Depressed, because those I love are depressed.

My boyfriend suffers from suicidal thoughts, my two closest friends cut themselves. I don’t know what to do because I feel like I am holding up their worries, thoughts, and feelings while trying to hold myself together, I’m going to reach a breaking point soon; and I need help.

I am a nosy, self-righteous, worrywart. I used to be the happiest person in the world, without a care or worry. Some of my friends, however are not so lucky. One of my closest friends Matt was (has been, and is currently) suffering with clinical depression for many years. Being that worrywart  I tried all I could (all in vain because I used all the wrong methods,)to help him out. He constantly goes through mood swings and is very bipolar. Being only 10 at the time, I just gave up on helping him. At that point his depression didn’t bother me at all, I guess that’s because we weren’t that great of friends at the time (I admit to myself, looking back that I was probably THE WORST friend to confide in).

But recently I got my first boyfriend, who I really truly love. All was well until he started telling me that he felt sad about the past. I brushed it off because I compared it to Matt’s depression and I thought it wasn’t serious. As time went on my boyfriend’s sadness developed into suicidal feelings and he told me about his parents yelling at him everyday for nothing and how they tell him he’s not wanted anymore as a child. He’s told me that he wants to ‘go away and never come back’ and that no one cares about him. All I want to do is help him I love him so much and it pains me to hear about his pain, so much that I’ve cried myself to sleep everyday for months.

I finally got sick of keeping this matter to myself and told my friend Garrett, about the whole situation with my boyfriend. We became very close and I completely opened up to him about everything. This eased the pain for a while, because I finally had someone to depend on. Things took a sudden turn when I found out Garrett was cutting himself, and with that I took a huge blow because I felt like I wasn’t allowed to tell Garrett anything anymore because all I’d do is add to his pain. So I went over to Matt, and Matt has been suffering through his clinical depression for many years so he’s an expert on what to do, but it’s the same situation with Garrett, I can’t tell him everything because I’m afraid I’m just adding to the pain .

All these things going on with the most important people in my life is creating a lot of stress on me, and all they talk about is suicide, their depression, and cutting themselves. Half of me wants to cut off all ties with them and be done with all this pain they’re giving me, but the better part of me knows that if I do, it may be fatal to those I love and I will regret it later. This causes me great grief and sadness. With all this going on I’ve wondered what it would be like if I could just end my life and not have to deal with any pain, even though I’ve preached to many that suicide is not the way to go and there is a positive. I’ve wondered what goes through their minds as they cut themselves or think of suicide, and oddly I think I might have picked it up (the thoughts, not the actions!!). It’s becoming harder and harder to get through each day, I stay up late at sites like these and don’t get enough sleep, and often fall asleep during classes. I think Garrett, Matt, and my boyfriend’s pain have influenced me to think like them. Yes, there are positives in my life, plenty and I can see that I have much to live for so don’t count on me going suicidal, but there are suicidal thoughts.

But the problem here is that I feel like I need to try and help my loved ones in any way possible , and it sucks because I can’t! There’s nothing I can do to help ease the pain of Garrett, Matt, or my boyfriend. I have to watch them suffer through pain, feeling alone, feeling unloved, and cutting themselves. I’ve tried to convince all of them that they are not alone, I’ve done research online to help, and nothing seems to be working. My relationship with my boyfriend has become very depressing, not at all like a normal teenage relationship should feel like, and Garrett has slowly retreated from me after telling me that he cuts himself. I feel like I’m carrying the world on my shoulders and I’m not nearly as strong as Atlas, the Greek god who held up the sky. I know it may seem stupid to some of you because I’m not the one directly experiencing the pain, but it truly hurts me as well.