CHAPTER 8: how is Ishmael lost? Literally and figuratively?

Beah recounts his walking for two days without sleep, stopping only to drink water from streams. He cannot shake the feeling of being followed, and so he keeps pushing himself onward. On the third day, he becomes lost in a forest and has difficulty finding his bearings. Emotionally (figuratively) Beah is also lost. The loneliness of being in the forest affects Beah the most. Alone with only his constant thoughts, he cannot stop his mind from pondering the fates of his friends and family. He develops a fear of sleeping, anxious that his suppressed negative thoughts would come through in his dreams. As the days pass, Beah keeps searching for a way out of the forest; his efforts are in vain, however, for the forest seems to become thicker and more threatening no matter how far or in which direction he walks.