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Finding the strength
Posted Thursday 28 June 2012
On the outside I look like I have the perfect life: I am studying for a law degree and I’m doing really well, I have a lovely boyfriend of nearly two years, lovely friends and the best mother in the entire world. However on the inside there is a confused, scared and lost woman, who finds life a huge and constant uphill struggle.
I have bursts of happiness here and there but they're always drowned out by lengthy episodes of sadness and exhaustion. I can go from happy to suicidal in what seems like a matter of minutes. People may think I’ve just got ‘mood swings’ but it’s much more than that.
I honestly cannot for the life of me help it.
During my school career I used to struggle to get out of bed every single day and I used to hate every waking moment. I’d come home and secretly cry for hours and cut myself because I just didn’t know what to do. I thought about death everyday and I thought of ways to kill myself to make the confusion and pain go away.
On a few occasions I began to try to kill myself, with whatever means I could. However my fear always got the better of me. This left me feeling like a freak of nature. I’d put a big smile on and act like everything was wonderful. I would hide my scars from everyone, because I wasn’t doing it for attention (most annoying stereotype of those who self harm). I just wanted the world to swallow me whole.
Since leaving school, I have found that because I bottled everything up for years, it has made me sink deeper into depression. Everything is finally coming out in a huge explosion of emotion and black fog.
I have such strong urges to kill myself it’s unbearable. I worry I will never get better. I desperately want these dark feelings to go away so I can get on with my life and to be young and carefree.
The last time I was on the verge of ending my life was on holiday recently. I just thought I am so tired of living, it requires so much effort just to strain a smile or to even brush my teeth. I just thought I’m exhausted. I just want to go to sleep and never wake up again. I decided I was going to walk into the ocean and just keep on swimming until I ran out of energy.
I hate the sea, so to have such a powerful urge to do something that would terrify me, goes to show how lost in my cave of depression I had got.
Since then, my supportive boyfriend and my mum helped me find a counsellor so I could begin to talk through my feelings. I can’t say that I’ll never want to kill myself again, because there’s a long way for me to go to get better. But in the past couple of months I’ve gone from pretending everything is fine to having the courage to write this blog.
And finally, a very good thing happened a few days ago – I found out my best friend, who I’ve known all my life, had also been suffering in silence too.
It was a miraculous moment of discovery that I suddenly had someone to share my experiences with, without fear of judgment or misunderstanding.
We were so convinced that the other would look down on the other, that we hid ourselves from each other for six whole years.
This has given me the strength to be more open about what I’m feeling, because I know it can never go away if I tackle it on my own.
I hope whoever reads this can find courage to tell just one person how they are really feeling. It has taken me years and I am so relieved.
Hannah
Suicidal feelings can be terrifying. Find out ways you can cope or how to support someone you know.
5 Comments
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Wow! You really have come on so far and done well with your recovery. You've taken the steps needed to turn this all around. It is a long journey, but you've taken the first steps.
So glad that you have someone to talk to who is going through something very similar. I wish the best for both of you. Big hugs x
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Strength to you, your nearest and dearest. Keep going - and keep writing!
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What amazing courage you have to share this with the world. I heard once that to feel these feeling of pain, lonely etc we have to be alive. I have had some very same thoughts as you and for a strange reason that I can't say why, but its nice to know your not going through this alone. There is always someone to listen. I often felt like I was a burden to my family and friends for feeling the way I do. We WILL get better it will just take time, and to try and remember that we don't always have these feelings , we will get past this and day by day it will get better. That we will have bad days. Good luck x
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Thankyou Thankyou for sharing this, I admire your bravery. I too have had similar feelings and thoughts.
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This is all one big conspiracy, the highly intellegent branded personality disorder, I now that now becaue my life is a prison my mind tells me that my dead mother will one day turn me into her and that my evil father will turn mysisters against me because only he and I know the full extent of the 12 years of abuse I took from that old man who is still alive. the world conspire s against people like us who are genuises because it cannot cope with our phylosopy of life. I have been ostracised by the community but at leaast they havn't done anything wicked for a few years, bet they would if they knew who i really was, i mean really because in all history people like me and us have been abused, ostracised for telling the truth of the world as it really is
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