Have you ever wondered what makes people so depressed that they choose to end their lives? I think I know the answer. You see, I am manic depressive, which means that I oscillate between moods of extreme happiness and extreme sadness. Sometimes I really cannot help it especially since I am usually caught unawares. All of a sudden I feel as if I have been drenched by a bucket of sadness. At this point, I begin to remember all that I feel is not right with my life, which more often than not entails a trip down memory lane: I remember the friends who were mere wolf in sheep’s clothing, the bullying that I underwent in my childhood, the desire to fit in that made me go to extreme lengths, the hope that one person in this life could truly love and appreciate me just the way I am.
Manic depression is not a great thing; it’s a disease that eats up your life and your zest for it. It makes you so helpless in the face of pessimism that you will not even be scared to answer the one question that will determine where you spend eternity, “ To kill myself or not to?”. Suicide is a very delicate subject, but I sincerely wish we were more open in society to talk about it. Not just any Tom, Dick or Harry wakes up one day and decides that this is the day I end my life, only people who are mentally disturbed ever think such thoughts. It is in this group of individuals that I find myself. I may suffer from mild symptoms of manic depression but this does not mean that I have not had my fair share of suicidal thoughts.
The execution of a suicidal act requires a lot of courage, a firm conviction that one’s life will never improve even if they live one more day. It is crucial for one to be in this stage for them to execute the final irreversible act. I have never had enough courage to take the leap and take my own life, I am a coward of sorts but it is this cowardice that has kept me with the living. I believe that society is in a way responsible for the individuals who commit suicide. Every person has a support system; this does not necessarily mean a family but rather people who surround us, human beings who are part of our immediate environment. We are our brother’s keeper; although more often than not we tend to be so caught up in our own lives that we fail to see the pain in other’s lives; and more importantly, the point where they cross over. Only after the person is gone from us do we bother to ask, to try and find out a little about their lives and what could have triggered such a violent act. We judge them because we are convinced that they could have found happiness had they held on to their lives. The bitter truth is that we never lived the lives they did nor experienced the pain they had endured. Judging them will not answer the question that we ought to be asking ourselves, “What could we have done different?” It’s not enough to just blame them for hurting us, for not looking at the silver lining in the cloud; what we do not understand is that perhaps, and I am fully convinced that this is the reason: they were blinded by their pain, by their manic depression to the point that they could no longer look at the cup as half-full. Their life was so empty or so full that they could not take the pain-pressure any more.
So whenever you hear about another suicide, do not jump to conclusions, to baseless judgments that will not add a day to your life; instead ask yourself: “Do I know someone who I can help?” And even if you don’t, remember to say a kind word to someone, you could start with ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ for those you don’t know and ‘I love and appreciate you’ to those you have formed intimate bonds with. You never know if it is your kind words that will save them from themselves, besides how many suicide-prone individuals go around announcing their desire to die?
