Can a Person Make it Back?

I cross lines. That is to say, I often have something that I will not do (like cutting) and, after some time reminding myself that it is not an option (in the case of cutting my last feeble argument with myself was that, if I started to cut that would mean there really was something wrong) I find I have crossed it. This is how it was with suicide.

There was no line I needed to cross as far as suicidal ideation was concerned. That was something that I really could not controll. Several times a day the thought that I would like to be dead, that things would be better if I was, would flit through my mind. Distressing as those thoughts could be (depending on how alert I was to begin with) it was not something I could not live with.

I do not know how or when exactally I got to the point that I saw suicide as a viable option. Perhaps the continuious parade of suicide related thoughts made it impossible to tell when the shift happened. I just know that it did. Slowly I began to realize that I could kill myself. Not only that I could but that I desperatly wanted to. I became aware that I was no longer as concerned with the affect my suicide would have on those who loved me. Instead (as at least one of my previous posts shows) I began to turn the anti-suicide argument of 'It's so selfish' around. Was it not just as selfish of these people to ask me to live like this?

I had a detailed plan: where I would do it, how much time I would need, what the optimal time to do it would be (as in, when was my roommate going to be out the longest). I knew who I was going to include in the note I would write nad about what I would say (I would keep the note with me so I would not be found before it was finished), the note I would leave on the door for my roommate (in which I would tell her to call someone for support, then call the police, and most important of all do not try and come in the bathroom. Suddenly suicide was not just another fleeting thought that ran through my head but a viable option, one that was looking more and more 'appealing' the worse I felt.

I'm not at that place any more. I think I can (almost) honestly say that I do not even have those fleeting thoughts of suicide daily, much less several times a day.

But... I do not think I can go back to the way it was before, when it was only a thought flitting through my head. I just have this feeling that it will never be the same, that I will always, even if it is just in the back of my mind, see suicide as a viable option. Once having come to the conclusion that death, for me, is 'no big deal' (in my words to my last therapist... don't fess up to that by the way, they tend to freak out ;-))... I am not at all sure that I can go back.

"Those Thoughts ARE What's Wrong"

I posted a link to my last blog entry on a self harm awareness type page that I frequent. I wanted to share it there because more often than not folks respond to posts (especially if they know you) and I was feeling like I needed to hear something about what I wrote.

I got a PM from a guy thanking me for my honesty on what is a rater controversial topic (a PM that I greatly appreciated). And I heard from a few other friends offering general support and maybe some advice. One response stopped me in my tracks and plunged me into something like two minutes of deep thought (lol). My friend (we joke that we are 'Across the pond drinking buddies' as we (obviously) live on different contents and at one point were bothering drinking probably more than we should) said something about the thoughts (suidical ideation) hopefully fading in time to which I was forced to confess... I am not sure I want them to fade.

My first therapist asked me several times to call crisis line if I had any suicidal thoughts especially if I thought I might act on them. My response was always something like 'Why would I call when nothing is wrong? If I haven't done anything yet nothing is wrong so what is the point?' Finally he replied "Those thoughts are what's wrong".

I agree with him. If someone else were saying the same things to me that I have said in therapy in the past I would respond in the same way. My reasons for not wanting to call before can all pretty much be taken back to pride. I am mortified at the mere thought of having to deal with what would follow such a phone call.

This brings us to another problem which ties nicely in with the beginning of this blog. If I really wanted to kill myself it would make no sense to call someone who could then go about stopping me (or at least attempting to). Now these thoughts, this 'problem', are not as prevalent as they have been in the past. And sometimes I find myself wishing I were back in that place. I find myself thinking that if I just stopped taking my meds that perhaps, perhaps I could reach that place again, that dark, smothering place, where I could take my own life and thus put an end to 'it all' (whatever 'it all' is).

I'm medicated. And in some ways things are better. But only just. Not enough to give meaning to my life. Not enough to cause me to want to stick around any longer. Mostly what has gone is some of my will to kill myself. I cannot do it. But that has not stopped me from longing to quiet this earth forever... Mostly it has just taken away my ability to bring it about myself.

-NO TITLE-

(I just couldn't come up with one...)

Many churches across the nation set aside the third Sunday in January as Sanctity of Human Life Sunday. For the past few years that I have been with my current church (since coming to University, and then staying after graduation) this Sunday has focused on the pro-life topic in regards to (unnecessary) abortion (please allow me my views on the subject, I have my reasons, the same as you, and am not a fanatic... this post is not actually about abortion). This year the title of the sermon our preacher gave (something like Caring for Bruised Reeds) and the scripture reference out of Isaiah had me thinking even before I set my bass down and took my seat for the sermon. It turns out that this years sermon was directed as much toward the new doctor assisted suicide law here in Washington State as it was at abortion.

I like babies. Love them, in fact. And unfortunatly there are many unnecessary abortions in this country every year. Some folks simply use it as a method of birth control for how often they do it. They simply do not want children or children will not fit into their life style at the moment. I do think that in dire circumstances (such as when mom and/or babies life is in danger) it is warrented, though that does not make it any less tragic in my mind. But that is all I will say on that subject as it is not really the point of this blog post.

I live with what my last therapist called 'chronic' thoughts of suicide. Praise God, they are not nearly as bad as they were a few months ago (when they were more frequent -several times in a day-, more intense, and more 'urgent') but I still live with them most (if not every) days of the week, month, etc. Needless (in my mind, anyway) to say I had a rather hard time jumping on the bandwagon (so to speak) during that sermon this past Sunday. To be totally honest I had a hard time just sitting there listening to it. Never once when thinking about the 'sanctity of human life' did I take it farther than the plight of thousands upon thousands of unborn babies.

Now before y'all recall my past asperations of becoming a counselor and totally freak out let me remind you of something else I have said in the past. It's not that I am, you know, all for suicide, for killing oneself. I become just as concerned as the next person when someone else shows signs of possibly wanting to end their own life. But I can't take it from there to myself. And talking about it in the abstract I would have to say that I find it easier to understand why someone whould chose to end their life (for instance rather than continue on with a painful, terminal illness).

I guess my point is that I never considered that killing yourself would be that big an offense as far as God is concerned. And I am not sure that I 100% agree.

It just doesn't seem fair...

What to do with that I have no idea...

I Can't

It was my last year (finally) of University. I had given up my place as wroship leader at my church group because I knew my last year would be tough. I (unwisely) had waited until this year to tackle some of the 'worst' required classes in my major (psychology). I planned to find an instructor to help with their research. I was going to study for, take, and, if God loved me at all, pass the GRE. No one would have been suprised at hearing that my roommate saw me only occasionally.

But as it turns out, none of those things happened.

Instead I rarely attended my classes (especially that first quarter in the fall). Instead I spent much of my time sleeping (sometimes in my car on campus between an attempt at going to classes and work, very often back in bed after an attempt at going to said classes). When I did manage to drag myself to one or the other of them I very often was not 'present' enough to absorbe any of the material being presented. I attempted one of those 'required classes from hell' three times before I finally managed to complete it (the instructor was wonderful about it, bent over backward to get me through it including supporting my petition for a hardship withdrawal the second time I took the class).

I stopped going to my church group completely and sporadically attended services on Sundays. I eventually even stopped playing bass for Sunday services (made sense as I was not attending regularly).

I stopped going out much at all. I did not join my roommate when she went to parties with friends. I went out only when necessary. As a matter of fact, more often than not the only times she did me were when I was coming down from my room to take care of some sort of commitment I had or on my way up to my room (which was dark as I had put aluminum foil over the window in hopes it would help me sleep later in the day and not wake up at the crack of dawn) where I either hid under my pillow, slept, or stared vacantly at the ceiling or wall.

I wanted so badly to die.

In the aftermath of all this (what was the worst major depressive episode I have ever had... and it was number five) I feel... incapabul.

And I cannot tell anyone. I want to so much, but I am afraid of their reactions (from past experience I annticipate something that I just cannot handle). But I want to. I want to so that they will understand. I want to so they will stop minimizing all of this; my depression, the experience of this last episode (my sister interpreted 'last year really really really bit' as having to do with difficult classes and not getting the grades I wanted).

God, I wish I could. But... I just can't.

I've Come to a Conclusion

As I sat on a bed in the ER yesterday I came to a conclusion. After being asked three (or was it four) times yesterday whether or not the cut on the SIDE of my wrist was a suicide attempt (the answer is 'no' by the way; almost got myself in trouble though when the doc asked me that question because I laughed and started to say 'No, if it was a suicide attempt I would have done it correctly'... thankfully I caught myself just after 'No'.), and almost (if not) as many times if I had ever tried to kill myself I came to a conclusion: The cut I made on my wrist when I was drunk in April, the one that is in the correct spot, going the correct direction; the one that was deep enough to hit a vein that then needed to be tied off. That cut, though intentional (to some degree), was not a suicide attempt. Possibly I am trying to fool myself. Intellectually it seems TOTALLY wrong...

But that is my conclusion.