What I Learned About Me By Wanting to Die

Before I even knew the word, I had a plan to die. I had not even reached my 5th birthday and I had a plan to take the pain out of my life. My first plan was based on my mother’s instructions about my safety. She told me if I played out in the street, I would get hit by a car and go to sleep forever. That sounded like a great solution to free myself from the harm I was receiving at the hands of my uncle. When I slept, I was not being hurt. 

What I learned then and now is that children, even very young children, consider dying by suicide. And because children don’t have a word for it, adults often miss the message. My experiences at such a young age laid the foundation for my interpretation of the world. I wanted to find out if there really was anything worth living for. As I was growing up, fun things occasionally happened. I would ask myself, “Was this it? Was this worth living for?” The answer was always “No!”

I lived my life in this question looking for something worth living for. What I found were people who seemed to know I was a victim and therefore, they victimized me more. Or maybe I put myself into those situations where they could hurt me. When you grow up feeling you are worth nothing more than being hurt, there is no surprise when people hurt you. This validated my reality of a world of pain and my role in that world. 

There were unexpected hurts, even in this mind set, which further shattered my life. I was knocked off my bicycle on a lonely road as I was headed for the mall. When I came to; brush and weeds covered my body. I believe the person thought they had killed me. Many times, I wished that had been the outcome. I walked my bike to a gas station to clean myself up. I went home and told no one. My mother used to say, “Girls who get attacked are asking for it.” So, I retreated into my bedroom for the next 6 weeks. No one could figure out what was wrong with me, not even the doctor. I would not speak about this event for the next 15 years of my life. Yet the experience was a living shadow of how the world was.

As I grew older I continued to be hurt and actually put myself in harm’s way, so I would have some control. I had a baby, a baby I loved from the very depth of my being, yet even my love for her could not make me love my life. The very act of keeping her made me feel selfish. She deserved so much more than me. I was not a good mom, but I did work to protect her from people who could hurt her. As a single mom, I worked all the time and she was raised by people who were better than me. I was a good provider and protector but I didn’t know how to be a good mother.

I continued to try to find something that could make me feel life was worth living. My thought was if I could find that something, then there would be a way out of the hopelessness of my life. I began to believe life could never change. My thoughts of dying escalated and the methods ranged from quiet desperation to vivid, boldly bloody actions. So bold were my thoughts, when talking to my therapist, she thought I should see a doctor. The day I saw the doctor began a new struggle in my life because that day, I became part of a mental health system. I was hospitalized within hours of seeing the doctor. I would stay in a hospital for the next two years of my life. I was told I was too much of a danger to myself to ever live outside the hospital walls. And yet, what they did for me, did not seem to help either. In fact, inside the hospital is where I began to put my thoughts into actions. Here I learned hospitals cannot keep you safe either. It is only an illusion. 

At one point during my hospitalization, I remember asking God why he hated me so much. Why didn’t he just love me a little bit and let me die or better yet never be born in the first place? And while I don’t expect you to believe this, because I would question it if I hadn’t been the one experiencing it, my hand began writing a note to myself in my journal. It was in old English and basically said, “You cannot lead my children out of their pain and misery until you experienced it first.” 

I was outraged!! I didn’t want to do that! And I didn’t want to go through what I had in my life to do that. Now I was angry at God. How dare he let all those things happen to me purposefully. How could he be called a loving God, a Father? 

In the next few days, I began collecting the strings which the hospital linens were bundled in. Although there was a person always with me and watching me, I managed to collect enough string to weave into a rope. My plan was to create a tourniquet around my neck, secure the handmade rope with a pencil so it would not loosen as I lost consciousness. What I didn’t know to plan for is my body convulsing as I lost consciousness. The person who was watching noticed. I don’t really remember what happened in the next couple of hours, but I was told the string rope was so tight around my throat, they could not unwind or cut it. I was rushed down to the ER on the first floor and my life was saved. I was angry that even after I told God I was not happy with his plan, he did not allow me to die. I felt even more betrayed. 

After being in the hospital for two years, I was tired. I had participated in everything they told me to. I had taken all the medications they asked me to. I had played all the games and yet nothing was different within me. I still did not find anything worth living for, but I knew I did not want to die in here. So, I lied. I made up stories of how much I loved my life. I said I had a job waiting for me on the outside. I said I was getting married and, hallelujah, I was cured!! I had to go to court to be granted my freedom and I reiterated all the same lies to the judge. He too seemed to believe me, and I was freed from the psychiatric hospital, or so I thought. 

My new plan was to move my daughter and me nearer to my grandmother and hide away from the world in my home. I figured if people could not see me, they could not hurt me and could not put me back into a hospital ever again. However, I really did want my life to be different. I wanted desperately to find something worth living for. Since I had been told the medications would help me, I found a doctor and continued getting those meds. I had case workers who would come to my home because I would not leave. During the next ten years, I found myself hospitalized over 50 times. I knew enough to not let the professionals really know how I felt or thought. I knew truth only kept you locked up. In being truthful, I would never get out of the hospital again. I was in just long enough to get a second wind and get back home to hide. 

Then one day, there was one case worker who came to my house and changed my world. I don’t remember exactly what she said. I couldn’t even tell you how many times she had come to see me before that day. But on this one auspicious day, she did something no one had done in all the times I had been in treatment. She validated my pain as only someone who experienced such pain could have. She had an experience of depression when her child died shortly after birth. That loss sent her into a chasm of pain where she struggled to find a way out. She was a peer. Then she told me how strong I was, for the very fact I was still breathing after all I had been through. While she would never know the depth of my pain, she knew the depth of hers and she validated the experiences of pain in my life. For the first time, I felt like someone knew what it was like to be me.

She moved upwards in her career, and I went with her as her volunteer. I could not let my connection with her end. She was the motivation to leave my home. Then I was asked to become more active by sitting on committees, being on boards and becoming an active member of my community. I had spent almost ten years hiding from the world plus the two years in the hospital, and I was finally beginning to see that just maybe I had a place in this world besides being someone to hurt. 

Soon after, my daughter had my grandson. I was in the delivery room with her and a miracle happened. The moment I saw this precious baby, my head screamed, “This was worth living for!” I finally found something worthy of living for. All the things that happened to me were worth going through to be here for this moment. My next thought was no one should have to wait 42 years to be glad to be alive. My passion to have people realize life was worth living was born. This became my life’s path. I knew those words written to me in my journal were true. I knew there was something I was supposed to do in the world. 

Once I knew I had a place in the world, I began to work with the mental health professionals more vigorously. I learned how I was feeling from the way I fantasized about dying. Those feelings I could not define, were an expression of my emotions. Vivid, boldly bloody was an expression of angry hurt and I wanted everyone to know. Quiet desperation was an expression of the hopelessness and trapped feeling usually centered on loneliness. I learned I had a right to say NO and the NO was to be respected. On the one occasion when I died for a few minutes after an attempt to take my own life, I learned I was more than my body. I had a soul and a purpose. I learned I had value and was not placed on earth to be hurt by others. I learned that the message given to me by God was right. Just like my caseworker helped me by telling her story, I too could help others by telling mine. I found I could even change systems by telling my experiences within those systems. So much of what we call mental illness is a reaction to trauma. I can give a real face to this. Countries began inviting me to speak at their conferences. I can see conversations about mental illness and suicide changing and I am a part of that change. I became a light out of the dark pain of despair. 

What I now know, is all those events causing me pain and hurt molded the me I am today. I would not change any of them, even if I could. Why, might you ask? Because today I love me! I love that my story helps others heal. I love that I help lead people out of their pain, just as was predicted. God and I are on good terms, and I understand the why and am thankful for the wisdom. Today I love my life. I love the changes I make because of my life experiences. My life is full of passion and direction. I make a difference for myself and for others. While I will work to ensure no one would ever have to walk my path of pain, I am grateful to know, I was never walking that path truly alone. Today, I am no longer a victim. I am a survivor. I am the victor!

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Photo by Bud Helisson on Unsplash