It’s a strange feeling when you can actually feel your heart breaking. It’s not the break-up kind of heart break. It’s the certainty that I know I’m going to kill myself kind of heart break. It’s the crying on the floor asking God “why?” kind of heart break. It’s the understanding and knowledge that your life, your supposedly “purposeful” life is completely insignificant. It’s the kind of heart break when you decided it’s over. It’s the kind of hear break knowing that you are the equivalent of celebrity’s homeless, drugged up, beat up sister. It’s certain that I’ll kill myself. I’m tired of all of this. I’m tired of dragging myself out of bed, at 36 years of age, living at home with my alcoholic parents. I’m tired of praying nearly ever minute at work “I hope they don’t fire me today”. I’m tired of apologizing to bill collectors that my check is late. I’m tired of this empty, meaningless, insignificant, pathetic life. Sometimes I wake up and the first thought I think when I open my eyes is “Darn, another day to live.”
Let me tell you about my perfect sister. What makes her so perfect? She’s the apple of my parents’ eyes. She’s their “successful” daughter. The married one. The pretty one. The mother. The wife of a rich man. The wife of a smart man. Living in Miami. I walked into my parents’ house. They rushed me to get home right after work because “everyone would be waiting for me.” Instead, I plopped myself on the couch and waited for my perfect sister to finish “getting ready” for dinner. She waltzed out of the bathroom, tan, thin, beautiful with long, dark hair (a prized possession in my family) and expensive clothes. She slipped on her shiny sandals from Nordstrom, I could only imagine how much they cost. She was so busy “getting ready” and being the perfect wife, the perfect mother, the perfect daughter, she barely had time to say hello and give me a hug. She picked up her Louis Vuitton bag with a carefree snatch, one daughter holding tightly to her leg and the other in her arms.
Their is pain that runs so deep inside of me, being “invited” to a social function, KNOWING, you’re not wanted there. Sitting at dinner, quietly, waiting for time to pass. Listening to their month in Paris in June, and vacation to Orlando last week. He comments, “It’s so less expensive to just bring in caterers and entertainment to my vacation home instead of ‘always going out.'” I nodded, like I understood. They talked about belly dancers, fire eaters, a Calypso band. They talked about different “theme” nights – all while on vacation. I grinned, thinking that my last vacation was in June. I sat home in a hot house, without air conditioning, with no where to go, nothing to do, no money to spend. I stayed at home. For. 9. days. straight. But right, keep talking about the fire eaters, and the Calypso band playing while you swim at night. Keep talking about “having so much family over” (of course I’m never part) that she cooked 3 dozen eggs and made a “burrito breakfast” for her family and their guests. Their family. But I’m not a part of that thing called “family.” I’m the broken one, the artist, the mentally ill, the depressed, the anxious, the suicidal one. I’m the one 36 and still living with “mom and dad”. I eat my gluten-free (thank you, God, another curse) pizza. It was a personal pie with paper thin crust. My dad chimed in just as I was chewing the last bite of crust, “WOW! You ate that whole pizza yourself?!!!!” Yes, Dad, and thank you for informing the whole restaurant. And might I add, it was a personal pizza. It was thin crust. Maybe I was just shoving food in my mouth to keep it occupied. Thanks, Dad. Thanks for being thoroughly annoyed when I asked my unbelievably ridiculously intelligent brother-in-law his opinion on my education/ career goals. I’m so deeply sorry it took 5 minutes away from your birthday spotlight. I watched the family across from us, laugh, share food, and talk. I crave the normalcy that most people take for granted. I crave the feeling of wanting to be needed, of being loved, of being validated. I made a cute joke over dessert. No one laughed. No one even looked at me. Lately you see, I talk, and my parents don’t respond. No nod, no glance, no response. Most of the time, they walk out of the room. While I’m in the middle of a sentence. Today, I thought to myself, “No, it can’t be. Maybe they’re starting to lose their hearing as they get older.” So I decided I would raise my voice slightly higher when I talked or asked them a question. It’s not that. They hear me. They just don’t respond. And if they do, they say it looking away from me.
Am I that horrible of a human being – your own flesh and blood – that I deserve NOTHING? Not an ounce of love, kindness, or care? And now? I don’t even receive the decency of a response or acknowledgement? Thanks. You’re. Really. Helping. Me. Rid. Myself. Of. Being. Suicidal. Thanks.
I sat on the sofa, listening to my brother-in-law show me the new website he designed. (I would have done it if he asked.) It was great. He showed me his “relevant landing pages” and Google Adwords campaign. He flipped through dozens of Excel spreadsheets with complex formulas and big numbers like $2,000,000. I nodded, barely understanding, but appreciating that I was at least being spoken to. He wasn’t looking at me when he talked, but at least it was directed to me. He talked to me for about 25 minutes. It was the most anyone has talked to me in weeks. Maybe months. My sister waltzed by me, brushing my leg. I apologized. Even though I wasn’t the one moving. I apologized. Because this is what I am. An apology for “getting in the way” of everyone. And so after watching my nieces on their iPads (yes, plural), and my brother-in-law reveling in dollar signs, I proclaimed it was “past my bedtime” aka, “I’m about to cry and I need to be alone.” It was my dad’s birthday and he made sure to be the center of attention. Drunken attention? But still attention. Posing for photos while blowing out the candles, laughing with the kids. My mom bought him an expensive piece of equipment, and my sister and brother-in-law gave him a gift card and “golf shirt” from Banana Republic. I quietly slid my card on the table after everyone walked away. There was no gift. Maybe the best gift I can give people, is my absence. My permanent, never-ending, long-time coming, absence.
I reminded myself about the loose suicide laws in Sweden and contemplated a vacation there.
2 comments
I think assisted suicide in Sweden is only available to terminally ill patients, not depressed people who just want to die.
I know how you feel. I mean, I’m not normally in the shadow of my sisters, but I’ve been through some long rough patches.
A year and a half ago, I got laid off from my job. Not a bad thing; I hated that job almost as much as the company apparently hated everyone who worked for them. But then, for almost a year, I was unemployed and for a few months, I’d just lock myself in my room and cry.
I’d taken to being in my room, taking benzos and antipsychotics with alcohol and tying a plastic bag over my head. I’d leave it there until I was panting like a marathon runner from all the CO2 in my blood. It’s actually pretty hard to kill yourself with only a plastic bag. I wasn’t trying very hard, I was only hoping that one day, I’d roll the dice and pass out before I took the bag off.
Anyway, I got a little sidetracked there, but what I want to say is that when you’re depressed, it really does feel like you’re alone. It feels like you’re invisible, or a burden to everyone else. I realised during my time in a mental hospital, that life through the lens of depression is very distorted. I mean, you send a friend a text message and they don’t reply immediately, your immediate conclusion is that they hate you, or just don’t care and think replying is a waste of time because it’s you.
I mean, think about your dad commenting on the pizza. Maybe he wasn’t trying to embarrass you. It might just be that he was feebly trying to make conversation. I know, I wasn’t there. All I’m saying is, it might not be what you think it is.
I realised that when we’re depressed, we spend so much time thinking the worst about what other people think about us. Yet, nobody will ever know what goes on in the head of anyone else. You make assumptions about things you couldn’t possibly know for sure. I learned that once you realise it’s an illusion, you can accept that what people actually think (and what they say when you’re not listening) actually doesn’t matter. What matters is their actions.
With that in mind, my advice (and this is only a suggestion) would be when you’re at home with one of your parents and you are both in a clear state of mind, take them aside, maybe into your bedroom (so they know this is important and private), and tell them how their apparent lack of attention to you makes you feel. About what it makes you think they feel about you. Don’t accuse them of anything, it’s not a fight, just describe your thoughts and feelings. Hopefully, you’ll have a meaningful discussion that will change the way you see yourself. Just a little.
Good luck
I know exactly what you mean. My older brother is much the same as your sister. Not just my family, but even my best friends since early childhood always ask me where my brother is when they see me. It’s the first question on everyone’s lips. And as soon as they find him, suddenly I become invisible. Hell, I could light them all on fire and none of them would notice.
Usually, it’s much the same for me. Every day, I’m apologizing for things that I haven’t done or been responsible for just so my family would stop arguing.
My brother makes a mistake and no one notices. I make a mistake and suddenly I’m not invisible for the ten minutes they’re all laughing at me.
But you have to understand that you are more important than your sister, than your brother-in-law. Yes, maybe not to other people, but definitely to the whole of reality. Because they’re living a luxury life. You’ve seen both sides of the coin and you’re still alive. You’re a survivor and by default an amazing person. You’ve been through stuff that they couldn’t even imagine. So my personal recommendation; don’t commit suicide. Live life. Be important to other people who care about you and treat your family like they treat you. Find happiness in whatever you love whether it be reading books or drawing or bungee jumping. Be yourself and live.