Phantasiis

Suicide.

This is, by far, as open as I can be about it online.
My first attempt happened on 2011.

I rarely talk about my experience with others, and not even close relatives know this about me. The reason for the latter is because of the stigma the word suicide carries. For most of my acquaintances, family and friends, mental health is a topic that is just too taboo to talk about. Hence, I generally do not talk about it mostly out of preference: it is difficult for me to try to de-stigmatize suicide on any scale for now. As much as I would like to educate my friends and family about mental health in general, I believe I still need to educate myself even more first.

It was an evening full of emotions. I was anticipating on having a beautiful relationship with someone whom I thought was the love of my life. It turned out that it did not happen that way. I never really thought about hurting myself until that night. What I noticed was that I just simply stopped caring. I stopped caring about anything and anyone. That careless feeling happened so abruptly and without hesitation. It just felt necessary. My mind transformed from chaos into a complete, solemn order. There was a silence within me. It seemed reasonable to just end it all. The silence that was inside of me grew stronger. With that calmness and silence, I felt that I was ready.

The night seemed too perfect for the wrong reasons. It was very late and I was alone: away from home and nobody could witness what I was going to do. I was dangerously calm, at complete peace with myself. I could only hear the emptiness of my being. The silence that surrounded me was peaceful combined with a bitter disappointment. Then, out of that state of peaceful awareness, an idea started to materialize. It turned to an impulse, an urgent feeling of finding a release to this silence that started to feel uncomfortable. My death was the answer that night.

The allure of death turned into action. I took all the pills. No hesitation, no compassion. I did not care about the future, nor myself at that moment. I felt no guilt, or anything special whatsoever. I did not see my life as a movie or any flashbacks. I was just very present on the moment. Think about it as mindfulness with a twist. After I finished the two bottles, I walked to the room and lay on the bed. And there I was, laying in silence, glancing at the nothingness, surrounded by darkness. Then she called me.

I answered the phone and I was just there, talking as if nothing happened. She told me how I was feeling and I did not have a clear answer. It seemed puzzling. Instead of telling her how I was feeling, I told her what I did. It appeared the right thing to do at the moment. She asked me why I did it, and if I needed help. I told her I was fine, and that I wanted to sleep.

I hung up.

I started to gently cry in silence after hearing her voice. My hearth was beating very slow. It was a bit hard to breathe. Somehow, I was not sad, I was imagining her face close to mine. Then everything around me got even more quiet, and darker. My body felt heavy as if there was a sadistic gravity pulling me down.

I woke up, and a reality kicked in. I knew what I did, or at least what I tried to do the previous night. I vowed to not tell others about this, and to not do it again. I was wrong about the latter after that attempt.

The above is a tale of what I am capable of. However, I have met beautiful people and learned so much since that first attempt. People and experiences that otherwise could not happened if my attempt would happened to be successful. It made me appreciate many things in life. Sometimes I forget about it, though. This is why I am writing this. To remind myself that this darkness that lives within me can kill me or make me survive through the creation of something that has meaning to me.

As the blog title says, September is Suicide Awareness month. According to the website by the CDC, there has been an increase of 30% on the rate of suicide since 1999 on half the states throughout the US, and 54% percent of the people who died by suicide did not have a diagnosed mental health condition (CDC.gov). Substance abuse, relationship problems, financial hardship or homelessness are some of the factors that might contribute to suicide (CDC.gov). NAMI illustrates that around 41,000 individuals die each year by suicide and that, “suicidal thoughts, much like mental health conditions, can affect anyone regardless of age, gender or background” (NAMI.org). No body is exempt of reaching to that point. The person next to you could be thinking about it. Please, learn the signs and help if possible.

I hope, that by sharing my personal experience with suicide I could bring awareness.

Thank you for reading.

-E.