I’m too paranoid these days, but I can’t stand feeling this way

There’s a familiar feeling I’ve been experiencing lately that was most common last year. The cold, bony hands of people who aren’t even there gently caressing my shoulders, paired with faces inching closer to me until I feel squirmish and dirty.

I used to have hallucinations. None of them were scary in the stereotypical sense, it feels better to describe them as suffocating. Silence is something you treasure deeply until you’re alone at home (well, besides the dogs that are with you downstairs, if you have any like I do) whilst your parents are at work, and the ringing in your ears gradually gets louder.

I keep glancing over my shoulder, scanning the mirror and my computer for patterns of faces in the screen of groups of creatures shaped like people staring straight back at me. They’re not real, but they still feel real, and no matter how many times I shove a blanket over mirrors and screens when I’m not using them I can still feel a presence nearby me, either grabbing me, standing next to me or staring back at me every time I look twice when I turn around. They drain my energy and leave me feeling numb.

Sometimes, I’ll hear footsteps or loud noises, but that was more common last year. Now, all I can feel is people that aren’t even real surrounding me almost every second of my life, whether I’m completely alone or not, and it’s ruining my life since now I don’t have the energy to do hygiene past bathing and brushing my teeth or eating properly unless someone else makes the food for me.