Suicide To Numbness

“To numb the world is another form of suicide” ~ Terry Tempest Williams

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Dear readers,

TRIGGER WARNING: Talks about suicide

There are no photos for this post. I couldn’t bring myself to add a photo here.

This is a heavy topic. 

A topic that I sometimes hate talking/thinking about. 

I had this post planned back in 2023. It was initially supposed to come out either June 18 or June 25. But I couldn’t write this. Hell, I don’t know when this will come out, as this is the fourth time I’ve tried and failed to write this post. I would start typing, erase everything, and then try again a couple of months later. It would never work. I think this post might be the reason why my post became so sporadic since December 18, 2022. I couldn’t write this out, but it’s time now.

It was such a horrible time in my life. Anyone who could overcome such a dark part of their life would tell you it was a dark time.

I nearly killed myself. I didn’t have a plan. I felt… it’s weird. I felt like I was a “fraud” because I didn’t have a plan. My therapist/school counsellor would always ask if I had a plan, and I would always answer no. I know it’s irrational, but I felt I should’ve had a plan, or else it wasn’t “real”. Again, I know it is not rational, and I know it’s not true. But back then, I believed that I was a fraud. I had imposter syndrome for being suicidal. Who would’ve thought?

School was my trigger. I didn’t feel I belonged in my program, which made it worse because my first year was 2021/2022. All my classes were online, so I didn’t need to move out and live on campus like planned. I didn’t get the opportunity to make friends and have those freshmen year experiences. I know people who have lived on campus despite the classes being online, but I don’t have an extra $1500 to spend on residence, and then God knows how much more to live on my own. It was cheaper to stay home, and it was the more logical solution. 

But I felt alone because I wasn’t around my peers—I didn’t make friends in my program. I know everyone has imposter syndrome in university, but it is harder when you don’t have the opportunity to meet people in your program and feel less alone. Knowing something but experiencing it are two different things. Logically and rationally, I knew every freshman felt imposter syndrome at some point during their first year, but I wasn’t thinking rationally or logically, and to me, I was alone.

My sister was in her third year, so her classes were a hybrid module, so she was living off-campus with the friends she made during her freshmen year. Seeing the close friends she’d made during her first year and the stories she’d had when she would come home to visit made me so much more excited for my turn. Honestly, I didn’t know it bothered me so much that I missed out on a freshman-year experience until I started typing it all out. This is why I love writing; I don’t actively think about what I’m writing; I just let my fingers fly across the keyboard. This is off-topic.

Anyway, I didn’t have a good first year. I was sad at my predicament, and with the university, they didn’t care. In high school—even online—you have a set time for when school starts and ends. There was a structure. Teachers would care—well, notice when you don’t attend class or hand in assignments/homework—but professors don’t. To be fair to them, they have hundreds of students per class section, so they can’t be accountable for every student. But it was so jarring to see. Again, this goes back to knowing something but experiencing it, which are two different things. 

I didn’t realize how far I had spiralled until I hit rock bottom. 

I remember sitting in front of my laptop, crying my eyes out because I had a midterm the next day, and I was nowhere near ready and wanted to be gone. It wasn’t just that I didn’t want to write the midterm; it was my health going out of my control, and I didn’t have my academic accommodations in place yet, and that professor refused to do anything until I gave him the letter from the school. Still, the school took too long to get back to me. I’m not blaming the prof or the school; I know there’s protocol in place, and I know there’s a lot of students, so of course, there’s a delay. It was just a horrible time. 

I wanted to OD on painkillers. With my chronic pain, I had access to really strong painkillers and Tylenol and Advil to last me a year, so… it was easy to get my hands on it. I called my mom immediately because it scared me. My dad was on his way home, and he sat with me and let me cry my eyes out, and I ended up crying myself to sleep. I didn’t OD. But I did cut. I started with a kitchen knife, took a part of a razor, removed the blade, and hid it in my room. 

I didn’t cut often, but I did do it, and it was… it was a different experience than I thought. I thought I was going to be in such high emotions, crying as I did and racing my mind, but it was the opposite. I mentioned it in my “My Spiral” post, but it was almost like an out-of-body experience. It was weird. But I only did it a handful of times.

I got better. I saw help, and my parents knew about it—that’s another issue—but I wasn’t hiding in the dark anymore and slowly got myself to a better place.

Then roughly a year and a half later, it all went to shit.

I got COVID again. I got COVID during my final exam period for the winter term. Somehow, it triggered something in me. This wasn’t the first time I got COVID, but it sucked because it was only a few days before exams started. It was horrible timing. All my exams—except one—were within the first week of the exam period, so I was fucked. I got them deferred, but I spiralled so bad that my therapist told me to call my parents and have them pick me up from Uni. My therapist didn’t trust me by myself, and she wrote a letter to the school to excuse me from my last exam. I didn’t get the deferral for my last exam, and a big situation around that last exam probably played a part. In short, the faculty had given me the deferral only to take it away the night before my exam was scheduled. Now, at this point, I was home. It took me a long time to get back to campus from my family’s home, so there was no way I could’ve made it to my exam on time. So, I got a zero. I was livid. I had gotten COVID, and I was so suicidal I was nearly put in a psych ward because my therapist didn’t trust me. I went from being self-deprecating to being so mad. But that didn’t last very long.

Yes, I was angry, but I was also defeated. Once the anger wore off, I was just defeated and gave up. I didn’t care anymore. I don’t know the switch, but I went from wanting to be gone to being here and not caring. 

I went from suicidal to numb so quickly; I don’t even know when it happened. I went through with the summer course blindly and didn’t care. I was here in the world and wasn’t actively trying to leave, but I didn’t care if something happened to me. I wasn’t going to fight for my life. 

I wasn’t angry at the school anymore. I wasn’t sad about my grade. I wasn’t happy about summer break. I wasn’t anything. I was just here. Just another human on this earth. It wasn’t even me. Physically, I was alive. Mentally and emotionally, I was gone.

In a way, I did succeed with suicide. I may not have physically killed myself, but I did end up killing myself. Because of who I am now. After all that, who I am is no longer the same person. I died that day. I went numb. 

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If you are feeling suicidal or numb or know someone who is, get them help. Whatever helps. Suppose that is watching movies with them and being a shoulder for them to cry on. Maybe talking to a professional. Taking away the things they want to hurt themselves with, whatever it is, be there for them. For me personally, listening always helped. Don’t give me ways to “fix” my problem. Just listen. Let me cry. Let me vent. Let me break down. Don’t try to fix me because that always pisses me off so much more, especially when I’m on the verge of ending it all. I just needed someone to be there and listen. From there, it depends on their state of mind, but listen.

I’m not a medical professional. I’m someone who has been through it, but this is my experience. Everyone deals differently and takes help differently, so take my advice with a grain of salt.

Thank you for reading

A.B.💜

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The reason for the bow and arrow emojis is that I found this explanation of the bow and arrow and fell in love. One can take any symbol to mean whatever they want, so your meaning of a bow and arrow might differ from mine, and that’s okay. A bow and arrow helps me keep my hope and determination in my future. An arrow can only be shot by pulling it backwards. So when life is dragging you back with difficulties, it will launch you into something extraordinary. Just remember to focus and keep your aim.

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