(Non-Fiction)
On Saturday last week, I decided to commit suicide. I had just been in an argument with my boyfriend, and I decided I couldn’t take it anymore. We were at a shopping centre, in the parking lot, when I decided to carry on walking outside and into traffic. As I walked, my phone rang. It was him. I ended up turning back to the parkade, but not before throwing my phone into the nearest garbage can. I wouldn’t be needing it anymore. I saw him come outside, and as I got closer to him, I wondered what I was doing, chickening out like that.
So I turned just before I got to him, looked at the road for a few seconds to find a suitable moving target, and prepared to launch myself in front of it. Before I knew it, I was tackled from behind by him, and pushed away from the road. I thought “fuck this” and pushed back. He weighs about one fifth less than me, so I had the power advantage. But as I pushed, I felt something pass from him to me, and I let him push me away. That feeling was stronger than my will to die, and it didn’t come from me.
Every day is a struggle to survive. I suffer from depression, sometimes to the extreme, but I refuse to take medication for it, mainly because I feel better than worse. I have a low substance tolerance, which means any uppers get me going. Caffiene, sugar, you name it. I’m scared to take any trendy drugs, like E, because of what they might do to me. I’m not an easy person to deal with, and that’s my opinion. My boyfriend agrees.
All this, and I’m autistic too!
I contemplate suicide about once a week. Sometimes it’s longer, and I’ll go ten days without thinking about it. While I was on anti-depressants, I couldn’t think at all, so I stopped taking them. And the doctors said it would help. An upper to keep me from killing myself, and a downer so I could sleep at night. Sure, it helped a lot, doc.
Not being able to express how I feel can be detrimental to those around me. Some of them take it personally, and although I insist it’s not them, they don’t always agree. I have had to learn what to say to people in certain situations. “How was your day?” is a favourite. I don’t actually care, because it’s not relevant, but people like to ask that. I have programmed responses for a lot of things. It helps me cope. It helps you believe I’m a real person. Yes, call me a bastard. I don’t actually care. But call someone I love a bastard, and you won’t hear the end of it from me. People piss me off very easily if they cross me, and I can scratch someone off my tea list quicker than you can say “you bitch!”.
Since around 1989, I have lost an aunt, a grandfather, a father, two grandmothers, another aunt, and some friends. I went to all of their funerals and memorial services except one. When someone dies now, I go numb for a while, and then move on. I wrote a poem about my father’s death in 1996 called “No More Tears“, and that’s how I feel. I cannot cry. When I do, it’s like an outburst and unpleasant for those who are around me. But I only cried twice in the last two years.
So for me to contemplate suicide is not, I suppose, like how other people see it. I will be at peace with myself, with my dead relatives in whatever afterlife, or not, is reserved for us, and so much the better.
But fucking hell, it’s a bitch to think about what I’m leaving behind. I truly love my boyfriend. I hate going one day without him. Just one day. I couldn’t live without him. I love him. I love my sister, my mother and my brother. I couldn’t do that to them. Not today.
But I also love chocolate. Ask me to choose between chocolate and visiting my mother, and I’ll ask if she has chocolate.
I survive every day. Some days are good, some are not so good. I have a lot to offer the world, and I’m not just saying that to gloat, because I don’t care what you think of me. But if I can offer the people I love a better deal, then it’s worth it. In some warped way, that’s my ideal life. Making others happy. My life has had its really shit periods, but I’ve survived them. I was mentally and physically abused at home by my father. I was mentally and physically abused at school by ignorant bullies. I don’t hate them now. It’s not worth it. But sometimes I wish I were dead, if only to stop the hurting inside.