April 14th, 2017. Friday. It was an average day. Spring was in full bloom, a high of 84 degrees. I got dressed for work, played around with Alison, got her ready and off to school. Just a normal day.

It’s also the day that I almost killed myself.

Why that day? I have no idea. That day was as good as any other. There was nothing that set me off. No trigger.

I’ve been depressed for a while now. Years if I’m completely honest. It ebbs and flows, and I gather coping skills and just deal because I definitely am FINE or I will be FINE because I have to be FINE. There’s not another option except . . . the one pervasive thought that ricochets around in my head. I’ve worked really hard to ignore it.

If you’ve spent any time with me in the past year, maybe I’ve seemed fine (or as fine as a weirdo like me could be).

My way of coping - I’ve kept myself busy. A busy person with a busy brain can have lots of loud thoughts that drown out the bad ones. I went to another writing retreat. I made good forward progress on my novel for the first time in a while. I made new friends. My Tuesday night writing group friends and I went to Nashville to a book signing, having a grand adventure along the way.

But the thoughts grew louder. I smiled and laughed and said and did all the things I thought I was supposed to say and do. I tried to act like everyone expected me to be. The thoughts were impossible to keep at bay now.

I was drowning.

Let’s rewind to April 2nd - A different writing workshop. A weekend with my amazing, kind, wonderful writing friends.  Lots of learning, laughing, loving. Not enough time with them. My heart ached having to leave my friends, not knowing when I would see them again - if I would ever see them again, the thought screamed and screamed and screamed. So I gave them extra hugs. Told them how much I loved them and believed in them and their work.

On the way home from this workshop, two of my friends decided it was time to have The Talk (™) with me. We know you’re depressed, they said. You need to get help. Please, please, please. We love you. You would fight if it was one of us. Is it money? We’ll give you money. Let us help you.

But I thought I was putting on a good front? Did I do or say something wrong? I racked my brain going over every conversation that I had with anyone and everyone that weekend. Trying to figure out where I had failed to keep my shit checked. Where my mask had failed.  

No, friend says. But we know you. And to see you sit here and think these bad things about yourself . . . it’s soul crushing. And I guess you have to know this friend to know how much these words weigh. She’s a straight shooter, no bullshit, non-emotional person and for her to say that my behavior was hurting her . . . it was such a gut punch. If I can’t even make it through a weekend of at least pretending that I didn’t want to die every breath every second of every day . . . if I was hurting my friends . . . then this was a real problem.

“Really, I’m okay,” I lied. “I’ll think about it”, I conceded.

Certainly this had to be rock bottom. Giving my friends a reason to worry about me was (and is) fucking unacceptable. But nope. That was just the beginning of the spiral of despair.

Each day got worse and worse and worse. I didn’t know how it could, but it did. The thoughts spiraled, and while I can’t bring myself to even write out the worst of them, I can share that I thought/deeply felt that the world is better off without me. And like, I know, I know it’s not true. Part of my brain knows that . . . but the other part? Y’all. I have no words to describe the pain and agony.

I stopped being able to get out of bed on time. Everything and everyone was exhausting. Fighting my brain and fighting the urge every second of every day to kill myself fucking exhausted me. I came home from work every day and laid in the bed for at least 30 minutes staring at the ceiling before I could even start dinner or help Alison with her homework.

Speaking of Alison, I know y’all are thinking how could I even think about doing this. Think of what it would do to my daughter? My husband. My family. My friends. But I thought it would just be easier on everyone if I was gone. I wouldn’t be a burden anymore. I wouldn’t be that weird girl blowing up your twitter. Everything would be quiet and nothing else could hurt me.

I felt like I had nothing of worth to contribute to this world. That I’m insignificant and everything is meaningless. These are just a fraction of the thoughts that I live with and it damn near killed me.

By April 14th, the thoughts were waking me up at all hours of the night. Sleep was a thing I didn’t see much of. At least restful sleep. I couldn’t remember the last time I slept through the night. And I was tired. So very very tired of feeling like this. I just didn’t want to hurt anymore.

7:53am. Running late for work. And then I almost drove my car off of a bridge. I swerved at the last second, made it across the bridge, pulled over and started sobbing. I was terrified. Once I was able to breathe again,I drove myself straight to my primary care doctor’s office and asked to see my doctor. They asked me what was wrong and y’all . . . I couldn’t speak. My throat felt like a hand was around it, cutting off all air. I quickly typed in a new text message. “I’m very depressed and I’m having suicidal ideations.” I put my phone up to the glass that separated me from the receptionist, and her eyes widened.

They immediately pulled me back and put me in the triage room.

My doctor was furious at me. She yelled at me. For coming in on a Friday. They were slammed and understaffed and she didn’t have the time she wanted and needed to spend with me. For letting it get this bad without coming in. All I could do was cry and apologize. “Tia,” she said, softening as she climbed onto the table and put her arm around me. “You have so much to live for.”

“But it doesn’t feel like it,” I sobbed. “I can’t see it. All I see is that I can’t live like this. I can’t breathe. Every thought tells me I’m better off dead. I can’t fight it anymore. I can’t live like this anymore.”

She wrote me a prescription for Wellbutrin, gave me a list of therapists, and made me swear to her that I wouldn’t hurt myself over the weekend, that I would call first thing Monday and report in, and that I would come back in one week.

She told me that if I killed myself that she would come to my funeral and punch my casket. And that made me laugh. The first spark of light in all the darkness that day.

I went to the pharmacy, got my prescriptions, and promptly took them. Despite my doctor’s warning that it may take a few days for it to kick in, I kept expecting to feel magically better. Wellbutrin doesn’t exactly work like that, but every day it’s a little bit easier to breathe. Maybe even one day I’ll be able to have my head above the water.

That brings me here, a little over a month out and I’m better. Not 100%. Not by a long shot. But Wellbutrin? It saved me. It makes the days seem less scary. The nights, too.

And writing? Writing doesn’t seem so impossible anymore. Finishing Little Foxes is still a far away goal, but for the first time it doesn’t feel unattainable. I’m here writing this, after all. And if I can be brave enough to write these words, then maybe, just maybe I will finish that novel of mine. One day.

So I’m still here. I’m still fighting. Every day is a battle, but I’m not giving up.

If any of my friends had told me they felt like this, I would have not stopped until they got help. Even if I had to drive them there myself. So why was it so hard for me to advocate for myself?

I just want to be someone y’all are proud of. Someone I can be proud of. And I’m not her. Not yet.

And for the first time in a really, really long time I genuinely want to see what that future would look like.

-Tia

* I feel like you should know that my doctor is not normally a violent person who threatens to go to funerals and punch caskets. I had really scared her, and she told me she had given up cussing, bread, sugar, and soda for Lent. I asked her if she wanted to die, too. LOL! I needed and appreciated her strong feelings and reactions. The fact that she didn’t blow me off and listened made all the difference.