I wrote the post below in 2014. These words are coming into the world now because by posting them I am accepting that emotions need not always be crafted, sometimes they want to be left raw. And sometimes, our ego does not matter.
I am angry. I want to scream. I want to understand. I want to cry. I need to rip open my heart, because the weight feels overwhelming, and tears don’t seem to do the heaviness any justice. They just burn.
I write this sitting next to my giggling best friend, watching Gnomeo and Juliet as she paints her nails “an explosion of pink”. What you don’t know is that she is the same person who minutes ago was sobbing and struggling to breathe through the searing pain that wracks her mind, body, and soul alike. Or that the title of this blog post is among the words she thought would be her last to me. I hate knowing that for my beautiful friend this big messy world feels like unrelenting fifty pound manacles, all the time, with little relief.
My best friend is not Robin Williams, or anyone who will ever be remembered by millions around the world, but she is incredibly important in our tiny universe so I’ll add my voice to the chorus – just because it is harder to see does not make mental illness any less real than heart disease or diabetes. If you don’t already know it, then say it with me: Mental illness is NOT a choice.
So often we hear “suicide is selfish”, “why can’t you try harder to feel better?”, “how can you feel so alone with so many around who love you?.” Having been surrounded by mental and physical disabilities my whole life, I know intimately how it is that one can feel desperately isolated. Yet before my experiences of this past week, I still sometimes struggled to not ask those misguided questions.
On the night when I thought I had lost that silly bright bubbly light that is my best friend, those angry spirits ravaged my hurting heart while I fought to remain calm and do what needed to be done. Call her. Call her boyfriend. Call security. Call 9-1-1. Breathe. Not panic. Anything that was not action oriented made my blood freeze. Basically I felt like a very dizzy zombie. Getting the call that she was physically safe finally gave me license to take a real breath. Lying in an ER bed she clutched my arm and pleaded, “You love me, why didn’t you let me die? Please let me die, this hurts too much.” Those words tumbling from her are still haunting me.
There are many nuances surrounding the topic of loving someone who is suffering from depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, or any other mental illness. I could write pages, yet I want to focus on something fairly simple to say and very difficult to do: Lose the ego and don’t take it personally.
I thought long and hard about her words in the ER that night, and have almost every night since. I’ve often said to anyone who will listen that love is the absence of selfishness and the loss of ego. Truly loving someone means working toward their health and happiness. So when a depressed friend:
Cancels plans, changes their mind at the last minute, or can’t seem to get out of bed, it is quite simply not about you. Instead of heaping blame, guilt, and expectations, be accommodating.
Try to ask what you can do. The answer may be “nothing”, it may be “let me die”, or “some chocolate would help”. You may not know what to say at times, that’s ok. Just be there.
When your friend tries to explain their pain and why death seems like a relief, don’t ignore that conversation just because it hurts. It’s important to give credence to those feelings. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying encourage the behaviour. But thoughts need to breathe because they are very real and can become toxic or worse, lethal, very quickly.
Humour is beautiful medicine, but don’t belittle their feelings or use it as a tool of self-denial.
And most importantly, if you see the signs of someone at serious risk of self-harm, act. That night I kept hoping I was being paranoid, and that the worst of it would be dealing with her fury at my over reaction. If I had ignored her subtle messages, or just waited until the next day to check in, we may not be sitting here painting our nails and watching TV.
Some days I’ve sat here and watched helplessly as she fluctuates between sobbing into a scattered heap of crayons, lashing out, or just staring into space, all while fighting tooth and nail to regain some sense of who she is when the emptiness doesn’t consume her.
In these instances, I really meant what I said at the outset. I want to yell and scream, and tell her I’m frustrated. Even though I know her pain is very real, I want her to battle a little harder. But the simple truth is that it isn’t fair. She never asked for this demon to be thrust upon her tiny shoulders. The beautiful unicorn that she is (this term of endearment comes from her rather unique perspectives on the world) can’t exist just for those of us who love her. So day after day, like Atlas, my mighty titan fights to lift the celestial burden of finding the will to live for herself.
She is truly more of a sister than a friend. I know this truth to be self-evident because in the past week alone, we’ve shared both a sharp exchange of words and a perfect meal on a downtown Toronto patio. We both know her battle is long term, that there will be ebbs and flows, and that sometimes the demon will win a round or two. But when her armour gets scuffed, I hope she knows I’ll always be there with some silver polish and a Tiffany blue cleaning cloth before she heads off for her next duel.
P.S - Check out her blog "Light Project Stories" for some incredible and powerfully written insights!