I don’t exactly remember the first time I tried to kill myself. I remember a few ambulance rides in middle school here and there, though I’m unable to recall any actual events that took place before or after. In fact, the majority of my memories when it comes to my mental health are scattered into millions of directions. Most of what I remember, I am unsure as to whether they were actual occurrences or just fabricated thoughts in order to piece together an entire story. Maybe most of what I remember really did happen, and my mind has forced itself into believing that I created the entire scenario in order to make it seem less severe. The mind is an amazing thing.

I’ve always had issues when it comes to mental illness, as my depression was spouted off as angry outbursts as a child, resulting in several early childhood therapy sessions. As I grew older, and especially after my father passed away, it began to mold into chronic depression that was accompanied by many suicidal thoughts and tendencies, along with anxiety disorder, bi-polar disorder (which may or may not be a misdiagnosis), and eventual complex PTSD (though this came later in life due to separate events and did not stem from my initial depression).

I had thought about killing myself for quite a while before I actually said it out loud. To be honest, death, not just suicide, is something I’ve always thought about quite frequently. I know I truly began contemplating it when I was in seventh grade, as I started to discover self-mutilation as a coping mechanism, and poetry as a way to put the darkest corners of my mind into words. I eventually started researching ways in which I could kill myself, up until an eventual outburst caused me to scream at my mother about what I was planning to do. I found myself being taken to the hospital for a mental evaluation when I was done with school that day. In a blinding fit of rage, which I only know of from what my mother has told me, I was taken by police to a mental hospital, where I was turned into a glorified guinea pig and pumped full of medications.

The next couple of years of my life are a complete blur. I remember only bits and pieces; mainly tragic events such as being sexually assaulted or one of my friends suddenly dying from leukemia that wasn’t discovered until just hours before his death. I remember days here and there from when I would forget or refuse to take my medications, and only fragments of how they caused me to just be a shell of my former self. I was empty, nothing; just going through the motions like a zombified robot. I remember being bullied constantly at every school I went to, though I’m still not quite sure as to why this was a repetitive occurrence, even in different locations. I feel like it definitely contributed to the depressing thoughts I developed of myself, and still struggle with to this day.

I stopped taking medications for my mental illnesses altogether in 2008. It was difficult, but I didn’t have quite as much of an urge to die as I did while I was medicated. It’s still difficult. There isn’t a day that goes by where it isn’t difficult. I still think about dying sometimes; about what would happen to those I love once I were gone, or if anyone would even notice my disappearance. It doesn’t scare me like it used to, because I don’t have the overwhelming urge to act on the thoughts that escape my mind just as quickly as they crossed it. I have survived each and every one of my darkest days, and I will survive many more. Learning to discover ways within myself to cope without the help of medications is far from being an easy task to accomplish, but it is important to me to be able to do so. (I am by no means shaming anyone that uses medications if they work, I just personally want to find any way possible to not go down that path again.)

It started with finding qualities that I love about myself. Such a simple thing to say, yet a complex thing to do. Telling yourself there’s qualities and characteristics you possess that you love isn’t exactly easy to do when you loath your very existence, but it isn’t impossible either. It took me awhile to say simple things like, “I’m really funny,” or “I have very pretty eyes,” without wanting to break down in tears and disgust. I still have days where I hate everything about myself, particularly physically, and struggle to find something positive to say about my self-image.

However, when life seems impossible to handle and overwhelming to bear, I remind myself of how far I’ve come. I think about the twelve-year-old girl sitting in her room with nearly every light off, bleeding from her wrists as she writes about her longing wish to die. I think about the seventeen-year-old girl getting beaten senseless by her boyfriend after crying because he raped her, and the suicide note she wrote and never delivered. I think about the young woman I have become, with a promising future in my career and friendships of a lifetime. I think about the gasps of air from laughter that arises when I spend time with my sister, after years of hating each other and finally having an unbreakable bond. I think about the tears that have fallen from my face as my best friend comforted me that I would survive the agonizing heartbreak I was experiencing.

You see, life isn’t about accomplishing ever-lasting happiness. You can’t appreciate the light if you don’t walk through darkness to get there. Happily ever afters simply do not exist because they would be underappreciated and taken for granted. I believe that good people experience the world’s evils so harshly because we allow ourselves to grow and become images of strength and survival, even if it seems to take an eternity to get there. Good people use their experiences and griefs in order to bring love and comfort to those not strong enough to cope on their own.

Stop looking for your happily ever after. Start looking for yourself.

With love,

Em.