A Year Later...

     It's been a year since a friend of mine decided to take his own life.  Let me just state this, he and I weren't that close, and still, his suicide rocked me.  I spent days in tears after, and months later, I still would cry when something would hit me about his suicide.  I cried the first time I saw a picture of his son, who was just a couple months old when he committed suicide, just because of how much he looks just like him.  I wanted to write a blog on dealing with someone's suicide, but every time I wrote it, it just felt so weird.  I couldn't find the words, and honestly, I think it's because of that emotion I can't find words for.  Instead, I've decided to write a blog on where I'm at now, a year later.

     It was the most chaotic period of emotions I have ever experienced in my life.  I went from sad, to angry, to just this raw emotion I had never experienced before in my life, and I still don't have a word to describe it.  For anyone who has ever experienced someone taking their own lives, I give you my condolences, because in my experience, it was one of the hardest things I have ever dealt with emotionally.  It was like a tornado and earthquake of emotions, just as soon as I'd get angry the anger would subside and I'd be hit with guilt, and then sadness, and back to anger, all before I could even figure out what was going on.  I wouldn't wish that upon anyone.

     In the beginning I was a wreck, and I'd just bawl at the drop of a hat if anyone even mentioned him.  I was a complete mess at his memorial, and even considered leaving before it started because I was having the hardest time holding it together.  There are just so many reasons why it tore me up.  He lived just next door to us, and I'd offered an ear or shoulder any time he needed.  I didn't hear the first gun shot.  Did I say the wrong thing?  Did I not say what he needed to hear?  If I would have heard that first shot, could I have stopped it?  Why weren't his three babies enough to stop him?  I would think about these things until my stomach would burn.  I had to ultimately decide that there was no stopping him, he made the choice, and I needed to stop feeling so guilty.  It was hard, it was so hard to stop feeling guilty.  I would get upset because I couldn't fix anything, because I couldn't bring him back.

     I miss that smile, and his sense of humor.  I miss silly stupid things, and it just makes losing someone that much harder.  I miss the times he would try to call my bluff and catch me off guard with some sexual gesture or joke.  That was just the kind of humor he had, and I loved it.  I've lost people throughout my life, and almost all of them have just been old age and expected, but losing someone like this, was just such a shake up in my life.  It was just so unsettling, because he had so much more to do in his life.  It wasn't supposed to happen.  But it did.

     Over time, these awful emotions have subsided somewhat, definitely, but there are still times, that someone says something, or a certain song comes on just as I will drive past his apartment building, and it'll cause a lump in my throat and my eyes will well up with tears.  There are times when I think, "I'd like to show him this, because this is amazing, this is worth living for," and I can't, and I get angry. I used to hope that there would be a time that I would be able to think about the times we worked together, or when we'd talk, and I could smile, and I think that time is closer.  

     For anyone who might be reading this who is considering suicide, please, don't.  On behalf of your loved ones, the ones that you might think won't be that affected if you died tomorrow, don't.  I know it seems like whatever you are going through is never going to end, but trust me, it will.  You are going to miss out on so many amazing things that you can't even imagine right now, but they're coming.  Find joy in the simplest of things.  Ignore what people think of you, because they don't matter.  When something feels overwhelming, it is not permanent.  Stick it out, because sooner than you might think, you are going to come across something that is going to make you so happy, to make it all worth it.  Reach out, because there is going to be someone that wants to see you stay, they will want to make sure that you are okay and be part of you loving yourself.

For Aaron  <3