These Are the Words

The moment when you reach out for help and receive the boiler plate response such as “You’re not alone” or “things are not that bad” or “hang in there sweetie, it will get better”; am I the only one who feels even worse after receiving that? I feel like those responses are the common response to a call for help, even if it is from people that really do care for you, but they were not helpful. Maybe their perception of what you are feeling is off, or they just simply cannot relate; it is still defeating. Perhaps just simply accepting how I felt may have made me feel better, to acknowledge the thoughts, and moved forward. Having had multiple run-ins with this exact scenario, I figured it would be a good opportunity to say simply that those that have been in that position would never belittle how you feel. Being alive gives you every right to feel how you feel. These are the words of a man with nothing much else to give, aside from his thoughts and experiences with something that many people deal with. My biggest struggle with depression has been how it affects those around me, and my fears of the letdown. It is hardly ever the case where your actions affect you and have no collateral damage and therefore, that is where I am. This is Me, and this is my story. Begin Tape 1 (just kidding). This is the first installment of multiple posts going through my constantly evolving story that has (yet) to end. Fingers crossed.

Contemplation

It is dark. Thirteen hours of bartending, catering to people I do not care about, it was all bullshit. The constant belittling of the person that I was had weighed on me for the last time; or so I thought. I had just gotten home from a particularly stressful shift at the bar, and my will to keep breathing was at an all-time low. I think I have always been somewhat of a morose person, but even this weekend got me to a point I had never been. Pure exhaustion as I fell back onto the couch, maybe just hoping to fall asleep and forget about everything, if just for a short time. My bare back itched against the rough upholstery of the IKEA couch my best friend and I purchased when we first moved in together. A random L couch became a symbol of the union of our lives and where we were and where we were to be, eventually. It was only right that in that uncomfortable but familiar spot I decided I was going to kill myself.

Wait! I am a man. I am strong. I am resolute. I am without emotion. I am Groot. I do not succumb to emotion. Wrong. I am a man. A broken man, a man who has experienced true loss, real pain, exponential sadness (wait, probably not exponential. Scratch this) and this is okay. These are the words I tell myself. Suicide is something that is done at extreme points in a life; sadness, terror, melancholy. The prospect of having the courage to do that, it had a tantalizing appeal to me. Would I be remembered well? Would my best friends speak beautiful words at my funeral? Would my mom be sad? Would my mom? Would my…Mom. My mother. The best woman I know, the woman that I would want my future wife to aspire to be. The woman that brought me into the world. How would she feel, the strongest woman I know, knowing that her youngest son committed suicide because “he just could not hack it”? This fear crosses into my mind. Shame. *ding ding*.

These are the words (and sounds) echoing in my head, and so the tempest carries on. Do I have the courage or willpower to do what needs to be done? How does that manifest itself? Do the words continue to hold some meaning from loved ones, when all seems lost? Or does shame, fear of reaching out and expressing these thoughts win?

Fingers crossed.

Author:  Blake Whitney