World Suicide Prevention Day 2018

September has always been my favorite month. Mostly it’s my favorite because it’s my birth month, but as years go on I find more and more reasons to love it. It marks the beginning of a new school year–which doesn’t directly impact me anymore, but I can still remember my first-day-of-school jitters and excitement every Fall. That first month of school as we all eased out of Summer was always full of new beginnings, the rekindling of old friendships and the start of new ones, new classes and class schedules. Everything fresh, everything new.

As I’ve gotten older it’s also marked the start of Pumpkin Spice Everything season, visits to the orchard for apple cider and donuts, and most importantly a full 30 days focused on mental health and suicide prevention.

September 10 is World Suicide Prevention Day. It’s a day where we can call attention to a worldwide crisis by showing each other kindness and reminding others to stay. We, all of humankind, can come together to realize how important each individual is to this earth. We can focus on community and the value of being present for each other. I will admit that in recent years I haven’t been as vocal or active with mental health awareness as I used to be, but I still care very deeply about the cause and what it’s meant in my life.

I used to lead Grand Valley’s chapter of To Write Love on Her Arms. I attended the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention’s Out of the Darkness Walk every year for 4 or 5 years. I wore the shirts, the bracelets, the hoodies. I attended the concerts and hosted the open mic nights. I handed out info cards, I donated my time and money to the cause. All of it. I was the poster child of suicide prevention.

On the outside I was doing all the things a mental health advocate was supposed to do. I encouraged my friends to “seek help” and reminded them that they’re not alone. I held them as we cried together. I urged them to love themselves and to see the worth in themselves. Meanwhile, I wasn’t ever following my own advice. I’ve been fairly open about my feeling of hypocrisy during my college years especially, and even since then. But I could never quite reconcile those feelings that I was a fake. Rationally, I realize these things don’t make me a fake. But when you struggle with depression and anxiety, it’s easy to beat yourself and convince yourself that you are.

For years and years I’ve told everyone not to give up. You are loved. You are worthy. Your struggles do not define you and it WILL get better. And I truly mean it every time I say it. That said, I have a horrible time believing these things for myself, and those doubts manifest themselves in ways that can cause a lot of strain on my relationships. It can be very isolating and disheartening. I have felt so lost, so alone, and so worthless for so, so long. Mental illness is no fricken joke, and it is an uphill battle every. single. day. Even with medication, I still have to fight the urge to stay in bed all day instead of being part of the world. I still find myself wanting to hide in a hole and disappear for awhile instead of facing simple everyday things like doing the dishes, or putting gas in my car.

I am incredibly fortunate that I do not have any suicide attempts under my belt, but I know far too many incredible people who cannot say the same. My heart breaks for them because I know they still struggle, and they deserve SO much more in this life than the pain in front of them. We all do. I am so thankful that many of them are still here to see things get better. And I mourn those whom we’ve lost too soon.

After many years of living the lie that I was a lost cause that wasn’t worth the time, money or effort to get better, I am happy to report that I finally started therapy last week with a counselor I think I’m really going to get along with. And even if we don’t, I know there is one out there for me that I will click with. It’s kind of like dating. It feels good knowing I’m finally giving myself the love and attention and care that I deserve. I likely wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t have the judgment-free support system that I do, and all it took was for me to say I needed help.

If you find yourself feeling like the world, or your friends, or your family would be better off without you–please, listen to me when I say that we are not better off without you here. It’s not easy asking for help. It’s TERRIFYING at times. But even when you don’t see or feel it, you are loved beyond measure, and you’re worth fighting for your life. I guarantee you have at least one person willing to stand with you at the bottom of that hill and help you climb back up. Tomorrow needs you.

 

Holding Nothing Back

I’ve had people tell me that they wish they could feel things the way I do. They see the way I can cry over the things that pain me, saying they rarely, if ever, cry. And I’ve never understood that. Not being able to cry. Not only that, but WANTING to cry. To feel things so deeply that you physically can’t hold back the tears. It can be cleansing, sure. Therapeutic even. But mostly it just sucks.

They see me seething, jaw clenched tight to keep from saying angry things I’ll regret. Sick to my stomach with anxiety and worry. “Things just don’t bother me that much.” Well, lucky you.

Even the things that should be good–hearing the perfect song to fit the moment, being happy drunk, love–even these are too much. Even these hurt. I can understand wanting to feel these things more intensely if they’re things that aren’t strong for you more than I can the others. But you don’t get to pick and choose. Most often if you feel some things in big ways, you feel EVERYTHING in HUGE ways, and there’s no middle ground.

Jamie Tworkowski wrote a book called If You Feel Too Much and it is a collection of essays he’s written for To Write Love on Her Arms over the years. It explores the things that move us, experiences that make us feel things we don’t know how to hold. It celebrates being human. It encourages honesty in the feelings we’re facing. It hit me today how much weight that title really holds for me.

If You Feel Too Much.

It’s something I’ve been wrestling my entire life. From explosive temper tantrums when I was a small child, to stress-induced breakdowns on the kitchen floor as a hungry, overworked college student, all the way up to now, when the thought of waking up some days makes me wish morning would never come. It’s changed shape, but it hasn’t gotten any easier.

I would give just about anything to not feel everything so damn deeply. So when someone tells me they wish they could feel things the way I do, I want to scream, “Take it–take it from me! For the love of God, please take it.” Instead I sink a little deeper. My chest restricts a little more. The shackles tighten around my ankles and I wish I could walk away from the weight for just a little while.

Even on medications meant to stabilize my moods, I still feel too much. I don’t have a medium setting. When I love, I love fiercely and with intensity. I love quickly and hold nothing back. When I’m hurting, my entire world aches and my chest wants to collapse in on itself. I wear my whole heart tattered, torn and bleeding in my hands, begging someone to nurse it back to some semblance of health. I can’t control any of it. I can’t keep any of it inside–at least, not for long.

I’ve found that people are really drawn to this at first. They’re intrigued by my intensity. They want to observe my unrelenting emotions, but from a safe enough distance that they can still live vicariously through me without being drowned in it like me. They want to sit safely on the shore, toes just brushing the tide as it comes in. They don’t want to dive in themselves, but don’t mind seeing me thrown off the boat. So long as they don’t get hit with the splash.

Once they realize it’s not just a novelty or amusing quirk, but a full-blown and constant rollercoaster for me, they’re out. They’ve had their fill, they can chalk me up to being emotional and/or crazy for my intensity, and they’re on their way. It’s more whiplash for me, and soon enough nothing for them.

Most people don’t want all of the messiness like they say they do. They don’t mind a little dirt here and there, don’t mind the polished, cleaned up version. But they have no real interest in the reality of how the messes come to be, or the process of scraping off the mud. They want watered down cocktails and coffee with their cream. They want flood gates and the Hoover Dam. They want canals and streams, not oceans and waterfalls. An occasional rainstorm, not hurricane season.

I don’t blame them for wanting the lesser versions. I do, too. I want Instagram filters and sunlight through sunglasses and tinted windows. I want the calculated release of rivers through the spillway. I want to give just enough at just the right time. I want the ability to hold back.

Some may see your empathy as a blessing. And maybe it is when you’re able to feel it with the volume turned way down. But when your own pain is already turned up to 11, taking on the burdens of those around you with the same fervor and intensity is absolute hell. It’s an inescapable curse. Your “normal” becomes a state of barely getting by, and the things that would bring others to their knees is just another day in the life. You’re stronger for it, stronger than you ever thought possible. Stronger than you even realize because to you it isn’t strength, it’s survival. It’s an ugly necessity.

For better or worse, you’re surviving, and that takes the most strength of all.

It’s a struggle. And it’s hard. And it fucking sucks. But for some reason people envy and admire you for it, even if they want to do so at arm’s length. And it’s okay that you disagree. It’s okay that it frustrates you. It’s okay that you want to give some (if not all) of it up.

It’s okay to feel like you feel too much. It’s okay to hold nothing back. And it’s okay to know that it comes at a price.

World Suicide Prevention Day and Why I Choose to Stay

Suicide is never an easy thing to talk about. 

There are so many different sides to it and I think I’ve been on almost every single one at some point in my life. And that’s not an easy or fun thing to admit. I’ve been on the other end of the phone at 1am when a friend was wanting to give up. I’ve been stuck in bed for days at a time wishing it could all be over. I’ve received text messages telling me ____ has killed themself. I’ve hugged a grieving mother who lost her only child far too soon. I’ve sat across the table from friends and discussed suicide at length and what it feels like and how hard it is to move forward when it seems like it would be so much easier to just not. I’ve sat in classrooms and panel discussions and looked at suicide and mental health from an academic standpoint. I’ve even had a psychology professor tell an entire lecture hall the intimate details of how a girl you knew died by suicide.

I know there are so many other sides to it, and all of them are painful. But it’s important that we don’t treat difficult things like they’re taboo. They’re not a glass bowl ready to shatter at the first sign of gravity. Pain sucks and it sucks to focus on the things that bring us pain even if it’s just for a moment. But those moments are important parts of healing and growth. If we don’t talk about the things that we struggle with they turn into shameful secrets we don’t dare whisper. 

Whisper them. Whisper them until they don’t scare you anymore, and then speak them a little louder. There’s no shame in needing help, needing someone to listen, needing someone to sit with you while you cry. And if you’re lucky enough to have never felt the crushing weight of suicide, please be patient with those who have and be someone they can trust won’t look at them differently because of their pain. Be someone who cares, who holds their hands and looks them in the eyes and tells them they are worthy and needed on this earth. 

Remind them you want them to stay. 

I’ve had a hard time finding reasons to stay sometimes. Not that I don’t know my family and friends love me, I do. But sometimes depression can become so blinding that it’s easy to forget what I’m fighting for. But when it comes down to it, when I’m at the lowest of my low, I know that no matter how much pain I’m in it is temporary. I know that it could never be worse than the pain of losing someone in such a tragic way. We mourn the deaths of celebrities when they die, we scrutinize their entire lives and careers searching for answers that may not be there. And if we can feel so deeply for people we’ve never met, then I can only imagine the gut wrenching pain that is mourning someone you know and love. 

I choose to stay because I know my work isn’t done yet. I choose to stay because there are so many things I have yet to experience in life. I choose to stay because I refuse to let my disease win. I choose to stay because I’m worth it. 

I hope you always choose to stay, too. 

A Dolled Up Life

I have finally found a home for my words.

Writing has been and always will be one of my greatest passions. I’ve let it take a backseat for a few years now and it’s time to let it get back behind the wheel. One of my biggest road blocks in writing is the ever-present question: What the heck should I write about?

Well, I finally have an answer to that question, and you will find that answer here.