.
I👂🏼U and went through that routine hundreds of times… so tired and spent… didn’t care if I died, in fact it would have been welcome. My son was reason for living. I would never let him down because of someone else. And that is what I am still here
Ms brown
I had to protect our daughter from him. You are right, I couldn’t let her down or abandon her. We pulled through for our children and that is what matters most.
I get it.
Wow, morbidly and yet wonderfully written. Very Alfred Hitchcock styled. And, I felt I was in that terror while reading it, damn! And, I imagined myself stamping the dirt as it came down…stamp stamp stamp…but then I’d imagine you would have thought of that too and bound my legs. Then, I pray a good forensic will find my bones! In the mean time, I’m haunting the bad ass that killed me!!! 👻
https://youtu.be/c-tqzcq1BY0
https://youtu.be/8yvGCAvOAfM