Suicidal for a VERY long time

Hi, I am Reitanna, and I have wanted to kill myself since I was about twelve or thirteen. I will be twenty three this November. When I was twelve, I was diagnosed with manic depression, but we had seen signs of it when I was a young child. There may have even been thought of suicide when I was young, but I don’t remember. I was abused by my mother, whom I will call E because I don’t consider her my mom anymore, until I was fourteen when custody of me was finally taken away from her.

However, I’ve always been scarred by this, and being manic depressive and being bullied all my life didn’t help. Now I’m not writing a sob story or anything, and I know there are people with WAY worse situations, but I feel like I need to share this. I’ve almost been killed by some of my bullies, and whether or not you want to die, that can be very scary.

They tried me on Prozac when I was a preteen, but that made my suicidal thoughts worse, then Zoloft made me shakey and panicky. So I was afraid of going on medication for many years. Finally, when I turned twenty, I braved up and saw a psychiatrist. I am now on one anti-psychotic, two anti-depressants, and recently, Ambien for my insomnia, which has been really bad lately. Now I at least SLEEP.

Sometimes my body gets used to the dose of medication, and my doc has to raise it. He says this is normal. But my insurence doesn’t cover my appointments, so there was a point where I didn’t see him for about eight months because of finances. (Bills suck.) My MDD got so bad, any fear of dying completely left. Many suicidal people still fear pain, or fear they won’t die, etc. I had only tried to actually kill myself once, and that was when I was eighteen. Because of that, I now don’t remember most of my Senior year of high school.

Now, I had been working at a Walgreens for three years, which was my first job. I liked it because it was a low volume store, and I also have agoraphobia, so being forced to meet people helped me be less afraid of them. My boss was THE best boss you could ever dream of having, and we had awesome managers, except one. I’ll call him B. Everyone was fully aware of my disorder, and there was a point where my boss gave me numbers to suicide hotlines. However, many of the assistant managers ended up switching stores, except for B. He’d been there since the store opened. EVERYONE hated him, but my boss was a little oblivious to the things he did or didn’t do. When the boss wasn’t at the store, B would just sit in the office doing nothing but like, reading customer comments and such.

He was mean, incompetant, and picked on me since about a week after starting the job. I don’t know why he singled me out, probably cause I was the weekest one. Anyway, things got worse over the years, especially after his girlfriend had an unplanned baby. I won’t go into details, but I will say I got SO tired of it, I quit. See, he KNEW when my meds wore off in the afternoon before I had to take my second dose. He actually caused my boss to put me on paid leave for two months, where I took therapy provided for free by the company. I had taken therapy for seven years without my consent when I was a kid, and just like then, it did NOT help. Therapy does not do anything for me.

But I came back, my meds slowly getting weaker as my body got used to them, and I had many attacks. My attacks are BAD. So after a couple months of being back, B took it too far, and I had another attack, shouting that I quit. I needed this job, I liked this job, but I couldn’t HANDLE it. My boss has kept me on “rehirable” in case I ever want to come back.

I ran home, which is an apartment about a two minute walk away, and my boyfriend, M was on vacation. He works at the Walgreens too, that’s where I met him. He wondered why I was home so early, but I strode passed him to the bathroom. He’s pretty experienced with my attacks, since we’ve been together for three years, and he’s MUCH stronger than me, so he was able to pull me out. I have a box cutter hidden in my drawer that I used. He kept me away from it, but I tried grabbing my 99% alcohol used for cleaning may makeup implememnts (i’m a liscensed cosmotologist and certified makeup artist), and also reached for my 100% acetone. He stopped me, and like always, had to hold me to the floor as I freaked out.

When I calmed down, I was still in my depressed state, and was explaining what happened while still crying, and realizing there truly was no way out this time. At the time I had no insurence, and my meds costed me around $200 out of pocket. How was I to pay for that? What about rent? Bills? Food? Food for my hamster and two rats? M thought I was calmed down enough, so he went to get my meds so I could take my second dose, but found me trying to take a bottle of Advil PM, and stopped me.

One thing that truly scared my loved ones and doctor is that, he had been planning on going to Vegas with his family that morning, but they had realized they couldn’t go at the time. He wouldn’t have been home that evening, and I would not be writing this. But it was still awhile before I actually saw my doctor from that day.

Back to the pain and fear thing. I realized this after I went to the dentist. I was TERRIFIED of needles, and would never go to the dentist without them knocking me out with laughing gas and a pill. But that’s expensive, and I had no insurence. My current insurence actually doesn’t cover dentistry. I was so afraid, I wouldn’t even get a tattoo. I still don’t have one yet, but because of money, again. When I went to the dentist to get a filling, I took the novacane without a problem, barely feeling pain. I FELT them work on the cavity, and it only hurt slightly, whereas it used to scare the crap outta me.

I also realized this when I cut myself. My disorder is MANIC depression, by the way, which means I can go either way. Nowadays it’s referred to as Bipolar. My manic attacks can be just as dangerous as my depressed ones. I have cut myself sobbing and cut myself laughing. It felt good, there was no more pain. I also used to be afraid (ironically) of using super sharp stuff, so I’d use really blunt stuff like keys, or something small like safety pins. But box cutters are SHARP, and my fear was 100% gone. The pain was gone. I actually tore open my hip, starting small, but started becoming out of control in a manic episode and slashed at it so much that my underwear had been practically covered on the one side where my hip was.

M discovered this and was horrified. I had done my hip because he had seen my wrists. When he told me to promise him to not cut my wrists anymore, I was a smartass and was like, “you didn’t say I couldn’t cut anywhere else.” He demanded I stop, but I said, “you can’t tell me what to do, and you can’t supervise me 24/7.” In the end, he said, “if you stop hurting youself, I’ll pay for your tattoo.” That’s right. I had to be BRIBED. I promised, and I NEVER break a promise, and it has been very hard, even after my meds were upped to the right dose.

My best friend, nicknamed Sempai, was hurt to hear that. Sempai and M are the only people in the world I can trust, and I love them so much. But I feel as though they’re forcing me to stay here. I end up thinking, “if they really cared, they’d let me go.” Another way M convinces me to not kill myself is saying, “what will your rats do without you?” My rats are so affectionate and smart, and I love them so much, I end up crying and saying, “don’t say that!” But it’s true, I’d be leaving my boys all alone. God, I’m starting to cry right now, they’re both chilling on my lap as I type this.

Anyway, my meds don’t stop me from feeling sad, they keep me from having attacks and keep my mood stabalized. All the same, I still do think about killing myself. The only way I’ve found satisfying enough to keep from from cutting is drawing a butterfly in red pen in every place I want to Cut. The idea is, if you cut, you kill the butterfly, and I would never harm a butterfly. It works surprisingly well. M hated this idea too, but I got so upset, saying, “so I can do something that DOESN’T harm me? I can’t do something that satisfies my urges to HURT myself?” Eventually he gave in.

But I’m no longer afraid of death, though I do want to do it quick and without causing my insides to burn like hell. I don’t like guns, so that’s not a preferred method. I have a few ideas of what I would do, but I can’t share them because the rules say so. I will say that they are combinations of methods. But the point is, even if I wouldn’t shoot myself, I could have a man point a gun to my head, and just accept it. I AM human, so I’d be afraid, naturally, but not enough to fight.

In fact, this part is very disturbing. There’s something called the Euthanasia Coaster designed by Julijonas Urbonas, a PhD candidate in London. The concept is for the coaster to kill you painlessly. There’s a TREMENDOUS drop and seven loops, each one getting smaller. You’ll experience thrill, euphoria, then tunnle vision, blackout, and finally die. It’s more humane, and I honestly would ride it in a HEARTBEAT if it was ever built. What’s disturbing is this:

I had always been afraid of upside down/loopty roller coasters, but last weekend I faced my fear at last while in Las Vegas with M and his family. This huge coaster is at New York New York, which also has an awesome arcade. The coaster was high, had one loop, two VERY sharp turns, and a crazy corkscrew. Just looking at it made me think, “don’t do it!” The way I faced my fear, however, was pretending I was in line for the Euthanasia Coaster. It was easy to imagine cause the line was so short. On the way up to the first drop, I repeated in my head, “don’t worry, you’re going to die. This will kill you.” This COMFORTED me. And my god, it was the thrill I needed to loosen up, it was AWESOME, and totally worth the trip! I was absolutely surged with energy after that, and if it hadn’t costed $14, I’d have gone again. But to convince myself to go by telling myself I’d die… that’s not normal.

I honestly, truly want to kill myself, and have wanted to for at least eleven years. I know it’s horrible, but I feel that I don’t belong here. I was unplanned, I feel so out of place, and I just want it to end. It’s like I’m a… Disney puzzle piece trying to be forced into a Nickelodean or Cartoon Network puzzle. And the more you force it, the more damaged it gets. I’m STILL not afraid, but I made a promise. I’ve begged M to just let me go, but the man loves me so much, he doesn’t know how he’d manage without me. I love him to the ends of the earth, but I’m still suicidal. Death fascinates me, excites me, and suicide definitely does.

I consider myself insane, and have considered checking myself into a mental hospital, but M doesn’t want me to go, and Sempai has told about her experience of being there (voluntarily). Apparently it’s horrible. But it’s obvious I’m not healthy, even if I am completely stabalized and in my right mind due to the meds. I can tell the difference when I’m off, trust me. I know that I never break a promise, so I’m here until M, Sempai, and others give in and let me go. But the point of this horribly long story is, it hurts to keep this promise. I’m still out of a job, and my agoraphobia is so bad, I can’t leave the house alone, and even when I go grocery shopping with M, I get nervous. That’s why I had a panic attack in Vegas, and the arcade and coaster helped me deal with being in public much easier. But still, there are WAY too many people in Vegas for me, and I had to hold on to M almost constantly. I know, it’s pathetic, and just another reason I’m so fucked up.

How can I cope with my suicidal feelings? Even after hundreds of YouTube and DeviantArt fans telling me they don’t want me to go, telling me why they look up to me, telling me why I’m a good person, it’s like I don’t believe them. It makes me happy to hear things like that, but I just have this mindset that they aren’t telling the truth. I know I have SO many reasons to stay, but I just feel that it doesn’t matter in the end. I’ll just keep going down further. So how can I cope with these stupid thoughts without having to hear the same old stuff from loved ones? How do I myself finally feel like I want to live?

I appreciate anyone who has actually read my novella, I know it was long. I’d also appreciate no hate or harsh judgement. Whatever you have to say that is negative, I tell myself every day. Even so, it does hurt hearing it from someone else. Even though I know the truth, it hurts coming out of another’s mouth.

So even though I’m not currently in danger of hurting myself or otherwise, I do need help from others who share similar thoughts, or people who are no longer suicidal. I don’t know how I can keep promises so strongly, but if I have to say “I promise” out loud, then it’s official, almost signed in blood. I’m extremely honest, and it’s a curse sometimes.

Last thing to mention, even though there’s the ever lying child who wants to give up within me, I can be, and have been know to be energetic, bubbly, and a “ray of sunshine.” Friends have told me that my emotions radiate, and if I feel sad, it makes others sad too, and if I’m happy, and THEY’RE having a bad day, I can cheer them up. It’s kinda cool actually, if they really mean that. Again, sorry this is so long (and not proofread.) Thank you for your time.