One summer night when I was sixteen I was walking home from my job at a pizza place a couple blocks from my house. It was real late, probably around one or two in the morning, and there was no one around. As I was crossing the street I heard this car coming toward me. It was a good four or five blocks away, but it must’ve been doing 100 because it was closing the distance between me and it pretty rapidly. It was so quiet out all I could hear was the car’s engine, getting louder and louder. I kept walking, thinking: “Surely they see someone’s crossing the street here. They’re gonna slow down.â€
But they didn’t. They might’ve even accelerated. It was the damndest thing. So at the last instant I stopped and the car shot past me, couldn’t have missed by more than five feet. I watched it go, flying down the street as fast as it had come, and thought to myself: “Holy shit, I just had a fucking near-death experience.†I was shaken. If I’d taken just taken two or three steps more I would’ve been knocked into the next zip code, dead before my body hit the ground. It was crazy, that car didn’t slow down one bit, even at that very last instant when I might’ve walked directly into its path. What kind of maniac was behind that wheel? My heart was still pounding after I got home. I guess I felt lucky to be alive.
That was a long time ago. I turned 40 in January. But I think about that incident a lot these days. I think about how, if I’d had a premonition on that long ago summer night of what the future held in store, I would’ve kept walking. At least I like to think I would’ve. Because I can’t think of a whole lot I would’ve missed out on. If I’d even been able to see into the immediate future: A few months after that night my father would abandon me, never to return, leaving me in the sole care of my alcoholic, neurotic, and quite likely psychotic mother. A year later I would get into a sexual relationship with a middle-aged chicken hawk that lived down the street from me, a real smoothie who knew how to play a confused kid with abandonment issues. A year and a half later I would lose (or give away, really) the best friend I had ever had or would have. And before I knew it, intense feelings of rage and regret and despair and loneliness would become the norm.
I would try everything: Therapy, drugs (both prescription and illicit), meditation, positive self-affirmation, exercise, health food, vitamins, you name it. Nothing would work. Maybe it would be because I’d never have good health insurance and would never be able to get the kind of intense, comprehensive treatment I’d need. Or maybe I just wouldn’t try hard enough—maybe I’d just be so broken inside that I wouldn’t be able to summon the will to commit to any course of treatment. Probably it would be a combination of the two.
I was reading a post on this site from a 19 year-old kid who’d lost his two best friends and was feeling terribly isolated and alone, and from the sound of it sliding into a long, grueling bout of mental illness. An optimistic commenter promised the kid that things WILL GET BETTER!!! and that this was only a temporary bump in the road. Now, I don’t know this kid, and maybe Little Miss Sunshine is right. Sounds like a nice kid, I hope he does get better. But I’m living proof that sometimes you don’t. Sorry to piss on anyone’s parade, but I’ve been listening for years to people telling me how much I have going for me, and how with the right this and the right that I’ll be right as rain. I’m sure they meant well, but they obviously didn’t know what the fuck they were talking about. And now I wish I hadn’t listened to them. I could’ve saved myself a lot of hassle.
I don’t subscribe to the notion of the big bad world beating up on poor little me. My childhood was a nightmare to be sure, but once I turned 18 my choices were my own, and I own every bad decision I made. Not that I can justify them very well, except to say that I’ve been committing passive-aggressive suicide for most of my life, bleeding myself out with a million tiny (metaphorical) cuts. Maybe this is what I wanted all along, to make things so bad for myself that I’d eventually have no choice but to take decisive action. I always was a procrastinator. And I could still keep putting it off, but I have no doubt that things will get worse. I’ll see to it.
So is there a moral to all this? Let’s see…how ‘bout: “Know thyselfâ€? Or: “Don’t put off till tomorrow what you can do todayâ€? Better yet, I’ll just quote another, particularly apt post I found on this site: “They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?â€
5 comments
You’re a funny guy.
I hope to be like you when I get to be your age because you have a more realistic view of the world than do most people. There’s still time for things to get better for you but, seeing as you’ve given up hope and are particularly opposed to the idea of anything working out in your favor, I’m just going to say good luck.
Don’t assume that you’re right just because you’re 22 yrs older than me and I’m a young, naive, stupid girl when I say this. Experience doesn’t equal knowledge. In all seriousness, you probably shouldn’t give up hope that things might actually work out. But if you refuse to believe it, and stay away from anything that could be good for you, then you’ll find it will always work out the way you expect it to.
Life is confusing and shitty isn’t it? I don’t how to say it to make you feel any better but life does get better, it just takes some time. Your still young, believe it or not, and maybe you just haven’t seen enough of life.
From what I’m taking from this story, it’s people that fucked up your life. SOMEONE almost killed you when you were 16, your FATHER abandoned you, your MOTHER neglected you, some DOUCHEBAG gave you hope then destroyed it, PEOPLE have been telling you what you don’t want to hear, THERAPISTS have been taking your money and haven’t done a damn thing to help, and YOU are putting yourself down for thinking it’s your fault. And then look at ME prolly pissin you off even more.
Get in touch with a different part of life. Go see nature. Go camping or just go lay outside in the grass and look at the clouds. Take some time out for yourself and stop letting people make you miserable.
I hope life can get better. I’ve tried all sorts of treatment and nothing seems to work. I’m 22 years old and I cannot imagine myself at 40. However, you made it somehow. Something in your life was worth living for. Believe that there is at least one thing that you anticipate in the future that would brighten your day. This way, even if you want to die, you’ve got something to look forward to. For me, I look forward to trying more drugs. This probably isn’t the best example, but anything is better than nothing. I also look forward to learning a new song on the guitar. Please, name me something you can look forward to- drugs, sex, shopping, eating cake, etc.
I appreciate the sentiments, people, but what works for some doesn’t work for others. I mention my age to make the point that I’ve spent a long time battling this black cloud and in that time have come to understand it just as you come to understand anything you live with your whole life. The reason I didn’t cash in my chips sooner is I wanted to be sure I’d tried as hard as I could, and I’m satisfied now that I have. I put up a good fight, and I give myself a pat on the back for that. Now it’s time to be realistic. Don’t scoff–to argue that someone else can get out of their depression because you got out of yours is to assume that your circumstances are identical. But there are highly variable factors that make everyone’s depression unique, including brain chemistry and personality, personal experience and numerous outside factors. And I can tell you just as there are inoperable forms of cancer, so too are there terminal cases of depression. I’ve seen a couple of family members die from it. They didn’t kill themselves, they just withered away into premature decrepitude until their hearts gave out. And that, my friends, is a much more sad and grotesque sight than the swift mercy of a bullet or a noose. I didn’t post here for pity or advice, I just found it interesting reading other peoples’ stories and wanted to offer my own. My situation is what it is and I’ve made peace with it. That’s not really such a bad thing.
Urs sounds very much like mine. Im ten years younger than u tho. I try my best and I get no where. I keep holding out hope but every time I do I just get smashed back dow. I swear the universe hates me as much as I do. I sat in a tub the other night for hours contiplating killing my self slicing open my wrists and just ending all my pain and haterid in one motion. But I am a single mother if I go my kids will have the same crapy world I did. So I got out of the tub put the razor away and I started a new day. I will always be alone and hated. But im trying. Maybe u need a friend I know I do. Someone who wont judge or ridcule u. Try talking to me maybe in turn we can help each other.