Author’s Note: I wrote today’s essay on January 19th 2021, the morning of my 31st birthday, as I sorted through a range of feelings surrounding grief, loss, death, change and survival. Later that day, completely engulfed in my own mind, I would come face to face with suicidal thoughts. I wrote about this experience on Medium last year, because I believe speaking about mental health and illness helps us remove stigma.
Content warning: Mental health, depression, suicide
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I. residual grief
No one likes to tell you how grief, even years later, can sneak up and overtake you. For the past few days, the gaping hole loss created within me has been painfully obvious. Though far removed, I might even dare say this hurt seems more pronounced. As a then-21-year-old, I couldn't begin to understand the gravity of what I had recently gone through; this was my first time encountering grief in such an intimate manner.
I needed to distance myself as far away as possible. I left my body until earth felt like some far-out mirage. I tried my best to be okay. I struggled to comprehend what it meant to survive when others didn't. I struggled each day to keep going when I felt I didn't deserve to be here. Ten years have provided me with many things, but healing is not one of them.
II. escapism for beginners
As I write this on the morning of my 31st birthday, I remember that time is a construct. The feelings I thought would magically disappear have remained, some only intensifying. On this birthday, ten years after one of the most traumatic events in my life, I long for the 21-year-old I once knew. I ache for the bubble she constructed to move her life forward and her uncanny ability to block out the bad in exchange for what felt good. Admittedly, this sometimes offered more risk than reward. I'm happy to be in the land of the living, but underneath it, I’ve been desperate to prove I’m worthy of being here. It’s all been an effort to validate the life I could have lost all those years ago.
Each accomplishment.
Each career pivot.
Each degree.
Each item checked off my to-do list.
My life has been an apology lived out loud for the people I couldn't save that day. I've been in constant motion trying to make sense of their deaths, and what and who they left behind. I'm exhausted. I'm weary because so many things that should have changed have not. I'm worried that more people will die unnecessarily, and others will be left behind to mourn, with no support to aid them in this healing process. The ripple effects of hazing gone wrong are far-reaching.
III. liberation as a lifestyle
There are so many things I want to say today, so many things I want to be. Instead, I'm left wanting so much more than what I have. It's not to say I'm unhappy to be alive. I'm elated. Each day reinforces the fact that someone is fighting on my behalf. Someone wants me to be here, and it's not by my strength alone that I've made it to this moment.
I can't help but sit in my many emotions on this birthday. Unlike 21-year-old Kamil, I have no vices to mask my feelings. I can only stare them in the face, no matter how painful. I struggle with the idea that two brilliant young ladies’ deaths weren't enough to create a world of difference.
In my 31st year, I wish for peace that surpasses understanding. I want to walk without feeling the weight of my burdensome past. I want to be free. Depression is tricky; even after ten years, it can be overwhelming. It feels like trying to climb a wall that is impossible to grip, so all you do is continuously slide backwards until you have enough energy to try again, hopeful for a better outcome. Every time I think I'm over the wall, I fall, crashing on something that makes it harder for me to climb up the next time. I want to get over that wall, but sometimes I wonder if I ever will.
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Dude, don’t end it, you got so much going for you. We still have to make the world a better place for women that look like you and me, and although you might end your own suffering, your loved ones will have to live the rest of their lives suffering, knowing they don’t have you anymore. This is just a dark spot in a life brighter than the sun, your audience loves you, and your family too, you just might not be able to see it...