I had decided to take my life twice last year. I didn't follow through (obviously) on either plan for very different reasons. Many people would at this point jump in and say, "Aren't you glad you didn't?" I don't know. I've gotten to a point in my life where I try not to have too much of an opinion on outcomes. Who is to say that killing myself wouldn't have been the best decision? We humans are not omnipotent and to assume that the current present outcome is the best outcome by default strikes me as faulty.
The first time was sometime in June and it was fueled entirely by hysterics. If it wasn't for Judith coming over and keeping me company for the evening and night, I'm not sure what I would have done. There was no concrete plan; there was just this swell of emotions that needed to be released and the only appropriate release at the time, at least in my mind, was a suicide. To a person who has never been depressed, suffered mental illness or had suicidal ideations, you cannot possibly know or understand the blinding torrent of emotions. It doesn't make sense and it's not rational; it can never be explained in a logical manner. To a healthy person with a healthy fear of death, ending your life is the most counter-intuitive gesture possible.
It's not like I wanted to die but I really didn't want to live anymore. It was an existence that had become empty to me. What once gave me meaning now gave me nothing. I was trapped in this state of limbo where I was neither living nor dead; I didn't know how to become alive again so dying seemed like the best option.
The second attempt was a little more methodical. I had been in therapy for about 4 weeks when I went back to my hometown, with which I no longer had any affinity or desire to visit, to attend a wedding. The wedding was at the same hall where I got married. A few days before that, I found out my ex-husband had started dating his co-worker. It was just the perfect storm. I came home from the wedding and decided that I would kill myself. I was numb; unlike the first time, I felt nothing at all except for deep, unending relief - which led me to the conclusion that it was the right decision. The only reason I didn't follow through was because I couldn't find a method I liked.
It seems like such a silly, funny reason but when you're about to do the most important thing of your life (i.e. your death) you just want it done right. There would be no shooting: I live in Canada where it is much too difficult to acquire firearms. It had been years since I cut, and I've developed a weird squeamishness about it so I knew slicing my wrists open was out. A drug overdose appealed to me the most but then there was the issue of what drugs. I no longer had access to dangerous and poisonous compounds; many of these substances would lead to a very painful death in any case. I read many stories about people's failed attempts, who did not get the dosage correct and whose efforts rewarded them with nothing than a trip to the hospital to get their stomach pumped and then a stay in the psych ward.
Yikes. I don't know why that was abhorrent to me but killing myself wasn't. I spent a good week looking up methods that would give me the Triple Crown of suicides: painless, assured and easy. But like in life, in death we can't always get what we want.
With some goading, my therapist convinced me to start taking antidepressants and by the end of the week, I was on Wellbutrin. I wasn't expecting the medication to do anything but surprisingly, it did and in a very strange and subtle way. It took away the extremes of how I was feeling. Sure - I was no longer able to feel super-duper-awesome-happy but it also took away the devastating edge of sadness. I never knew not feeling anything could be such a blessing. Now while I go through the motions of this so-called life, it doesn't really upset me anymore. I can fake it and I can grind it out and when it's time to die, it's time to die.
