Being Human Together

Busy. Please hold my calls.

September is National Su***de Awareness Month and it’s an important month to me for myriad reasons…many of them are memories…acquaintances, friends, family. And that one reason…I tried to end my life and was so angry to come back into awareness and still be alive. I’m Lauren and I am a su***de attempt survivor.
Finding my voice and using it is still challenging seven years later. But it’s important. Fighting the demons within requires a lot of support from a therapist, psych doc, family, friends, my husband, sometimes strangers. It requires vigilance and awareness of my thoughts and actions…ensuring that I’m catching when my brain and body are in the midst of ptsd and depression symptoms, and that I’m taking action when something isn’t right.
It’s exhausting and affects every relationship I have in my life. There are moments when even texting is too much, when engaging with people I love and care about is too overwhelming, when I find that I’m working to create a sensory deprivation chamber in my life…numbing and separating myself from difficult things…or everyday things. Learning to battle less with ptsd and learning to let it walk alongside me is hard, but it’s a journey I’m on. There’s no cure for this…but there is hope.
When I woke up in the ICU, I didnt want to be alive and I was enraged to still be. I was completely raw and there was no reason to exist. But I showed up. When my psychiatrist suggested a med protocol, I showed up. When my mom reached out to a therapist I’d seen briefly in the past and set up an appt, I showed up. When EMDR was suggested, I showed up. Even though I believed with every fiber of my being that none of it would work. I told my family and friends it wouldn’t work. But I showed up.
The road isn’t easy. It’s not pretty. It’s not convenient. It will break you and bend you and twist you. It will force you to confront all the things you’ve locked away so that you could survive another second, minute, day. And then…
You start to notice changes…somehow the weight that’s constantly on your chest feels a little lighter. Somehow you respond less angrily to everyone and everything. Somehow, you’re looking at your children and you’re present with them…grateful to love them, to be rebuilding a relationship with them, grateful to be alive with them. Grateful to be alive. Grateful. To. Be. Alive.
You keep working at healing, it’s incredibly messy. You still feel all the painful things, but you feel joy too. Happiness even. Then you meet someone incredible, build a life together, get closer to your babies and family, and friends, but still have times where that’s all hard. But you learn that’s okay. That healing isn’t linear. There are hard days. And there are harder days. And there are better days. And there are really really really good days.
But you show up anyway. Because you’ve got a love for the life you’ve created from the ashes. And you finally feel and recognize the people who stand behind you, next to you, holding you up, never wavering.
So here I am, seven years after a failed su***de attempt, with you. And I’m really glad about that. I’m a mess and still figuring it all out. But I hope if you’re going through something yourself, you feel a little less alone. If you know someone is going through some things, I hope you feel a little better and confident about reaching out.
And I hope you know you are loved and wanted in this world. And if you don’t, I’m telling you now. I’m glad you’re here and what a better place the world is with you in it.
If you’re struggling, let’s get you help and support. It’s possible. And it does work (even if you don’t believe that’s possible right now).
Here’s to the love I’ve known, the joy I’ve felt, the tough journeys I’ve trekked, all the life I’ve lived (with the best support system I could ever have asked for) in the seven years I didn’t think I wanted.
Here’s to LIFE.