How do you get that lonely?

I'm glad today will be over soon.

Yes. The election is part of it. I'm tired of the phone calls. I'm tired of the commercials. I'm just ready to kiss the day goodbye. Maybe it will be an easier day to handle next year, although I doubt it will ever be an easy day for my family.



Three years ago today, my beautiful nephew, Edward, took his own life. He was only 19.

Not a day goes by that I don't think of him. That I don't miss him. That I don't miss his beautiful smile and his laugh.

I get it to a certain degree. I survived a suicide attempt in high school. I remember not feeling present in my life. Like things were happening to me, but I wasn't a participant. Instead, I sat like a porcelain doll perched precariously on a shelf, and if a door slammed too hard, or if someone bumped the wall just right, I would fall and shatter into a million pieces. I was 17.

I wouldn't have made it, if someone hadn't called my mom from school. She talked me into sticking my finger down my throat and vomiting before she got there and could take me to the hospital to have my stomach pumped. The ER doctor said she saved my life. If I hadn't thrown up when I did, the 2 bottles of aspirin I took would have caused me to bleed to death internally.

While we were at the hospital, my mom and I talked. A lot. She made me promise to never, ever try to hurt myself again. Ever. And I know that that promise kept me alive over the years. I've dealt with depression off and on my entire life. And any time my depression got bad, Mom's plea and the promise I made her came back to mind. And I never tried to hurt myself again.

I'm so very thankful that I made it out of the darkness. I shudder to think of the pain I would have put my family through. The pain of losing Edward has been unbearable at times for each of us. And I know there is no way he'd have done it, if he'd have known the pain it caused his loved ones near and far. I wish I'd have known, so that I might have been able to say something. That I might have been able to impact him enough that he didn't give up.



Promise me something? If you ever feel like you want to hurt yourself, promise me you won't. Promise me that you'll get help of some sort.

And know that no matter how hard life is, it gets better.