I'm going through bouts of being suicidal.
My therapist knows, my caseworker knows, my friends know, I have the crisis hotline and I've made use of it on several occasions.
Suicidal is often thought to be a disproportionate response, a "permanent solution to a temporary problem", an irrational response. However my background experience is years on end of extreme suffering on par with terminal illness yet not terminal and without palliative care...and suicide blended more into the realm of euthanasia. It was a topic discussed in the group of patients I used to correspond with. Some took that route. Others still have it on standby. I made it through...enough to escape from the abuse, at least.
Initially when I was living in any running vehicle it was the euphoric high of freedom that pulled me through. I became suicidal last winter when, before I had a community around me, I was told that there's no way I could have a caregiver despite my documented need for one. I contracted severe hypothermia that winter. I was incontinent for weeks at a time, and had a nerve injury rendering my right arm mostly useless. I made it through that with hope of better times ahead.
It's a year later, and I have more community around me. That's it. The main thing keeping me here is that I know it would devastate them.
I've told my therapist, I need to know there's a realistic hope of my life improving. This degree of medical suffering combined with physical discomfort combined with trying to eek by on so little and getting hammered by bills while everyone tells me if I just tried I could work is not okay with me. I've lived this way for nearly a year and a half in one form or another, I'm soldiering through and can keep doing so a bit longer but only so long as I have hope of improvement. I'm losing that right now. I know people like to say that change will happen eventually, but if it's, say, 5 years down the road then I'm out.
My caseworker's best response is "I don't want to give you false hope......but I want you to feel like there's hope out there." In other words, I have nothing tangible to help you with but please feel better anyway. My caseworker is a bit at a loss for what to do because "most people who come to me don't have their lives very organized." He ended up in tears and said the job is difficult because he wishes there was more resources available.
My therapist is constantly shocked by my level of self-awareness, emotional "tracking", and stability through crises. "Most people, it would take days to recover from that!" (He said of me waking up to a flat a few days ago). For me, I was more concerned when my dash showed an unfamiliar warning light, because one more financial blow due to unexpected mechanical problems and I would immediately be very suicidal, because I'vee yet to have 2 months in a row where nothing major goes wrong on a vehicle I'm in, and that's financially unsustainable on $733/month. But when I saw it was the tire and a massive screw sticking out of it was the obvious cause, I felt relief. "Oh, is that all??" Pulled out my 12V compressor, pumped it up, cost $15 to patch it at the nearest shop. And my therapist is amazed that I'm not still reeling from that the next day, and I'm going...I could not live this life if I was thrown by that sort of stuff.
I have pretty severe PTSD. I have a lot of physical illness issues, many of which are life-threatening, all of which are unpredictable, few of which are being currently treated. I'm disabled by those things.......and the rest of me is super, ridiculously functional, which I have a bunch of friends who would be happy to attest to. Unfortunately, that's not enough to change my circumstances.
My latest thing is another flare of "let's see if I can do any work". These always begin with optimism, result in me sacrificing my health, but I can manage it....until it all comes crashing down on me. The last round was just with volunteer stuff, which they kicked me out of when I cancelled too many shifts due to legitimate extreme health issues (things that would have most people in the E.R.). I'm having another go-round at it, because that's what's giving me hope right now. But I know there's a huge risk of getting crushed the next downspin.
I'm incredibly proud of myself for having carved out the life I have, for obtaining freedom for myself, for surviving through incredible odds on such a low budget without racking up debt. But gosh darnit I do not have it in me to live the next several years barely scraping by, not just financially but physically as well. I need to know the average week will have a fair number of days where nothing major goes wrong in my life. The most recent week-long suicidal period ended when I had an entire 48 hours without catastrophe. I called up a friend and was like "Ohhhh, so THIS is how normal people do life, they can actually go a couple days without anything major going wrong!"
It is human nature to assume that if someone just sets their mind to it, or is just creative enough, or positive enough, their life will turn around. I used to believe that myself....then after a decade of giving that a good solid go I realized it actually doesn't work. For a while, though disillusioned myself I faked it for the good opinion of those who felt that way. Now I'm past the point of caring. People want to think it's because I'm too "negative" or focusing on things I can't do, that's fine. They haven't been by my side the past 6 hours straight of job searching, or several hours straight of vomiting.
Most people live in a world that is unfair in some ways, but still surmountable. With the cards I've been dealt, life often feels like I'm playing a rigged game, never designed to be won only to make you think you barely can even though it's purposefully impossible.
I'm pulling out every stop I know of to try to get myself through this. Will I make it? I don't know. I honestly don't know.
My therapist knows, my caseworker knows, my friends know, I have the crisis hotline and I've made use of it on several occasions.
Suicidal is often thought to be a disproportionate response, a "permanent solution to a temporary problem", an irrational response. However my background experience is years on end of extreme suffering on par with terminal illness yet not terminal and without palliative care...and suicide blended more into the realm of euthanasia. It was a topic discussed in the group of patients I used to correspond with. Some took that route. Others still have it on standby. I made it through...enough to escape from the abuse, at least.
Initially when I was living in any running vehicle it was the euphoric high of freedom that pulled me through. I became suicidal last winter when, before I had a community around me, I was told that there's no way I could have a caregiver despite my documented need for one. I contracted severe hypothermia that winter. I was incontinent for weeks at a time, and had a nerve injury rendering my right arm mostly useless. I made it through that with hope of better times ahead.
It's a year later, and I have more community around me. That's it. The main thing keeping me here is that I know it would devastate them.
I've told my therapist, I need to know there's a realistic hope of my life improving. This degree of medical suffering combined with physical discomfort combined with trying to eek by on so little and getting hammered by bills while everyone tells me if I just tried I could work is not okay with me. I've lived this way for nearly a year and a half in one form or another, I'm soldiering through and can keep doing so a bit longer but only so long as I have hope of improvement. I'm losing that right now. I know people like to say that change will happen eventually, but if it's, say, 5 years down the road then I'm out.
My caseworker's best response is "I don't want to give you false hope......but I want you to feel like there's hope out there." In other words, I have nothing tangible to help you with but please feel better anyway. My caseworker is a bit at a loss for what to do because "most people who come to me don't have their lives very organized." He ended up in tears and said the job is difficult because he wishes there was more resources available.
My therapist is constantly shocked by my level of self-awareness, emotional "tracking", and stability through crises. "Most people, it would take days to recover from that!" (He said of me waking up to a flat a few days ago). For me, I was more concerned when my dash showed an unfamiliar warning light, because one more financial blow due to unexpected mechanical problems and I would immediately be very suicidal, because I'vee yet to have 2 months in a row where nothing major goes wrong on a vehicle I'm in, and that's financially unsustainable on $733/month. But when I saw it was the tire and a massive screw sticking out of it was the obvious cause, I felt relief. "Oh, is that all??" Pulled out my 12V compressor, pumped it up, cost $15 to patch it at the nearest shop. And my therapist is amazed that I'm not still reeling from that the next day, and I'm going...I could not live this life if I was thrown by that sort of stuff.
I have pretty severe PTSD. I have a lot of physical illness issues, many of which are life-threatening, all of which are unpredictable, few of which are being currently treated. I'm disabled by those things.......and the rest of me is super, ridiculously functional, which I have a bunch of friends who would be happy to attest to. Unfortunately, that's not enough to change my circumstances.
My latest thing is another flare of "let's see if I can do any work". These always begin with optimism, result in me sacrificing my health, but I can manage it....until it all comes crashing down on me. The last round was just with volunteer stuff, which they kicked me out of when I cancelled too many shifts due to legitimate extreme health issues (things that would have most people in the E.R.). I'm having another go-round at it, because that's what's giving me hope right now. But I know there's a huge risk of getting crushed the next downspin.
I'm incredibly proud of myself for having carved out the life I have, for obtaining freedom for myself, for surviving through incredible odds on such a low budget without racking up debt. But gosh darnit I do not have it in me to live the next several years barely scraping by, not just financially but physically as well. I need to know the average week will have a fair number of days where nothing major goes wrong in my life. The most recent week-long suicidal period ended when I had an entire 48 hours without catastrophe. I called up a friend and was like "Ohhhh, so THIS is how normal people do life, they can actually go a couple days without anything major going wrong!"
It is human nature to assume that if someone just sets their mind to it, or is just creative enough, or positive enough, their life will turn around. I used to believe that myself....then after a decade of giving that a good solid go I realized it actually doesn't work. For a while, though disillusioned myself I faked it for the good opinion of those who felt that way. Now I'm past the point of caring. People want to think it's because I'm too "negative" or focusing on things I can't do, that's fine. They haven't been by my side the past 6 hours straight of job searching, or several hours straight of vomiting.
Most people live in a world that is unfair in some ways, but still surmountable. With the cards I've been dealt, life often feels like I'm playing a rigged game, never designed to be won only to make you think you barely can even though it's purposefully impossible.
I'm pulling out every stop I know of to try to get myself through this. Will I make it? I don't know. I honestly don't know.
The exercises are almost exactly like the ones I was taught about 3.5 years ago, which got me out of a bedridden state. I've been doing them since then, and my bf and i often do them together as well. It is certainly healing, it's just like....so, after all these years, after doing it as often as possible, and continuing to feel great reward from doing it....this is as good as it gets. Therapy has the potential to do more, but the problem is my life keeps going too haywire to even do therapy at all, which my therapist readily tells me. You can't do deep therapy work when you haven't figured out some immediate basic life essentials, or are constantly being freshly traumatized, or are physically too ill to arrive at appointments. Ugh.
