Finding the Reason to Make Living Worth It

It can be done.

I wasn't originally going to do a blog about Robin Williams death. In fact, I'm working on editing a vlog about feminism that I filmed before the whole thing happened -- well, the day of, I should say. But I am compelled to share my story, since so many people are discussing suicide awareness right now. I knew I couldn't do another vlog about it, since I would probably be an emotional mess. So text is all you get right now.

I should say that I'm not asking for advice or sympathy here. In fact, just typing out these words has been a bit cathartic in itself. I just wanted to share my story. To tell others out there, if they can hear me, that they aren't alone. That we all go through some sort of battle between being a teenager and being an adult.

My story:

I was a really bad teenager. Like, every parent's worst nightmare come to life. We can all speculate as to why I was such a terrible child. It may have been my mother's death when I was 7. Or it may have been my grandparents taking legal custody of me at age 5. Maybe it was because I had such a hard time making and keeping friends or creating longstanding relationships with anyone at all. Maybe it was just the chemicals in my brain. We'll never know why I was so messed up and it's pointless to wonder now. 

I think my emotional problems all started when I was about 13 or 14. Right at that peak of hormonal craziness we call puberty. I was in the 8^th grade or so and I was a mess. I started listening to angry music, stopped caring about what I looked like, and started sleeping – a lot. That’s also when I started having trouble making friends – or keeping the ones I already had. There was a boy named Andrew who I remember wanted to date me in the 8^th grade. I told him I would go out on a date with him after school and then I didn't show up because I was too nervous. I guess that’s when I started having anxiety problems too. All of those signs in 8^th grade were warnings of what was to come. I was an okay kid in middle school. But, when I started high school, everything changed.

I know what it is like to want to die. And you can say that, as a teenager, I didn't even know what life was or why I should want to die in the first place. And maybe you’re right. But the fact still stands that I wanted to die. Twice, it got so bad that I unsuccessfully attempted to do just that. I know how teenagers feel when they say their parents and everyone else around them just don’t understand. I take them seriously when they say that. I don’t just laugh it off like most adults do. There is something about being a teenager, being in that horrible and scary storm of hormones and emotions where you don’t feel like you can control anything you say or do that still haunts me to this day. And like I said before, maybe I have some sort of chemical imbalance that isn't helping things. But I still, to this day, have times where I feel like I can’t control my emotions. My husband will say something to me and I know I won’t be able to control my own reaction. It’s a horrible feeling, being powerless to your hormones and emotions, and it can lead you to some pretty scary places.

I was hospitalized twice for trying to kill myself. The first time in a place that wasn't really that serious and didn't really teach me the lesson they wanted me to learn. But the second time was good enough for me. What was the lesson? That killing yourself isn't socially acceptable and, as a teenager or a child, you aren't allowed to do it and if you try and fail, you will be in for a huge shitstorm of punishment. That’s what I got at the second place, which I won’t name. They made us write our entire life story, in horrific detail, and wouldn't let us eat until it was done. If it wasn't up to their standards, you had to start again, not just add in things, but start the whole thing again. And you had to hand write it. It was supposed to be some sort of exercise to make you see the good things you had. And, if you’re starving because you haven’t eaten in 24 or 48 hours, you’ll write almost anything to make people happy. That’s what I think I learned there, how to figure out what people wanted to hear and spit it back at them. And that’s what I did from then on. I did what people wanted me to do and said what they wanted me to say and knew that all that life consisted of was telling lies, saying I’m fine, and living up to whatever everyone else wanted from me.

I didn't try to kill myself again. I just did things to try to make life easier. I got high, I drank, I took a lot of pills that I didn't necessarily understand, I did things that I’m not 100% proud of. I console myself by thinking that I am a different person now and I would never do what I did then. I was desperate to establish some sort of meaning to my life. I was 18 and frustrated. If life was so hard for most of the first 18 years, how could the next 50 or more be any better? It seemed like such a long time. I took solace in thinking that, if it kept getting worse, I always reserved the right to quit. I quit almost everything else anyway. I was already labelled a quitter. The truth was, when you’re always doing what other people want you to do, nothing is fun and quitting is always what you want to do. And when you have no dedication, no motivation to do what you signed up to do to make someone happy, you’ll end up quitting at some point. I was living to make other people happy and I knew at some point I would quit that too.

I went to college and hated it. The only thing good about college is I didn't have to hide my drinking and drugs as much as I did when I lived with my parents. In fact, drinking was encouraged. For once in my life, I was kind of cool. But that didn't last very long. I pushed everyone away for my own silence. People didn't get me. They didn't understand the way my brain was working. I don’t blame them for that. They just didn't understand. I was an outcast by my own choice.

A year at college passed and I moved into an on campus apartment which my grandparents paid extra for so I could have it to myself. They saw that I wasn't getting along quite as well as they had hoped. I begged for the apartment to myself and they always gave me what I wanted. But, in fact, the apartment to myself probably wasn't the best thing for me. I spent most of my time in bed watching television and trying to get out of my own body. I had too much freedom, did whatever I wanted all the time, and crashed and burned. I was put on academic probation. Then my grandpa got cancer and all bets were off. I used it as an excuse to quit going to class. I pushed my best and only friend from college out of my life (with a little help from her roommate who really didn't want me around – probably for good reason). My grandpa died in 2009 and I quit school in the middle of the semester. I got my excuse to quit school. That was it, I was done.

I spiraled from there. I was still alive, but I didn't see the point anymore. I wasn't ready to die yet though. So I played along for a few months. I moved home in March and, at the time, I was talking to this girl online a lot. We were becoming friends. By June, she had convinced me to go to Chicago from Kansas City to see a band that we both liked. So I skipped my class that my grandma had convinced me to take (after threatening to kick me out if I didn't) and drove to Chicago. I felt so free in Chicago. More free than when I was at college 3 hours from home. I was a full 8 hours from home now and there was no way my grandma could stop me from doing whatever I wanted. The little voice in my head told me I could do ANYTHING and then kill myself if it still didn't seem worth it.

If you’re counting, that’s a full 7 years of being suicidal. It was always there, always an option. When I think back on that time, it makes me exhausted. It wasn't over yet, but we’re getting close.

I went back to Kansas City after staying in Chicago an extra two days more than planned and missing so much class I had to drop out, costing my grandma more money. At that point, I wasn't interested in anything but moving to Chicago. It was all I could think about. I had been interested in theater and performance for a long time and had always been involved in some sort of performing art. At the time, I wanted to be a stand up comic, which is where I tie this back in to Robin Williams. If you watch comedians talk about themselves, you will hear them talk about how hard it is to be one of them. You have to see the world through a different lens to be a comic. You have to see everything, all of the awful things, and then translate that into something good. And though I quit being a comic because I didn't think I was any good (that’s my own self-esteem problems ruining something else I’m probably half decent at) I understand how it feels. I really do.

So I found an apartment and I moved up to Chicago. I dropped everything. It was all I wanted. I wanted to go be a famous comedian so I could make a lot of money and drink and do drugs and not be judged. As long as I was funny, no one would care what I did in my free time anymore. The first roughly three months I spent in Chicago were mostly spent in my bedroom. I had a friend up here – the same friend I came to visit in June – who was over 21 (while I was 20) and could buy me alcohol. So I spent a lot of time in my bedroom, drinking and watching TV and wondering why I moved up here in the first place. I had moved in with a girl I met through Craigslist. I didn't know her or what she was like and, though the situation turned out to be not life threatening, it was hard. We didn't get along. But she did do me one huge favor. She introduced me to the man who is now my husband.

When I think back on it, the time in Chicago before I met James was spent mostly in bed, crying. There was a lot of crying. And then, suddenly and without warning, the sun came out. It was like he just sauntered into my life and all the lights came on. I stopped drinking and taking pills and started spending every minute I could with him. I talked to him about everything. I felt like he knew me, he was the only person who understood me, and I wanted to be a better person for him. He took away the little voice that kept telling me that, if everything still sucks, I can always kill myself. He saved my life.

So every time someone tells me that depression is a chronic disease that must be managed and can never be cured, I cringe. Yes, it will always be there for me in the back of my head, but I don’t notice it nearly as much anymore. I don’t self-medicate anymore. I don’t need to! I found the reason to stay alive that I had been looking for. I got lucky. So many people don’t get lucky. They might search and search and never find that reason not to die. Robin Williams thought that his reason to live was to make people laugh but in the end, maybe that wasn't it at all. We’ll never know if he found his reason to keep living and if it failed him or if it was never there. But the reason I wrote this all out is to tell you this…

You can find it. It is out there. Just keep looking. Don’t give up yet. 

If you are feeling like suicide is your only option, please consider talking to someone before you act. There is always the National Suicide Prevention Hotline, which I have used in the past. The people there are awesome and are great listeners. Please call them at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).