Relapse.

The word that normally would be something you would think of when it comes to a drug or alcohol addiction, or maybe even going back to a toxic person.

That's not the kind of relapse I'm talking about.

I'm talking about a mental illness relapse.

You feel yourself getting better, you're happier, you're living life to the fullest. You finally feel like you want to be alive, you're finally happy with yourself, and your mental state. Everything is perfect. So perfect.

Then a flip switches one day.

You find yourself unable to get out of bed again, find yourself sleeping hours and hours on end, you find yourself crying on the bathroom floor. Things are bad again. But you don't want to feel like the person who cried wolf one too many times. You don't want to be "that person" that asks for help every single time things change, every time your mood changes because that would be multiple times a day.

You find yourself thinking those same thoughts that almost ended it last time. You find yourself going over what would happen when you're gone. You find yourself thinking, "would my friends even miss me?", "would my parents be able to move on?", "what would people say about me?". You find yourself sitting there crying because you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't, you don't want to be here but you don't want your parents, friends, family to feel that same exact pain that you're feeling.

You feel like you're drowning and there's no way out. You feel like no matter how hard you try to become happy, nothing works. You feel like you could scream out for help and not a damn person would hear you. You feel like there's no other choice.

I could sit here and tell you everything is going to work out, I could tell you that there are better ways to deal with the situation you're going through, I could tell you that you're not going to feel like this forever.

But I would be lying, because the honest truth is I don't know. I don't know if you'll be okay, I don't know if I'll be okay, I don't know. No one knows.

Relapses are hard. It's new. It's different every time, it starts differently, it's unexpected. It could last a few hours or it could last a few months. Relapses are scary as hell. You don't ever see yourself getting back to that point after getting better. You don't see yourself ever needing help again. Relapse pulls and tugs and eventually rips away any bit of happiness that you've created for yourself.

So if you find yourself getting bad again, promise me this.. you will get help. You will do everything in your power to get help.

You are so special to so many people, you are worth so much to so many people, you are perfectly imperfect to so many people. So please, please try, please fight, please, please, please.

Tell someone, tell anyone. You are not the person that cried wolf too much, you're not that girl or that boy.

This is just a relapse.

If you or anyone you know is thinking about harming themselves in anyway, tell someone, call 911, or call the Suicide Prevention hotline at 1-800-273-8255.