TW: suicide
A couple of days ago I received two rejection letters not an hour apart. Rejection letters are a thing of their own kind. Singularly painful and yet vague and unassuming. I’ve gotten them multiple times before…but not two at the same time.
Unfortunately, I’m in a bit of a state at the moment. Between my bad health and my empathy for others in pain, my sick brain was gaining momentum.
Depression, for me, is an ache, an ache in the core of my body. My body and mind are so filled with despair that living seems a challenge. I have to fight every urge to kill myself. And I say urge as in the times a day you might want a snack. That’s how often, and how calming the idea is. A pack of gummies is the same as suicide. Anything becomes a way to hurt—a pen to stab myself, and scarf to choke myself, and belt to hang myself, a knife to cut myself. Now imagine not being able to turn it off in your head. When it gets this bad all I can think to do is sleep. It’s much less dangerous as long as you can keep it going for a while. I’m talking hours of sleep. Just trying to stay safe.
I’m in a very happy marriage and my husband is aware of everything. There’s nothing to question within our love so I don’t need to focus on writing about it. Besides to say that he is the only reason I stay alive. I’m sorry to my friends, my pets, family…but you couldn’t save me…I’m that far into this journey.
Depression this bad makes life seem so long. How many more years of this can I ideally take? I think of when Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain succumbed. I got the feeling that (he especially) just knew he couldn’t do it for years and years more. No matter the lifestyle, death is ready when you are.
And so who knows how long my life will be? And does it matter how many times a friend tells me not to because they’ll miss me…I can’t make any promises. As a person with a fairly cushy life on the outside, getting two letters about a “hobby” isn’t this big of a deal. If only my brain thought of it that way. But writing is where I see myself as something, just something not nothing. And not nothing is that only thing I want in life. A sad person who just wants to be something. Can anyone hear me?
*image DC character Constantine