The world seems bright today. I have recently emerged from a long depressive episode. Always a nice feeling.

Learning to live with my illness has been a continuous journey. Some distance gained, and many setbacks and mistakes. Still today the main focus is doing what it takes to remain stable and keep myself safe. It does need to be said that I have made a lot of progress in managing my illness. A world of progress. This progress is not a result of anything heroic on my part. All I have done is try and give this life an honest effort. It seems the advancements have simply come with time. Time, and a healthy decision here and there. If I can do it, then anybody can do it.

I used to listen to every single word that the demons in my head told me. The more I heard, the more I believed. The ill mind has a way of repeatedly attacking you from the same angles until you start to cave in. It will attack your character and criticize your every move. If you keep hearing something over and over again, it becomes hard to resist.

My demons attached profanities to my name and stripped away my self-worth. Instead of disputing all of this, I spent my time trying to convince myself that it was the truth. Slowly the thoughts crept in that maybe I shouldn’t be here anymore. I thought that I wanted to die. That was not true. The fact is that I wanted my pain to be gone, but I wasn’t able to see it that way. My mind told me that death was the solution to the problem. To this day it persists in trying to make me believe that.

I spent a lot of time in the clutches of my demons. Many times things got really serious and I would be admitted to the hospital for a while. Life would clear up during my admissions, only for my illness to start wedging it’s way back into the forefront. Suicidal thoughts, skipping meds, self-harm. It was a vicious cycle.

In the Summer of 2017 things started to come to a head. My mind became increasingly clouded, I began to focus on death more than I ever had. I had plenty of time feeling suicidal before, but this was different. My self sabotage became more serious. Self-harm reached its lowest point.

I began skipping my bedtime medications and taking caffeine pills at night. One night I gave myself caffeine poisoning. My body has never felt physically worse than I did that night and carrying into the next day. I spent the early morning vomiting. My heart was pounding and my blood pressure was high. I was quite sure that I needed to go to the hospital. But like I said earlier, my mind was in a worse place than it ever had been before. I told nobody, and gutted it out. I recovered just fine. But that didn’t stop the snowball from continuing to roll downhill.

One day I found myself in the forest performing a strange ritual of some sort. My memory of that is quite blank, so I don’t know exactly what was going on. I do remember the fire department being called out to extinguish that spot later in the day. I had left ashes there that ignited and started a fire. This incident caused overwhelming amounts of grief and self hatred. I truly hated myself. My demons were succeeding.

It is often a build up of events that lead up to suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts. Nobody was able to help me in this case, because I was bound and determined to keep my struggles a secret at this time. That way nobody could interfere with my thoughts and plans.

Eventually I was able to realize that my demons were dead wrong. Unfortunately it wasn’t until I had a stomach full of pills, thinking about falling asleep. The regret that I felt in that moment cannot be overstated. By far the most powerful emotion I have ever experienced in my life. I saw how I had been led astray by my illness. The clarity that I felt was incredible. Many attempt survivors have echoed similar sentiments. God gave me the strength to call for help. I was able to make a full recovery.

I realized then that it is my responsibility to do my best to stand up to my demons. So far so good.

*I was not planning to get into this much detail about the time surrounding my attempt, but the words kept coming.

Stay strong.