Friday, July 6, 2018

Since the awful news of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain, my head has been spinning. And these news stories seemed to be making everyone else’s head spin, as well. For the first week, the stories were all over the place; headlining news, posts from everyone and every news outlet about depression, opinions on why and how, opinions on what you need to not ever find yourself in that position. But, then they stop. As someone who has struggled her entire life with depression, seeing these conversations happen made me so happy; hearing people share their own stories and opening up about a topic that has long been buried in the depths of souls was a reminder that I am just one of many  But now, all that’s left are false hopes from well-meaning people, dried-up “thoughts and prayers”, articles from poorly-educated people on how suicidal thoughts can diminish entirely, and the scars on people like me, who still suffer.

WhiIe I can’t say I’ve ever tried to take my own life, I can say that I’ve thought about it. There have been about three very significant times in my life where I had that thought, things would be better if I weren’t here and times where that thought lingered for longer than a few seconds. I eliminated all the ways in which I could or wouldn’t do it, and thought about the “easiest” ways to do it. 

I have a very clear memory of a girl I used to know who opened up to me about her struggles with suicidal thoughts and told me she tried to drink a whole bottle of NyQuil to do it. And, I did my best to listen and comfort her and to try to say the right things at twelve or thirteen, when, honestly, I had no experience at all to even know what the right thing to say would be. But, I also wondered, would that work? It obviously didn’t work for her, but was it because there wasn’t enough? Did she not drink the whole bottle? Did she need more than one? That seemed like the most enticing way to go — flush a collection of pills from my mom and dad’s medicine cabinet with a couple bottles of NyQuil, lay down in my bed and drift off into an endless, peaceful sleep.

But then I thought — what if it didn’t work and I ended up like the kid in high school who never came back junior year. There were quiet conversations and wild rumors going around that he had slashed his wrists. I didn’t want to be that kid; I didn’t want to have to leave my school with no warning, to force my parents to move away or to constantly be looked at by friends and family with those soft, I’m-sorry faces or have people smile at them and say behind their backs, what did they do wrong? Because as much as I didn’t know about my depression, I knew enough to know it wasn’t their fault.

I often wonder why I never got to the point of trying. And the only thing I can think of was because I was too scared. I was scared of everything — scared of falling off a bike with no training wheels, scared of a soccer ball kicked my way and of roller blades; scared of large dogs, of water, scared of the dark, and of the turning bar on the playground. I was scared of what everyone else thought about me, of disappointing people, of not having friends, or even worse, having friends who really didn’t like me all that much; I was scared of failing and of not being enough — I’m still scared of all these things. I was scared of ruining my mom and dad’s lives, mostly. And I think in a way, all these things saved me. I was more afraid of being the person who tried to kill themselves and failed than of actually doing it.

Sometimes, I think maybe I just wasn’t “depressed enough”. Maybe my depression wasn’t close enough to the “suicide” end of the spectrum. Maybe I was helped at the right moments. Maybe I had enough support around me at those darkest moments where that option seemed really, REALLY good at the time. 

But I look at Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain — of Chester Bennington and Robin Williams — and I think about the siblings of people I know who took their own lives, and I wonder if they also had these moments of saving grace at some point in their lives and for whatever reason, in those last ones, they just…didn’t. Or maybe their illness was just — plain and simple — more advanced than mine.

I’ll never know these answers. I’ll never know why I never got that far. 

I grew up in church, which had a big role in shaping who I am (for better and worse). And a lot of people think, well you grew up reading the bible, going to Sunday school, going to youth group and summer camps, and all the church functions (and I mean ALL). You know Jesus, who is the ultimate healer and the only way for true peace and the Alpha and Omega, etc., etc., so how can you be depressed?

Ugh.

Statements like this (or statements that basically allude to having a relationship with Jesus = 100% joy) make my blood boil. I’ve spent a majority of my life hating myself. True, deep, dark hatred and self-loathing. My depression manifested itself by constantly telling me when someone hurt me that it was my fault and I deserved it; it told me I wasn’t going to be good enough for anything and that I would always have to work hard to get people to love (or even like) me. It told me I would always be an outcast, a nerdy little girl who people pittied, not really great at anything, not even very smart. (To this day, I’m constantly feeling like I can’t ever do things right or that I’m always close to failing at something.) It told me that if I died, no one would really care much. And, oh how I prayed. For years and years I prayed and prayed and prayed, and begged God to take away these feelings. I bargained, made promises, and spent so many nights crying to God to change me and make me feel different

At a very young age, I knew I believed in Jesus. I’ve had so many moments of my life where I felt God showed up, and if you aren’t a spiritual person or a believer, it’s hard to explain what that’s like. But, what I can say it’s like is just having an overwhelming feeling of comfort. It’s like feeling you know everything will be okay without knowing why you feel that way. And even though I always feel like I’m not “Christian enough”, what I know is that it doesn’t stop God from loving me and showing up for me.

What all this comes down to is that what I do know is this — severe depression doesn’t go away with church or prayers or believing in God. Depression doesn’t discriminate. It doesn’t care who you are, what you believe, what your childhood was like, what or do, or what you don’t do. Suicidal thoughts are rooted in a deep, dark place in the soul; it's born there, it grows there, and it lives there and all you can do is whack away at it to stop it from continuing to grow. I have been blessed enough to have people around me to nudge me in the right directions and amazing therapists who have helped me find myself (and all the good things and all the reasons to live) and some fantastic pills that keep me level-headed and keep my emotions stable. 



But, some aren’t as blessed. Those are the people we need to seek out, to love a little more, to support, to nudge in the right directions. Will it stop suicide all together? 100% not. But, could it save a life? Yes, yes it could.