Suicide
Dear Editor: In the early winter of 2012, the community I was living in experienced a devastating cluster of deaths by suicide. After courageous and long struggles with mental illness, five young community members’ pain became too unbearable. My community and I will never forget the memories of those individuals. I write today to share parts of an old therapy letter as a current Sitkan community member both a survivor of suicide and a survivor of suicide loss. There is hope.
In 2012, it was after my then-community’s most recent tragedy that I had to admit to myself something I had been pushing back and ignoring for quite some time. I was 16 and had been struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts for quite some time. When talking with my peers at school, many would say something along the lines of, “When walking through the hallways at school, I can’t help but wonder who is next.”
For months that year, I truly believed that I was next.
I made some negative decisions that felt right in the moment and I now recognize that they have forever changed me and the course of my life. I was hospitalized for the last two months of my junior year of high school after confiding in my social worker who took charge of saving my life.
When I was in the hospital unit, I felt something that I hadn’t felt in a long time: hope. The walls that had crashed down over me and were slowly crushing me started to fade. I was finding my way out of the rubble with the supportive hands of therapists and gentle guides of teachers, peers, mentors, and positive adults in my life. My stay in the hospital fell over the night of prom, where I was supposed to be on the prom court. Upon finding this out, the staff allowed us to have our own mini-prom. It was moments like this where I felt good, where I learned that the moments of fleeting joy were possible to feel. I felt like I could overcome this.
Fast forward a couple of months to September 2012. My world came crashing down once again; every step I took felt like I was losing my footing. This newly formed dark cloud was thicker, darker, and much more menacing than the one I experienced just months prior. I was quickly absorbed, feeling blinded from any sense of good. I started to rely on destructive feelings as a way of living - they were the only things that actually felt real and they were things I could grasp onto. I held onto horrible perceptions of myself, literally for dear life.
As I continued to be enveloped in sadness, the already tiny voice in the back of my head screaming with all its might, “Hold on.” faded into an inaudible whisper, but I knew it was there.
This little whisper would show itself in the multitude of hours I spent laying completely motionless in my bed watching my phone light up with messages from friends and schoolmates. The tiny voice would use these brief seconds of light in my pitch-dark room to scream at me through my sight. Whether it was a message of encouragement, or a simple “hey,” these electronic beacons of hope slowly got me the further care I needed.
I was hospitalized for a second time that year in November. Seeing the familiar faces and being in a familiar routine tried to convince me that I was better within a day. I knew that was false. The emotions I was feeling were present and they were real, but I couldn’t let the dark abyss hiding inside me trick me. My hospital therapist and I were able to make this hospital stay different. I had finally begun to allow myself to see and feel the scary emotions I was hiding from. I was emerging from the muck that this terrible darkness had me trudging through for years.
My community grew to be strong and relentless and I leaned on them throughout my healing journey. My community has changed and grown in the years that I have changed and grown. Healing is hard work, but it is worth it. I still vividly remember the first time I felt genuinely happy in the spring following my challenging 2012. At the time of writing this letter, I ended with: “Since that day I have had moments of similar feelings, but I ultimately cannot wait until the time when this feeling becomes natural and a part of my everyday life.”
I am honored and humbled to share that joy, sadness, and everything else in between have become feelings that are a part of my everyday life. I am happy to have survived.
I write to you as a thriving member of our Sitka community, who 12 years later is grateful to be alive and enjoying what this life has to offer. This journey hasn’t always been easy, but it will always be worth it.
There is hope to keep going; you do not have to walk alone.
National Crisis CareLine 988; Crisis Text Line 741-741; our local agencies of Sitka Counseling and SEARHC are here to help. With peace,
Sitka Community Member
