Unhappily Alive

Greetings Readers,

I’m a 27 year old gay male and have suffered from depression since I was a child. My father died in an accident when I was 7 and it sent me into a traumatic spiral from which I’ve never truly recovered. After his death, seemingly every four months on until I was 15, somebody else in my family died. Mostly it was the older generations (great grandmothers, great aunts/uncles), excepting my cousin who died at the age of 26 from a sudden case of the “flu” (drug addiction and alcoholism). These events all contributed to the never-ending battle with depression I face.

When I was 18 and in college I went into one of my very few truly manic episodes where I grabbed a razor and slashed myself about 200 times, leaving mostly superficial wounds. I carved a few words into my chest (“LOSER”,”******”) that night as well. I sought student-directed counseling the next day, and was immediately granted access to a counselor. I showed her my self-inflicted injuries and she gasped in shock. Her reaction alone completely turned me off to the idea of ever going to therapy. (Also, I think it’s pertinent to mention that my mother used to threaten me as a child with therapy in order to make me ‘normal’ as a result of my incredible dramatic outbursts and tendency to inflict bodily harm on myself, such as self-slapping and slamming my head into walls).

After I finished College, the depression didn’t get any worse, but it didn’t get any better. I cut myself sporadically for about another 2 years. I became dependent upon alcohol for a few years as well, but I moved away from that to self-medicating with marijuana.

As I grew into my mid twenties I began to try to treat myself for depression. Instead of relying on drugs or alcohol to defeat my demons, I embraced them as a part of who I was and who I will always be. I accepted their existence, and tried to accept my homosexuality as well (but it’s not been easy).

Any time I am met with failure, real or perceived, my mind immediately jumps to suicide. I fantasize about it almost daily for weeks on end and finally “snap out of it.”

However, my step father recently passed away after a battle with cancer and it affected me very negatively. We weren’t incredibly close, but he was the only member of my family who shared most of my interests (politics, current events). It was cathartic having somebody to rant and rage with, and even though he was dying from cancer, he was fighting the fight all the way to the end. It made me feel terrible about my suicidal thoughts, and it kept them at bay until his passing.

Now, however, I’m caught in the cycle of perceived/real failure->urges to kill myself->rationalization->perceived/real failure->et cetera ad infinitum. I can’t find a job. I have no money. I have no romantic life, and all of my friends (95% of whom are heterosexual) are getting married and having children, while working stable jobs and making a living wage. They have everything I’ve ever wanted out of life and that bitter beast Jealousy is rearing its ugly head, reminding me that I’ve failed at life, and telling me to end it all.

I’m not at the end of my rope yet. I’m struggling very hard though to maintain my sanity and am finding it difficult to move forward in life. My future plans ever since I was a child was to get a little older and kill myself, so I never contemplated what the future held for me. I still can’t make a decision as to what I want to do with my life, and when I try to figure it out, I just fall back into the perpetual cycle.

Sorry I wrote so much on my first post here, but I was hoping that I could get some advice on how I can go about trying to break this cycle and felt that some background explanation was necessary as to how I get caught in these loops. I can’t afford therapy, I gave up drugs, I drink occasionally socially and usually not to self-medicate (but often times it’s the first thing I do when I am disappointed). My binges last about a week at a time, followed by two weeks of depressive, suicidal thoughts, followed by a 3 days of forcing myself to try to move on.

I’m not afraid of death itself — it is a natural part of life that happens to everybody and brings on the peace of painlessness and the lack of despair I seek so often. I rationally don’t want to end my own life, but when the dark thoughts come, I have a hard time resisting.

I guess my question to you, reader, is: do you have any advice or recommendations on how an individual with no money and no insurance can find support? And is it possible to ever move past a lifetime of depression and break the cycle?

Thank you for reading and thank you in advance for your response.

-Unhappily Alive