Coming clean

I just read an article on someone coming clean about their first suicide attempt. If I count the times I’ve taken overdoses or tried something else, I realize it’s about 5. I can’t really remember. My last was a little more violent on the surface, but probably less dangerous in reality. My suicidal fantasies are  a little more violent too, but given my track record I think I’m fairly safe.

Still when I think about the fact that I have actually really wanted not to be here so much that I have tried five times to go down that road (before aborting my mission each and every time) I realize that that is not what most people would think of as a “normal” way to proceed. But it has been my normal.  I have just been following my brain down a certain path before intense fear drives me back.

I’ve been really afraid of pain and of dying for much of my life.  So much so that fear has overcome the worst of my misery and psychosis and kept me alive. I guess I should thank it but I don’t. I am not a fan of fear as a motivation for living.  However it has protected me, the way fear is supposed to, and gave me the opportunity to live and find there was much to enjoy, to hope for, to dream about and make a reality.

I had a friend (one of several) for whom fear was no protection. Nothing was. I was so hurt when he died. Mostly I thought, what a waste of a potentially beautiful life. He was so smart and funny and well-loved but he was also an utter mess. My part in his life was strange and I didn’t understand it because I didn’t think we were that close, but I blamed myself  when he died, as people do. And I wondered if, after I found him the first time ( the first of our acquaintance anyway) , whether I could have done more to prevent the second, and  last, time. I had thought of asking him to be my roommate, but I didn’t know how I could keep myself healthy with him in the other room. So I chose self-protection, and in the end, he chose something else.

I am tired right now and trying to figure out how to be happy.  Not suicidal but the possibility is there lurking in the background.  I have a headache, which feels like a huge weight. And I realize some of my patterns are playing out again. But what does it mean to be so public about it? In the past I’ve written about feeling lousy from the vantage point of feeling well. Right now. I’m feeling lousy and it is possible I will feel ok tomorrow, like did not long ago today and then lousy again because that’s the way the cookie crumbles. Eventually though, if the past is any indicator, things get better for me.

I can’t think my way out of this, or talk my way out or even feel my way out. I have to breathe and wait and accept something. And I need to get rid of this damn headache.  Wish me luck.