I Had a Suicide Plan

I haven't told anyone this for an odd reason. I have been worried for years that if I made it public, I wouldn't have an option to go for it if I felt like I needed to again. But it's suicide awareness month and this is my official letting go and leaving it behind.

**Trigger warning: this is going to outline some dark thoughts and detailed plans for suicide. (asterisks will indicate where to skip over)** But then it gets into some of what helped and got me out after and what you can do if you find yourself on either end of it.

At the time I took this photo, I thought to myself, I need to remember how I look when I am the worst I have ever felt.

Four years ago, from about November 2015 through January 2016, was the peak of many of the fails I've oulined in this blog. I was at, or near, my biggest weight and felt it, my ex-husband had just moved back to MN and seeing him was both infuriating (I remember why we were divorced) and conflicting (I still cared about him and questioned if I had made the right call months before), I had been dumped by the most significant boyfriend of my life (and it wouldn't be the last time, but this time Adele's album, 25, just came out and set the soundtrack of it all), I had to leave my therapist because we learned she wasn't in-network after $900 of visits I couldn't afford, kids were struggling in school and sanity, I was missing my sisters who had both moved hundreds of miles from our hometown like I had always dreamed I would, I had missed out on a promotion, I was donating plasma to tread water on the bills, and tens of thousands of dollars of debt was suffocating me. 

The tipping point came when I called one of many debt collectors, and they said they could lower my minimum payment if I would fill out a monthly finance form to find out where I had space to pay them. I did the form honestly, sent it back, and the collector on the other end said with sadness in his voice, "Ma'am, according to this, your basic bills are more than you make. We can't work with you if there is no space to make reasonable payments. We'll have to keep the payments as-is." 

That was it. I couldn't even take small steps to get better, so it would just never get better. And even if it DID get better, I was fighting like hell to move from drowning to just struggling. What a pathetic thing to want to look forward to, I told myself.

**I was in a cycle of still showing up in life - I made it to work and got kids to theater or basketball - I know some forms of depression aren't so active, but otherwise I would just lay awake in bed. I was always in bed, but never asleep. This bizarre insomnia was enough to get me to the doctor for sleeping pills, but I was careful to not let on to her about the depression. I deliberately didn't check the blocks that said "Have you felt hopeless in the last 6 months" because I knew she might not give me the pills then. I needed those to start the plan.

After a suicide, people wonder what that happy friend with so much ahead of them could have been thinking. Well, I'll tell you: With the ex-husband bonding again w the kids while I hid in my room, the rationalization started. I could die and they would be OK. They would be BETTER than OK because my life insurance could pay off my debt, my ex-husband would be happy to stay in the house and have the kids full time, my ex-boyfriend would feel like a jerk and regret losing me forever (ok, that's a petty justification, but whatever, it existed), and - and this is the biggest lie I told myself - I had already screwed up my kids so badly, that at least having a dead parent would give them SOME pity in the world for how terrible they would inevitably turn out. These were as true as the laws of gravity to my depressed mind. Yeah, sure, people would be sad, but people get over it. They'd cry for a while, but then they wouldn't. People are resilient.

The key was to make it look like an accident, not a suicide. I couldn't let my kids think I CHOSE to leave them, just that it was my time to go. So I had a plan.

We had a really great snowy Saturday together one day that January, and I knew Sunday would be a good time to do it. I told them I had to run some errands and planned to never see them again while they gave me a quick "bye, mom" while still glued to MarioKart on the TV. I put the sleeping pills in my purse and got in the car. I was going to take enough to show up in a toxicology test, then crash my car somewhere isolated (to not hurt anyone else) but where it would be found soon. Something like driving into a tree or off a freeway ramp. I had a few locations in mind, but I drove east, cried, and listened to Radiohead while I tried to get the courage to do it.**

I wandered and drove until I had crossed one of the bridges I had on my list and ended up at my Grandma's cemetery. Last time I was there was the day I filed for divorce a year earlier. It's a Godspot of mine - somewhere in the world I can go and feel a little closer to God, a little more spiritual than normal. I remember getting out and the cold air hurt my face where I had been crying. I got to her spot, laid down on the cold ground, and cried. I asked her to help me. I said out loud to the snowy tombstone, "I just don't know what else I can do."

I can't adequately describe the feeling I got, but it was definitely a warmth and a pressure like a hug or a heavy blanket. My tears stopped. My mind cleared. And it wasn't a voice, but just a distinct feeling that someone told me it will get better. I laid there a while longer, then got in my car and went home. I wouldn't toss the pills for another year, but I never started the plan again.

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So other than the spirit of my grandmother, what else helped me that could possibly help YOUR suicidal friend? Most of you had no idea how bad I felt, but a bunch of people knew I felt bad. I think the key is to show up however you do best.

- My mom would pick me up and buy me dinner and just talk. I didn't talk much back, and she's not one to directly confront questions like "do you want to kill yourself" but she could tell I needed to get out of my house and had the means to pull me out and make me exist for a few hours.

- My best mom friend, Adeana, let me walk in whenever and cry on her couch. She made good food and had the same sense of humor to pull me out of a rut. I'd show up puffy faced and word vomiting about whichever of the above problems and she just listened and empathized. I started coming out of my mental cancer just as she found her very real breast cancer, and I realized that her being there for me showed me how to be a good friend for her when she needed it. 

- My best work friend, Warren, could feel it like a 6th sense. He'd buy me a beer after work to vent or offer to fix my car for free or cover my work and let me cut out early. He defended me to the new boss and said "she's not normally like this, be patient."

Show up how you can. If you're the funny friend, be funny. If you have some extra money, treat your friend or send them an anonymous gift. If you can give them some regular time like a Thursday girls night or monthly book club, keep inviting them. Give your sad friend an easy invite, something where they feel like they're really not putting you out. Stick it out, because they might also avoid you, might not call you back, so it means a lot if you're still there when they start climbing out. Don't take it personally, they hate themselves, not you; love them through it. 

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And what do you do if you're me? You're a person who has been suicidal on and off since you were 15 or so. It comes at some obvious low points, but also unexpected a random times. It feels like a constant plan Z if nothing else works. So what are the things that have kept me further from that point even though the rough spots since:

- a list of my Godspots that I go to earlier in the slippery slope

- writing and oversharing sorts it out for me

- avoiding alcohol - it makes you feel better until you feel much, much worse

- having something to look forward to - a trip, a budget, or a 1 or 5 year plan to get back on track

- a lot of suicide prevention training 

- a good therapist
- My Zylo puppy. Really, if you need something to live for, get a dog who adores you because sometimes the unconditional love is the only string holding you together.

But the biggest thing is to stop thinking that you will be cured. You won't. This is your brain, it's your life, you are a suicidal person. Accept it now, and learn to MANAGE it. Understanding that has helped free me from needing to solve it and instead to say, this going to come again, and next time I'll be ready. I need to FEEL it before I can FIX it, but I will always come out the other side. 

When I lost the election, 3 years after my lowest low, I felt the depression, I saw the suicidal signs creeping in, but I opted to just FEEL sad and live in it and know it would get better. And that's exactly what happened. And that's what will happen next time. I'm going to get sad again someday, but while I'm not, I can get myself the people, the tools, the plans to pull out when it hits. The thoughts don't come as easily as they used to, I'm getting stronger. You can, too.

But if you need help to get yourself there, always know you can reach out to me. If you're feeling it now, if you can see it coming like a storm on the horizon, I'm here. I've been in that pit, I know the way out.