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4 Days.

I don't know what it was like for Robin Williams, or Kate Spade...or the loved ones of people left behind when they kill themselves. I only know what it's like for me.

I've written about this before - things that lead up to a suicide attempt - but I thought I'd reiterate (my friend Marc's word) so that you will know why I did what I'm planning to do. Tonight I'm writing to you on the rage of a thousand suns because my period is in full force. I've had to change my pants SIX FUCKING TIMES today because I bled all through them. I bled all through the bedsheets. I bled on the sofa and on the rug. I have bled out about 2 pints of blood and I'm feeling light headed, SICK AS A FUCKING DOG and AS ANGRY AS A FUCKING BULL tonight.

I'm so angry it's scaring me.

Straight up - I AM TERRIFIED.

This bastard menstral rage is so all-encompassing that I am fairly sure I'm going to kill myself just to escape it.

I can't take the pain of this depression anymore.

It's a pain that has built up and up and up over time.

It's a struggle that I go through again and again and again.

So I'm pretty FUCKING ANGRY this evening. If you want to, go back through my blogs and read my 'open letter about suicide' (I think it's called that?) because I wrote that when I was a lot less angry so it's a lot more loving, patient and compassionate.

Tonight is all anger because that's the only feeling I have right now.

So.

I'm going to tell you that when someone kills themselves - it's not a new thing. It's not out of the blue. It's not for some random reason that popped up out of nowhere. Not for the people who do it, anyway. It's something we have struggled with for YEARS and when we do it, it's because we've reached the end of our rope. We've hit 'empty' on the fuel tanks of our lives and we just can't go on anymore.

I was talking to my friend on messenger tonight. LB. He means the world to me and when I look at this "with my wise mind" (my psych's favourite phrase), I can see he's coming from love. LB just wants to care for me and to help me. He suggested breaking the cycle of depression and suicidal thoughts I'm in by changing what's going on in my life. LB suggested a change of job because he knows from reading my blog and talking to me all these years that jobs where I feel miserable end up making me suicidal so he sees it as a pattern that I am responsible for and therefore must break.

However, I am not in a wise frame of mind. I haven't been for months.

I have instead been slowly sliding away from logic and reason and have been hysterically losing my God damn mind. I'm mentally, physically and emotionally climbing walls, screaming and tearing into my own flesh because I'm that panicked, terrified and out of my mind in fear of life.

I'm fighting bronchitis and I'm on antibiotics - to cure this bastard chest infection that's taken up BOTH MY LUNGS - that make me blast poo until my stomach is empty. So I'm drained, de-hydrated, exhausted from either coughing up my lungs or pooing until my asshole stings with pain.

(Sorry for swearing - I'm just so angry)

I also have heavy, clotted, disgusting FUCKING PAINFUL periods right now.

MY PARENTS IN LAW are in mine and Alun's home so I can't just go to bed and rest which is probably the very thing that will save my life right now.

I think of this house - this HOME - as my sanctuary. My place to just chill - and with GUESTS in it that HATE me - it is impossible to be comfortable in the ONE place I used to be able to run to.

THIS IS TOO MUCH!!! THIS IS ALL TOO MUCH!!!

I'm crying hard as I blog this. I'm crying so hard I'm having to stop typing and just remind myself to breathe, JD. Just breathe. There you go.

I'm crying but you know what? I'm also at peace because I have decided that I am going to make this pain stop. For good.

This pain, by the way - is not something that EVER ceases. It's ongoing. It's like being burnt alive over and over and OVER again. It's like being tortured over and over and over again. Only it's me that's doing it and I don't know how to stop. I wish to God I could stop. I wish I could turn my brain off for just a second. I wish I could breathe in and out without thinking "FUCK THIS IS PAINFUL". I wish my world wasn't so dark.

I am in so much incredible pain ALL THE TIME. It does NOT stop. Not even for a second.

The hardest part of suicidal tendencies and depression are these:

- They are INVISIBLE so no one believes that you have them - that they WILL kill you - so you have to prove it. And the only way to PROVE you feel suicidal - is to kill yourself.
- People who don't suffer with it think you're making it up for attention so they get fed up with you and are pretty damn harsh with you when you're as fragile as a dry leaf and don't have the strength for even the most gentle 'suggestions'.
- They are damn near impossible to 'fix' - they require an almost super-human strength to combat and they require A LOT OF TIME which a lot of us just don't have. We have work to go to. We have families to care for. We have bills to pay. We can't just GO TO FUCKING SLEEP for a week but ironically, that's the very thing that would set us on our way to getting better.

Speaking of getting better:

I wish it was as easy as changing/quitting my job. I really do.

I wish it was as easy as eating healthier, going to the gym, back to yoga, volunteering at a children's centre and living poor but ultimately happy.

I HONESTLY WISH IT WAS THAT EASY TO ACHIEVE.

"Do something you love and you'll never work a day in your life".

BUT WHAT IF YOU CAN'T FEEL LOVE???

"Do what makes you happy, fuck the rest"

WHAT IF YOU ARE NOT ABLE TO FEEL HAPPY???

What if you can't move a muscle without feeling intense fucking seething HATRED for yourself and all that you are?

This depression - this is mostly down to a chemical imbalance in my brain and that is something I CANNOT FIX.

I do not have the right amount (or ANY at the moment) of melatonin or the endorphins in my system. I instead am filled with anxiety, worry and adrenaline. I'm wired for a fight ALL the time. I'm scared ALL the time, guys. I don't sleep.

My sleep-deprived mind and body are SCREAMING OUT for rest and I can't seem to get any.

My depression feels like running to the finish line on broken ankles.

THIS FUCKING HURTS!!!

THIS IS SO FUCKING HARD AND SO FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE THAT JUST BEING ALIVE TODAY IS FUCKING AMAZING TO ME.

This depression - this powerful urge to kill myself and to do it soon - this is not related to life events. 

I am not considering drowning myself next week because I hate my job. I am not considering leaving this earth because I'm 'a little bit unhappy'. I am not considering dying because I'm stuck in a wheel of misfortune and feeling pretty fucking jipped that almost EVERY JOB I TRY is one I ultimately get screwed over in. This is not because my parents loved my brother more or that I failed my first marriage. It is not because I am dark-skinned and have dealt with racism my entire life. It is not because I have a flat nose or afro hair or pimples or a HUGE FUCKING UGLY BODY. This is not because I hate who I am. This is not because I don't attend the gym or don't work in an industry that reflects 20 years of childhood education study and a degree in community development.

THIS IS BECAUSE THE CHEMICALS IN MY BRAIN ARE LACKING AND THE TABLETS I HAVE BEEN RELIGIOUSLY TAKING FOR THE LAST 2 YEARS ARE NOT FUCKING WORKING.

I know what you're thinking "Go back to the Doctors and try a new medication"

But I've tried so fucking many!!!

You don't think I've been? Check my medical visits lately. Cos I've been!!! I've asked!!! I've tried new tablets and they all have terrible side affects. I am SO SICK on them that I can't continue to use them.

DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT, you guys??? I'VE TRIED SO FUCKING HARD TO DO EVERYTHING I SHOULD BE DOING.

And it's not fucking working!!!

So I give up.

I give up mostly because whenever I talk to someone I love and think highly of, they want me to try something.

"Have you tried accupuncture?"

"Are you applying for new jobs?"

"Have you thought of...taking time off/doing some volunteer work/going to the gym/eating more fruits and vegetables"

I HAVE TRIED EVERYTHING.

I STILL WANT TO KILL MYSELF.

This is what my life is right now - I could quit my job. I could stay at home or I could get a new job "doing what I love". I could go back to the gym TOMORROW. I could lose weight. I could win the lottery. I could change my skin colour by bleaching my skin. I could put my ENTIRE VALUE into what people who love me think instead of constantly seeking my parent's approval and crying EVERY SINGLE FUCKING DAY BECAUSE I MISS MY SHIT OF A BROTHER.

AND IT WOULD NOT DO A FUCKING THING TO CHANGE ME.

Because it's the chemicals in my brain. I am struggling with a chemical imbalance that is going to take FUCKING TIME to sort itself out and because I'm off kilter, exhausted PHYSICALLY ILL WITH FUCKING BRONCHITIS AND PAINFUL ENDOMETRIOSIS - Sensible solutions are as 'easy' for me as working out how to instantly cure cancer while simultaneously replacing the earth's ecology and balance.

I CAN'T DO IT!!!

This is why I want to die: Because I CANT FIX THIS AND YOU ALL THINK I CAN BUT THAT I'M NOT TRYING.

"Have you tried..?"

I BELIEVE I FUCKING HAVE. AND YET, I STILL WANT TO FUCKING DIE SO WHAT IS UP WITH THAT?!?

Because guys, I need you to believe me and believe in me.

What I would really like at this juncture in my life - at this very moment - is for you to PERSIST. Please persist!

This is where loving someone with depression gets really bloody difficult - because we WILL wear you out. We WILL 'repeat patterns'. We WILL struggle AGAIN AND AGAIN.

And it's not because we're not trying!!! It's because staying alive is FUCKING HARD!!!

I need you to KEEP loving me. Keep encouraging me. Persist in telling me you love me and need me even though I do your fucking head in. Don't tell me what I 'should' be doing - tell me you see how hard I'm trying and to not give up because I'm worth hanging in there with.

Walk alongside me and tell me how much you like having me in your life as many times as possible so that I can get the strength back to go to the Doctors and try another 'new' medication.

I need you to trust me in BLIND FAITH that I'm already doing everything I can to make this better, I promise you!!! I am already beating myself up - LITERALLY TO DEATH - because I am not the confident, happy person I want to be - the person YOU want me to be.

That inbox message from Kim - the one that says "I won't wish you a good day - just have a DAY - because I know anything more than that is hard and I love you" - that's what gets me up the next day.

The message from Becci listing all the things you love about me? I printed and framed it and it sits in front of my computer monitors at work so that when I have 10 guests shouting at me, the phone ringing, the front door intercom beeping, couriers shoving paperwork in my face "sign here", Directors asking me where their laptops/glasses/car keys are, Karl wanting to drop off drycleaning, 4 caterers asking where 500 different meals go and I just want to shout "JUST FUCK OFF!!", I don't. I look at number 3 - that you love how I sing no matter what I do - and I remind myself "Becci loves me" and I keep going. I KEEP FUCKING MOVING and I GET ON WITH MY JOB because that post means the bloody world to me.

The email from Brenna that popped up in my personal mail telling me to "hang on, don't give up" when I honestly thought she'd forgotten all about me because we'd not spoken online in so long - that saved my life. I printed it and kept it in my purse and when I am scared to travel into the city and go to work, I get it out and run my fingers over the words AND THEY GET ME ONTO THAT TRAIN.

Messages from friends on Facebook saying "Get some rest, we love you" - they are the very reason I AM HERE TODAY AND NOT DEAD IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD SOMEWHERE. Because if left to my own SERIOUSLY OUT OF WHACK devices, I would continue to work and come home to impress Alun's parents until I end up hospitalised or dead. SERIOUSLY.

I can't give myself permission to rest but for some insane reason - if YOU say it's okay, then I can have a nap and OH MY GOD it does me the world of good.

I need you to persist in telling me it's okay to rest because this body of mine is crying out for rest and a few hours a day is not cutting it. I need you to KEEP telling me it's okay to lose my shit. I need to hear from you - the ones I love the most - CONTINUALLY - that it's okay to be scared and that it's okay to NOT DO ANYTHING BUT EXIST because I need to know that you know I'm trying my best and that this is all I can do right now.

That message from Marc that his life wouldn't be the same without me in it - THAT'S WHAT I CLING TO. I bring it up on my phone and I read it EVERY SINGLE DAY - SOMETIMES EVERY SINGLE HOUR - so that I keep moving forward. I love hearing from you all. I cling to your messages of support just like I clung helplessly to someone's inflatable donut in that awful waves pool in Florida - I'm desperately grasping at the good that you see in me BECAUSE I HONESTLY BELIEVE MY LIFE IS NOT WORTH IT. SO I HANG ON TIGHTLY TO WHAT YOU BELIEVE ABOUT ME, INSTEAD.

But unfortunately for the both of us, I need you to keep cheering me on.

I need it now more than ever.

When you get annoyed - and you have every right to - about the patterns I repeat...When you say things to me like "you always do this" "you do this a lot" "you don't last long in jobs, do you?" "Are you even trying?" "Why do you do this to yourself?" "Don't you want to change?" "Don't you want a better life for yourself?" "Why don't you get over yourself?" "Why don't you DO something about it?" "Why are you ALWAYS feeling sorry for yourself?" "Grow a bloody backbone" "Why do you do this again and again?" "have you applied for other jobs?" "Why don't you just quit your job?" "why don't you stop seeking the approval of others and just do what makes you happy?"

Then it makes me sink down a level. And down another. It makes my depression stronger and harder to battle. It makes my suicide seem more and more appealing to me.

Because now on top of HATING MY FUCKING SELF AND ALL THAT I AM, I'm disappointing and annoying YOU. AND I HATE THAT EVEN MORE!!! I don't want to hurt you. I don't want you to think I'm not trying. I don't want to disappoint you. I can't bear it - I HONESTLY CANNOT BEAR IT A SINGLE MOMENT - if you think badly of me because you mean the FUCKING WORLD TO ME.

When you suggest "have you tried...?" and I have and I don't know how to explain to you that 1) I've already FUCKING TRIED and 2) No mate, IT DIDN'T DO ANYTHING - that makes that knife a lot lighter in my hands. A lot shinier. A lot more tempting to use on one of my main arteries.

It makes the water temperature fade away so that it doesn't sting my legs because now I don't feel anything except your disapproval when I walk into the sea for the last time. All I feel is your disappointment. So I can swim for longer - deeper and I can make sure my drowning is final.

I decide that you're right - it must be ME that's 100% at fault for what's going on in my life. It's entirely ME that accepts these shitty jobs and lets people FUCK ME OVER so it's MY FAULT that now I feel like dying.

How the FUCK do I fix that?!?

I've given myself - and you, God - FOUR DAYS.

FOUR DAYS.

For FOUR DAYS I'm going to hang in there.

I'm going to keep going.
I'm pledge here and now - to keep myself alive.

I might not shower. I might not change clothes. I might not get out of bed. I might drool. I might wail, scream and rant and rave.

But one thing I won't do...IS GIVE UP.

FOR FOUR MORE DAYS.

Why four more? Why not just kill myself now? Why not pick 2 days? or 5 weeks? Why just that random number?

Because guys, I've LOST MY FUCKING MIND. Four Days. That's the number my brittle brain threw out and I'm going to hang onto that with the very edge of my fingernails until I they slide off my bruised and broken fingers.

I don't know why FOUR was what my brain settled on. I don't know.

But it's better than ONE and it's sooner than FIVE so I'm good with that.

I will hang in there for FOUR. MORE. DAYS.

Because that one last spark in me is shining bright. That little sassy Filo chick that makes up part of my heart is saying "try again tomorrow, JD...something good will come of this".

So I've made a bargain with myself.

I will try for FOUR. MORE. DAYS.

Then, I'm out.

I'm actually PLEASED that FOR ONCE IN MY FUCKING LIFE I've come up with a do-able plan.

I will spend the next 4 days saying goodbye to the world around me.

I will treasure every hug from Alun. I will file away in my heart the sound of his laugh, it's like sunshine. I will read all my messages of love from those of you who love me and I will treasure each and every word because it's those very words that keep me going. I will savour and enjoy every drink, every meal, every feeling, every breath.

Jack reached out to me this morning "You are always there for me so this time, Kane and I would love to spoil you. We're taking you to lunch tomorrow - meet us at 12:30pm in the city xx". I am going to cherish every fucking second of that.

My friend Aurelie rang me today "I saw your Facebook and I want to come over. I just want to be with you". We've arranged to go to lunch on Monday and oh my God, I am going to soak up every second in your presence, Aurelie - because it may very well be the last time I see your lovely face or hear your beautiful French accent.

Pete - my adopted Daddy - text me today "Kiddo, I saw your Facebook. I'm taking you out for coffee - text me a time that suits you and I'll come get you. I love you xx"

Oh Pete. You have no idea but you've saved my life because before I got your text, I had counted out all the paracetamol I'd stored over these past months. I have more than enough to erase myself from this earth and just a few minutes before you texted me, I had been crying over a goodbye message I had just sent to my friend LB. I don't think he understands that I'm trying so I wanted to die because I'm at that scary point in my life right now where I don't think anyone will understand. I don't think I'll ever feel better again. I don't think quitting/changing my job will do a damn thing so I feel helpless, alone, stressed, strung out and I want to die.

My blood was rushing in my ears and my heart was beating so fast as I held that bag of pills in my hands - it is too easy to do away with ourselves, is it not?

I am in so much pain you guys - I think the only way to PROVE it is to be lowered into the ground in a wooden box.

"Oh shit. She really was depressed - it wasn't just a cry for attention"

I am so fragile, so bruised, so off-kilter, in such dangerous waters and so broken right now that ANY small word of disapproval or disappointment feels to me like an 80 foot wave and I can't look at it logically. I just take it to heart and I want to kill myself.

I had decided to die a few hours ago when my phone pinged with a new message.

DONT LOOK AT IT. KILL YOURSELF.

But something deep in my heart whispered "Read it, it could be something that changes your life"

So I swiped across to activate my screen and there was Pete's text all lit up. The words "I love you" seemed bigger than the 80 foot waves of the last message I read so I now have the strength to go on.

Instead of dying right now - my INSANE MIND has decided I would very much like a cup of tea with Pete so I have to hang on. 

Pete, I want to hug and hold you. I want to stay alive and hear your grainy laugh and I want to store it away in my heart for the dark, cold days of nothing that are coming. I want to tell you how much you mean to me, how much you are a Dad to me and how much I love you. I need you to know. So I will hang in there until the words are said.

FOUR MORE DAYS.

And if nothing changes, GOD - I'm throwing this challenge out to you because I trust in you to fucking change something in me - then I'm out.

This depression and anxiety hurts too much to keep enduring. It just hurts too much.





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