At 27, I’ve settled into a comfortable coexistence with my suicidality. We’ve made peace, or at least a temporary accord negotiated by therapy and medication. It’s still hard sometimes, but not as hard as you might think. What makes it harder is being unable to talk about it freely: the weightiness of the confession, the impossibility of explaining that it both is and isn’t as serious as it sounds. I don’t always want to be alive. Yes, I mean it. No, you shouldn’t be afraid for me. No, I’m not in danger of killing myself right now. Yes, I really mean it.
How do you explain that?
I fear that I’m on this path. Like I don’t want to die, I just often find myself thinking how much of a pain in the ass it is to be alive. Right now, if I didn’t have children I’d be in a different place; the fact that I have others relying on me is enough to make me care. But I fear that once they are on their own, I won’t feel much reason to stick around. I’m actively working on mental health but I can’t shake this apathy in the deep down of my brain.
My kids are definitely the main reason I’m still around. There’s a meme that ties things to “mom will be sad” but I don’t really like my parents. My sister would get over it, so would my friends.