Preventive Measures

In the last few months I have started getting better. I no longer fantasize about dying every moment of the day, I no longer consider jumping in front of a train whenever I am at a station, or of jumping off a multi storey car park, I no longer hope there’s a car crash that kills only me whenever I get in a car, and I no longer think about how many pills it would take, or how deep I’d have to cut. I don’t plan what I’d write in a suicide note, or think about how much happier everyone would be if I wasn’t here any more.

I have, in all honesty, started to enjoy my life again. I realise that I cannot yet say I am fully recovered, because there are sometimes days when the darkness comes back, but I can say that I am on my way. I have started to plan for a future I never imagined would be mine, and in that I have realised that the future always has belonged to me, it was just that for a lot of last year and the year before that, I lost sight of it and the idea of a future became terrifying. What terrified me then and what still terrifies me now is the thought of not changing at all, of being stuck here and staying here and never moving forward, all that has changed is that I realised how free I really am, and that nothing will ever stay the same as everything is constantly changing and constantly in motion, whether I realise it or not. I am only 17 and there is so much I have yet to do and I know now that I can’t give up on my life before I have ever had a chance to live it because there are so many amazing things that could happen in the future I very nearly gave up on last year.

I am, however, being careful to avoid certain things in order to aid my recovery. I am trying really hard to keep myself busy doing things in the time I would previously have been shut up in my bedroom crying or feeling numb or cutting or just generally allowing the sadness to get me. I listen to music that makes me smile, or makes me feel less alone. I bake cakes. I clean and tidy. I do homework. I read books. I talk to friends. I play with my kitten. I go for walks. I draw pictures. I sing songs. I do yoga. I do basically anything that makes me happy, or at least distracts me from my feelings and usually, these things work. The sadness does still get me, though, it is just that I am putting up a slightly better fight that I am determined to win. I am also one of the very few people my age who is not learning to drive. I am not learning to drive because I know that if I was feeling especially terrible, the temptation to crash might be too much for me to handle, and I am determined not to give up my life that way.

I am determined to fight the darkness and I have faith that one day I will be able to say with certainty that the sad, numb, suicidal days are behind me for good.