Selfish When Alive, Free When Dead

 I haven't been doing that well recently. I don't think there's any specific reason for it, other than maybe the stress of moving and living in a new apartment completely on my own kind of got to me in a way. But nothing has happened that would've made me upset; I've just been hurting a bit more than normally. I guess it comes with the illness – ebbs and flows seemingly without reason. 

However it may be, this has resulted in me thinking about suicide more. Usually, the way that I go about working on my art collections and the complimentary blog posts is that I concentrate on one thing that I am struggling with the most at that given time. Working on this collection has been the most taxing so far, which is why finishing it is taking a bit more time than the previous two. It is not that making art is making me think about suicide more; rather, I am making art about suicide and suicidal ideations because I am thinking about them so much right now. That is what is hindering me a bit currently. 

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During these past few weeks, I've been met with a lot of people online who are there to reinforce the stigmatization of suicide. I don't think they see it in that light, but nevertheless, that is what their actions and words lead to. I struggle to understand how we are still failing to see the very basic natural of suicidal behavior and the core reason for it. And most of all, I really cannot fathom why we still think that it is okay to silence those who are struggling and tell them to "go talk to professional", because "not everyone wants to hear your biggest problems". 

A common misconception among these people seems to be that suicidal people expect everyone who they talk to about their struggles to become their therapist. That they want others to give them reasons to stay, reasons to keep fighting, reasons to keep choosing life over death. I understand that that might be the first reaction for someone who has not experienced suicidal ideations themself or who's lost a loved one to suicide. Death is a very scary thing for most people: it is something they do not want to think about if not absolutely necessary. And like I've previously discussed, wanting to die is against the very basics of what it means to be a human: we are programmed to want to keep living, for as long as possible. So when someone says that they want to die, it freaks us out. I understand that.

However, the kind of reaction that these feelings typically lead to can be very damaging. We should be extremely mindful of the way we approach a person who's opening themself enough to talk about something so incredibly personal and vulnerable. Any kind of attacking, blaming, and humiliating could very well prove to be the thing that causes the breaking the point. 

too much pressure. 

When I open my mouth and say those very painful words, I am not expecting anybody to convince me not to kill myself. I am not expecting anybody to give me reasons to keep living. I am not expecting anybody to listen to my trauma dump, either. The only thing I am hoping for is that somebody would listen to me without making me feel guilty for being sick. I know that I should talk to a professional – I have done nothing but try to reach a doctor who would take me seriously for the past six months. But when you are in the deep of those thoughts and you are feeling desperate, that is when you need someone, just someone, to be there to listen. 

What you say to my vent is irrelevant. You do not even have to say anything else than "damn bro, that sucks". I know how hard it can be to come up with anything to say in that situation; I have also been on the other side of the conversation. But once I'd read more about suicide and experienced those thoughts myself, I understood that the reply does not matter. What matters is that you listen. Literally. 

But that is putting too much pressure onto other people. Or so I have been told. 

While it may not be stated directly, suicidal people are often viewed as extremely selfish. They do not care about the lives of their loved ones, how they are going to cope with the loss. They do not care about the way their death will affect everyone around them; they only care about themselves.  It is a paradox rooted in misunderstandings. Suicide is the least selfish thing a person can ever do: they are ending their own life, choosing not to think about themself anymore, to the point that they do not even care if they're alive or not. Their life has come to the point where they feel like no matter how hard they'd try to do what's in their best interest, none of that would bear any fruit. Chances are that they have been told that if they killed themself, they'd be doing everyone else a favor. In that situation, suicide is the last good deed they have left to do. Then everything will be better. Because their existence in this world was only putting pressure onto others.

we didn't know.

Instagram is full of info graphics on suicidality and suicide: how the former paints the person as selfish and an attention-seeker, and how the latter makes the person a victim, a poor soul who could have been saved. It took me several years to understand what those posts truly mean. Now that I know what it's like to be that person in the equation, I can finally see it. On various online communities, I have been silenced and censored for the sensitive subject of my art and writing. I have been punished on these platforms with warnings and temporary bans for simply stating that I am mentally ill and struggle with suicidal ideations. Every mention of my art has been deleted, and I have been warned that if I continue to talk about my art like this, my account will be at risk of permanent banning or deletion. 

No matter how you look at it, this is an act of artistic censorhip and silencing of a mentally ill person. 

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I haven't been able to stop thinking about Amanda Todd lately. She was a 15-year-old Canadian girl who was a victim of online harassment, bullying, and sexual violence. She killed herself in 2012 only a few days after publishing her infamous black-and-white flashcard video on YouTube. I remember stumbling upon that video very early on; I think she was still alive at that time. With my poor English skills, I tried to understand what the video was about, and while I did not understand the majority of it, I could see that she was in a lot of pain. I was 12 at the time, only three years younger than Amanda. I wished I could have done something to help her, but for me, that was practically impossible. 

Amanda Todd is someone that could have been saved. If she was still alive, she would be 25 years old, probably graduated from college, living on her own, maybe with a family too. But instead, her cries of help were not listened to because it was putting too much pressure onto others, because she was only seeking attention, and at 15, she chose to end her own life. 

Amanda has never really left my mind, but right now, I look at her from a bit of a different perspective. I look at her and think, "I'm sorry no one listened to you the way you deserved to be listened to."

"I hope my story doesn't become too similar to yours."

Rest well,

ichigonya