I’ll Make a Bet With You.

Sometimes I think there are only three things keeping me on this Earth:

1. The money that my parents have paid into my college education (and the guilt I would feel knowing that I cost them $20,000 of their retirement just for me to dip out of this world right after they’d paid it).

2. My own personal fear of the actual deed of taking my life.

3. The fear of something worse than life for those of us who choose not to stick it out. There’s got to be something worse than this, right?

I’m graduating from college in May. Next month. May 18th at 2:30 P.M., to be exact. In some ways, I feel a bit selfish even saying it here; I realize some of us will not (or do not want to) make it that long. In many ways I have lived a fairly privileged life. I grew up in a middle class home, went to good schools, and dealt with normal teenage problems. I am sure that many others on this website would look at me and think, “she hasn’t seen shit.” But like everyone else I had my own unique issues; often I felt that they were too great for me to face.

In 8th grade I faced my first bully. In fact, I should say team of bullies. I’d always been accepted in school without problems, but this year was different. Things started out alright; but in the second week of school when I made the apparently monumental move of switching my lunch seat to a different table (to sit with my actual best friends) the girls in my class took it very personally and decided I must be their enemy. They decided to exclude me from everything. Gradually the entire class got in on it. By the end of the year 25 of my peers disliked me, and only three of them truly knew why. I’m sure that many people on here can relate to the idea of being disliked by one’s peers. What got me through this was the support of my best friend (I’d only moved to this area relatively recently and we’d known each other about 4 years – quite long for 13 years old), who was not in my class and had no clue what was going on because I was too embarrassed to tell her. I came out of this with several scars: I have a serious need to be included and get mild anxiety when I am not. I have an inherent mistrust of others. I have learned to keep a great deal to myself.

Fast forward several years.

I was drinking. Smoking weed. Showing up at school drunk. Dating a boy who did none of the above. He caught wind of what I was was up to and dumped me (I don’t blame him). I took the breakup hard though, because I liked him a lot and didn’t understand my misdeeds at the time. I later regretted treating him like crap. He ended up being our valedictorian. Meanwhile, there was another boy. I’d liked him for years. He liked a friend of mine, who we will call Hanna. Rather than admitting that he’d “chosen her,” I claimed that I no longer liked him. They started dating. It didn’t work out and they broke up – an angry, messy, breakup. I still liked him. A lot. I thought I loved him (and I thought this for several years afterwards). I lost my virginity to him. Consequently I also lost Hanna to him. She and I were very close at the time, and this was the first time my privileged little life faced a serious obstacle. I hadn’t had everything handed to me, but I’d never had to seriously work for anything. Suddenly a boy I’d liked for years was breaking my heart, stealing my virginity, and taking my best friend away from me all at the same time. These things were not his fault, but I didn’t recognize that at the time. These are the some of the most important things to a 17 year old girl. I didn’t know how to separate them from myself – I didn’t know how to not allow them to define me.

That was the first time I thought about suicide. Well… technically it wasn’t. The first time I’d thought about it was when I’d broken up with my soon-to-be-valedictorian boyfriend, which had sent my on a major “what am I doing with my life” spiral. But I think most teens face that kind of spiral at some point. This was the first time I’d seriously thought about it, and there’s a difference.

I think there are a lot of people out there – at all ages – who think, “fuck it. I’m done with life. I’m giving up.” And I think most of them never get past that initial thought. The rest of us are here.

I have a close friend whose older brother ended his life. Shortly after we graduated high school she asked me, “what can drive a person to that?” I wanted to tell her about how you wake up in the morning feeling like you’re at the bottom of a hole. You know you could probably climb to the top if you wanted to, but why bother? What’s waiting for you? There’s no hope; hope was abandoned a long time ago. Happiness? What’s that? You can scarcely remember the last time you felt genuinely happy. You feel like a disappointment. You feel like a burden to everyone, and you genuinely feel as though they would be better off (in the long run) if you weren’t around at all. Yeah, there would probably be some initial tears, but they would all get over it and be happier without you around. Being suicidal is the knowledge that things will probably get better eventually, but not having the ability to wait around for it to happen. It’s survival of the fittest, in a way. And we’re losing. If you want to win, you keep going. It’s seriously that simple. But I couldn’t tell her those things. My suicidal secrets were my own.

So, moving on in my story.

My high school drama blew over with a few additional scars. I lost two of my best friends. In the long run I managed to keep the boy as a friend, despite deep, more-than-friendly feelings. I developed a sensitivity to a few particular words. But most importantly, my trust in others was utterly shattered. Those who I’d counted as my “best friends” had ended up turning on me when I’d needed them the most. I learned not to count on anyone but yourself. I learned to trust nobody. I drove to New York City (intending not to come home) and back (a seven hour round-trip drive). I built a wall around my heart out of giant concrete blocks.

I went to college and I slowly broke down that wall. Lo and behold, I made the same mistakes all over again and had to start from scratch. In a sense I had to completely rebuild myself. I still have insecurity issues and trust issues, but I’ve learned who I am again. Unfortunately, my definition of who I am relies heavily on my friends. It relies heavily on where I am as opposed to where I want to go. Consequently I’m left with the sense that my best days are behind me, and my typical, simple solution comes back. It’s my ultimate solution.

I feel as though I am not prepared to face the world. I find myself clinging to every aspect of college that I can, because this represents a time in my life during which I am allowed to screw up and not know which direction my life is going. Once I graduate I am expected to have answers.

To be totally honest, I don’t know why I’m writing this. Maybe just to show that people from all walks of life share the same desire to end things. Maybe to open the eyes of others to the idea that nobody’s life is perfect. Maybe it’s to show you guys that I’m still here. For over four years now I’ve seriously considered ending it all, and I can honestly say that I don’t regret sticking around. There have been triple the number of great moments to make up for the shitty ones.

Maybe just to hear somebody say, “me too.”

I’ll make a bet you aren’t still reading this.