Water Horse Writing Studio

Letter S is the crux, it is the hardest part to share. Please keep reading, you will have your own unique response, maybe it will be confusion, embarrassment or maybe you will laugh at the absurdity. Whatever your response, it is yours and there is no reason for fear. Ideas are not contagious you choose how much power a thought can have over your life. I hope your response stretches your capacity for compassion first for yourself and then to the world.

S

S- is for Suicide. For me depression and suicidal thoughts have always gone hand in hand. Not until recently did I realize suicide and depression are not synonymous, how one can commit suicide and not be depressed and one could be depressed and not be suicidal. I remember the first time I realized I could make myself sick from indulging in melancholy. I was 13 years old and I felt I had been rejected by the love of my life. I pitied myself and decided to feel very sorry for myself. I walked the .4 mile to a gas station and bought an unhealthy amount of candy, several packages of Reese’s cups and a grape taffy called Bonkers.  I came home from the gas station and locked my bedroom door and wept until I was exhausted, gorged myself on candy and danced wildly around my bedroom to a cassette tape of UB40. Swirling and jumping, thrashing my arms to “Red, Red, Wine”. The room was dark and I stayed dancing until it was dark outside. I did not come out until the next day. After that day I was in a depression I could not get out of, I felt worthless and wanted to die. I felt shame that up until that moment felt like embarrassment and vulnerability. Reinforcing the problem of my melancholy was a desire to be loved and not recognizing love around me. I thought if I was sad enough and embraced the negative feeling of being rejected help would come. Hope died for me that day. And after that I knew I had the power to destroy a part of or all of myself.