Living Lit

On August 11, 2015, I died.

Crazy. Am I crazy? Floating above my dying corpse, looking down at my dog jumping on me, trying to keep me alive… one might say the position that I find myself in may constitute that I am, in fact, crazy.

Stop. I told myself to stop. That girl swallowing the pills, that isn’t me. These hands, the ones putting that razor to my thigh, those are not my hands. Put it down. She slices. Get up. She collapses. GET UP! But she’s stuck on the floor, paralyzed. Pick up the phone. I send a text: Can you please take care of Coltrane? My suicide note. My best friend had no idea that this was my 3 AM call for help.

Please. Don’t close your eyes. My final command. She didn’t listen. I felt that girl’s cold grip tighten around my heart and everything faded to black. Sleep. All I wanted to do was sleep, forever, but I awoke. Waking up alive. That’s what it’s called. I’d prepared a bed in my personal hell. What the actual fuck do I do now? How do I brush my teeth? I wasn’t even supposed to be here.

No one knew it was that bad. That’s how I wanted it. I mastered the art of duplicity! We all embellish, but my lies were so rich even I believed them. This can’t be where my life is, this isn’t where I was supposed to be, I wasn’t supposed to be raped, I wasn’t supposed to be bipolar, I wasn’t supposed to... be in a mental hospital.

So maybe I could will myself out of it, after all, I was sunshine. I was the big fish in the small pond. I was the girl who had every opportunity available to her. I was supposed to make it!

I am not a depressed person, that is to say, I don’t revel in my misery. I suffer from manic depression. I fight my depressive episodes with every ounce of my being - because it sucks - yet I crave those moments of mania like a junkie. My only reprieve? A cocktail of pills. But… Let me ask you something, if you felt like God Almighty, would you take pills to make you feel any less? Yeah… see, I don’t think so.

That mania gets you high. You are filled with immense amounts of joy, endless energy, you find abilities you didn’t know existed within you, and frankly, have the best sex of your life. Somehow, I fail to remember how destructive those episodes can be, and somehow I fail to remember that the fall follows the flight.

The “passing cloud” I’ve heard it called. What a belittlement of a human experience, and complete disrespect for the seriousness of this illness. It’s a virus that strengthens as your immune system strengthens; it’s a hurricane that tears away at your foundation; it’s battling an endless war with your shadow.

This is something I will be fighting daily for the rest of my life. You may see a smile, but that smile is a false belief that anything is in my control. Yes, I know my triggers, mediate, eat right, work out… blah blah blah… but, you know how difficult it is to do even when you are not “crazy.” That smile weighs a lot.

It feels like the loneliest place on earth. Pill pushers who write you five prescriptions after you’ve just overdosed. Facilities that won’t take your insurance, pharmacists and doctors who don’t cross check your medications, and those you thought were going to be there can’t or won’t. You experience a lot of no. Your support network dwindles and relationships shift drastically.

I’ve seen the dark side of mental illness from several different perspectives, and I can’t say that I understand it any better than the next person, I just know what it is. Some make it. Some don’t. Robin Williams died by suicide the same day, a year earlier than my attempt and that parallel haunts me.

Mental illness does not discriminate, it takes the heroes and the mere mortals. This illness works day and night to disarm you. Just when you think you’re prepared for the next episode it attacks in a new and unexpected way. It is exciting! It. Is. Exhausting. This illness absolutely wrecks you.

My suicide attempt feels like a nightmare, but it’s real. It is a very real actuality that I have to face. I tried to kill myself. It doesn’t get any easier to admit. All of my memories from my past life, tainted by the stink of death. And it is an awful stink, a stink that entraps you, chokes your throat, straddles your chest, and sinks deep inside of your stomach.

Some days, all I see are weapons, things surrounding me, begging me, seducing me to pick them up… just so I can hurt myself. WHY? This is the relentless truth that I have to face. This is my disease. People may think that’s a use of smoke and mirrors to disguise the ugly fact that my hands did, in fact, do this but, see... I wasn’t in control.

Since I started speaking out about my experience with manic depression and PTSD, I've been told how brave I am, but I don’t see this as being brave. I see this as something I have to do, like when you see a kid with snot running out of his nose, you hand him a damn tissue; it’s just the right thing to do.

As artists there’s a weird juxtaposition between debilitating self-doubt and moments of grandeur. There's this idea that you've been given this talent, so you must use it, you are meant to use it. After I was assaulted for a second time in 2013 I decided that I didn't want to be quiet anymore. All of a sudden my artistic talents could serve a true purpose. So, for the past five years my work has been focused on mental health awareness.

There's a point in every artist's life when she/he has to decide how their talents will be used. That was my moment. I wanted to end stigma about mental illness. I wanted sexual assault survivors to know they're not alone. I wanted everyone in these communities to know they didn't have to suffer in silence. So I wrote my first full-length play and in December 2015 it was produced at the Greenhouse Theatre in Chicago. After two years of staged readings and workshopping, people were going to see my story played out on stage.

Now, I don’t have this delusional fantasy that my experiences happened so I can create meaningful art, or so I can feel better about being alive. There's a dangerous romanticism of the parallels between mental illness and creativity that I am careful to not promote. My pain is not eradicated by my art, my art is not a product of my pain. I’m not stronger than those who are not ready to speak out, and I'm not under some delusion that my survival is a sign that I am meant for some sort of greatness. I am just here.

Being here allows me this opportunity, so I am using my craft to combat the suicide epidemic. Last year, I saw the results of a Community Health Assessment in Berrien County in Michigan, where I am currently working. The number one issue is mental health. We need a solution. That which I have experienced, I carry with me. Those whom I’ve known, I carry them with me, too; it all influences my actions.

I am not a sad story. I am here. I am alive. I have lived. I am living. I am living because there are people who choose to invest in me every day. I have found my tribe. They love me in my silence, in my maniacal hyperactivity, in my suffering, in my self-centeredness, in my anxiety, fear, and ultimate sabotage.

I need my tribe, but I don’t need them to justify, fix, rationalize, or erase my pain. I just need them to acknowledge my pain. I need them to listen, to believe me, to believe in me. I just ask that they be present in the moment with me as I soothe my tormented soul.

“I was blessed with a birth and a death/ And a gift or a curse somewhere in between/ ‘Cause you’re only as loud as the noises you make/ And as big as the things that you dream,” (from "When it Rains" by Tristan Prettyman).

I was blessed with two births: one in January, 1986 that allowed the world to shape me and the other which has allowed me to shape the world, because on August 11, 2015, I didn't die, I lived.