Surviving Suicide. My Journey

The Aftermath

The months and even years that followed my mom's suicide were not at all what I could have pictured them turning out to be. I was consumed with guilt, anger, and sometimes even denial. There were days that I expected her to open the door and tell me that it was all just a bad dream. Of course that never happened. I tried with everything in me to "just get over it", to make myself better for the sake of my son and my sister and on the outside, I may have done a pretty good job of it. But on the inside, I was dead too. I didn't care about anything, found myself lost in a fog that just would not lift. I felt like I was the only one that really felt the loss even though everyone around me claimed to feel it too. It seemed like everyone's lives except mine moved on.

I didn't want to be at home, didn't want to be around all of those people that said they knew how I felt. I knew that no one else shared my pain and my feelings of hopelessness and self loathing. I knew that it was my fault and nothing that anyone could say would convince me otherwise. My boyfriend, who I ended up marrying that year, tried so hard to be the rock that I needed but a part of me even blamed him. He was there that night, why didn't he do something to stop her? I was in a dark place and the only thing that helped was drinking. I got a job in  bar where I could make money and be drunk to forget my pain. That only led to other bigger problems, of course. I wanted nothing to do with my family, nothing to do with anyone that would remind me of what I had lost. I was a complete shell of who I used to be and it was only going to get worse.

My family life began to suffer as I began to distance myself from all of the people who had been there before my mom killed herself.. I did not want to hear them tell me that it would get easier with time. To me, time only made me miss her more and want to die too. I couldn't celebrate Mother's Day, no Halloween or Thanksgiving and definitely no Christmas or New Years. Life would never be the same again for me. That is when I discovered that there were things out there that made me feel better. I began smoking weed all of the time just to numb the pain. It worked for a while until even it wouldn't help. I was a mess of alcohol induced hazes followed by sleep deprived nights and a mess of poor choices. I realized that I was in a place where I could care less if I lived or died. And that is when I discovered cocaine and self harming.

I became a complete functioning addict, spending more money that I dare to really think about. I literally worked to support my habit and made friends with the people that I knew always had drugs. I felt so numb and so lost that the only way for me to feel better was to cut myself or get high. The guilt of not being able to stop my mom from killing herself was eventually going to kill me and honestly I didn't care. I was so wrapped up in my own pain and turmoil that no one else mattered to me. I could not believe that there was anyone esle that hurt like I did. The drugs and self harming helped to ease the pain for me. I felt a release unlike anything that I had ever helped so I got addicted to the feeling of being ok, even if it was just for a little while. Then things got even worse for me, as if I ever imagined that they could. All of the drugs, alcohol, and partying had only made me lose even more.