Regarding Suicide

As another celebrity suicide hits the front page (may you be at peace, Anthony Bourdain), my various social media feeds are filling up with friends posting numbers, hotlines, and general messages of support and love, in particular saying "you are loved."

And sometimes I find that baffling.  Let me explain.

I'm not untouched by suicide:  I've lost both a dear friend and a dear friend's husband to it.  Not to mention, of course, my own attempts at it.  And when these messages pop up, they give me pause.

Because I don't think I have ever once, not during my attempts or any of the many suicidal thoughts that flit through my head, thought, "I want to kill myself because no one loves me."  In fact, I don't think I think of other people at all.  And maybe that's the point.

Please don't misunderstand.  I am only one mentally ill individual, and even people with the same mental diagnoses can have vastly different experiences of the disease.  I can only speak for myself and my own broken brain in this case.

In my case, when those thoughts come creeping in, it's because of endless hours of simply existing, of surviving.  There's a Jane Austen quote, of all people, that sums it up for me:  "Life seems but a quick succession of busy nothings" (Mansfield Park).  Now replace "quick" with "endless," and that's often how I feel.  And I think, How am I going to get through this?  This week?  This day?  These next two hours?  Sometimes days just seem to stretch on and on forever, with me just hanging there in a continual state of ennui.  And it is exhausting.

But I don't think of the rest of you.  I don't think No one loves me.  Or Everyone hates me.  I don't think about what people might think or do or say when/if I'm gone.  I don't think of other people at all.  Suicidal thoughts are a profoundly solitary activity.  I simply think of not being able to handle the burden of living anymore, of finding ways to fill up all of that awful space and time.

The only time I do think of people outside of myself is the occasional passing thought that there are people out there who have "normal" lives.  There are people out there who don't wake up every morning hating every fucking thing.  What is that like??  There are people out there who go through twenty-four hours feeling fine, if not great, even physically, not wracked with constant pain, aches, and fatigue.  There are people out there who, when asked, "How are you?" they say, "Great!" and they actually mean it.

That blows my fucking mind.

I know "How are you?" is a greeting, not a real question of my state of things, which is why I usually respond with "Fine" or "Okay."  Because you know what?  I don't ever, nor will I ever, feel "good" or "great," and I find it hard to lie.  So yeah, the most you'll get out of me on a daily basis is "fine" or "okay" or even "meh."  And sometimes even that is a stretch.

A good friend (who shall remain nameless) recently said to me, "Sometimes you seem so unhappy, and I can never quite figure out why."
And I responded with:  "It's called being mentally ill.  It's part of my DNA, my chemical make-up.  This is just how things are."

I know it may not seem like it.  With my theatre and my shoe fetish and my love of kittehs, but it's there.  And it never goes away.  Most days are a struggle of some kind.

But it's not because I don't think people love me.  It's because my cells are constantly tired of existing and my brain lies to me about why I'm here and what's going on, and it's an uphill battle every day to convince my body and head otherwise.

Suicide Prevention Hotline:  1-800-273-8255