It would have been easier in Cheaper than Therapy

I don’t understand. My world feels black- empty. For a while it was muffled, then muted, but now it just has vanished into nothingness. Why is it this hard? When do I stop hurting?
I’m trapped, suffocating under this pool of empty pain and sadness. I fight- I claw my way through the day with my face craned upwards towards the surface but I never seem to reach it. I just want to feel the unfiltered sun… I want to be happy even if its just for a second. Instead, I just watch the silent film of the world beyond the water move on without me. I watch normal life and yearn for it; so close to see but something I feel is impossible to be a part of anymore. I just keep straining; running out of breath, out of fight, out of will to live.
It’s almost easier if I would have stayed. At least I was loved partially within strict, barbed-wired parameters. At least I had a roof over my head and my dogs to fill in the gaping holes between episodes of being “loved”. I could have survived on what I had- to obey, to sit, to eat, to come… a dog on a leash. But not a stray.
But now I have nothing.
My head feels so damn heavy from carrying these thoughts that are constantly slamming into the sides of my skull. My throat feels raw from swallowing imperfect words that would fall into emptiness even if I tried. I want to pry my eyes from my head just so my cheeks would finally have a chance to dry.