Scene 27 - Questions of Suicide

NOTE: Before we begin, I will warn you that I do use some explicit language in this entry — if “swear words” will offend, please don’t read.

************Scene 27 - Questions of Suicide***************

I remember praying.

God…

They
say I am Here because of You.

They say you must have
Kept me alive for some reason.

They say you Breathed life into my dead, body,
but God Why!

WHY!

why?

You took everything I Am.
Everything.

My,
my skills, my friends,
my self control,
you took it and you threw it out, like, like it was nothing.

Like I…
…am nothing.

On November 4th, 1999
I died.

now I’m just waiting for this body to catch up.

********************Commentary**********************

It’s late afternoon, orange sunlight sneaking through the thin coat of grim on my parent’s kitchen window.  I’m at the chipped white tile counter — just to the right of the sink — the heavy weight of the largest kitchen knife in my hands — the sharp chill of the steal point pressing against my wrists.  Looking at the skin fold under the slight pressure…it is thin skin here — just a little pressure and I bet I could break it…how fast would I need to move to…


In this moment I spoke the words — cried — screamed at the overwhelming nothingness of an infinite universe.  My cries claimed that they were prayer — pleas directed at God — mind, at that moment I knew no God, but I wanted my pain, my rage, my Hate and frustration and anger and fear and loss — I wanted to be heard!  But I did not want any advice — No interventions — Let me me deal with my own fucked life however I goddamned please!  I couldn’t express a desire of suicide to anyone I actually knew because they would worry for me — try to get me help — counseling — medications — things that numbed but could not fix. Numbed the dream of what I thought I had before — numbed the pain inside…

And I wanted to hurt — if I hurt then I could Blame life — Blame God — Blame for my Situation-Confusion-Pain — I wanted whatever had kept me alive to be conscious — and I wanted Know that whatever was my damned salvation would Hear me Suffer.  I wanted to watch the world weep as I die.

At the time, I didn’t really know how to slit wrists, and I don’t know if I could have killed myself.  But I did contemplate it, several times, and this moment — the moment I describe in the commentary above — the moment I remember when I present this scene in my storytelling — This is the closest I came to making a serious attempt.  It was not a moment of impassioned rage that brings consequences of harm to myself or others — it was a meditated, conscious consideration of ending the suffering by slitting my wrists and letting life dribble from me.

My thoughts were filled with elementary and high-school inspirational speakers labeling suicide as “the weak person’s way” — “giving up” — “the lazy way of not facing problems”. 

And my thoughts replied, spitting back at this speaker, “How DARE you echo in my mind when life has decided to toss me to the side, cripple my soul, destroy my dreams, forget about me.  Fuck you if you say I’m weak for considering suicide, that I should ‘grow up’ and ‘face my troubles’ — what if I can’t beat them — is it better to try and know I will fail?  You want me to fail?!  You — speaker — who has not had brain injury — you say ‘Hey, it’s not that bad — ‘You’re alive, right?’ — ‘You can fix your life, it just takes strength and determination, and you seem like the go get ‘um kind of guy who can do it!’ — FUCK YOU if you think it 'just takes strength'.  My strength is gone.  I am gone.  You haven’t had brain injury, don’t you give me advice until you smashed your head open and you're forced to live after life is taken away — see if you can give me the same goddamned advice — see if you still want to live through the recovery.  I’ll don’t want your fucking advice — everyone’s giving me advice and telling me what to do and nothing is helping a Fucking Iota.  This is my decision, and for once I’ll decide what I want to do..”


I spent a long time looking at the knife— feeling the handle against my palm, the blade against skin.  Could I do it?  Would I do it right?

Time became meaningless — seconds — minutes — maybe an hour passed — the decision was infinite — the question devoid of time.

Until the sound of the front door opening shook me to the present — my mother coming back from the store.  The knife dropped to the counter and I fished around in the cabinets for a snack — providing a reason for being in the kitchen.  The decision would wait.

And the question of suicide never pressed into my life as urgently again — it would flicker into my brain, and still does at times, for moments, but these are passions that I quickly quell with reason and/or meditation.  But I often remember my thoughts described above.


How to provide appropriate commentary for this scene?  I took the space above to try and flesh out the moment — to share the memory that remains in my conscious.  I want you, the reader, to understand where I was and where many survivors find themselves — maybe you relate or maybe you learn something new.  When one hears about suicidal thoughts, its easy to say “Don’t do it” and “Get help” — but this doesn’t address the damning confusion and pain that infects many thoughts after brain injury.  Medication numbs the tortured soul and therapy will help to form strategies for understanding, appreciating, and navigating life with the “New You”, but it cannot bring back the infinite ineffable elements of being that have been torn asunder.

 And a simple truth needs to be acknowledged —


Brain injury Fucks your life. 

It does not end life and life can get better — I am a living and joyful testament to continuing after TBI — but after brain injury, your life is FUCKED UP!  All those goals you had, those ideas, those plans…fuck ‘um.  You’re starting over…you don’t know what tools are available…and you’ve got to deal with the world NOW.

Brain Injury takes you to a dark place.  As I have stated repeatedly in this blog, it is important that a person does not dwell in this space and convince oneself that you cannot escape, but it is important to acknowledge where you are.  Don’t hide it.  Dark moments of the mind will come and dangerous thoughts will surface.  Get help as these thoughts begin to become unbearable, but do not try to ignore them — recognize where you are.  As a survivor, the situations of life have brought you here, and now you must deal with it.

The commentary for the next scene will attempt to more rationally discuss suicidal thoughts and express reasons why suicide is not a solution, but for this entry, I feel there is a need to acknowledge the truth of where this experience of brain injury takes you.

And contemplating suicide is a place many survivors find — so if you’re here, look around and see that you don’t see much — it’s a God-damned, dark space.

But you need to know where you are if you want to figure how to get out, and that’s the next step.