Melissa's Story: Life After a Suicide Attempt

From Michele: I’ve met some of the strongest people on Instagram. And here’s one of them. Read Melissa’s story of what it’s really like to live after a suicide attempt. And if interested, please connect with her!

Behind Every Person There’s a Story & Mine Was One that Was Almost Never Told

I was 14 when I first tried to take my life. I swiped a bottle of my mother’s pills and swallowed them whole with a chaser of whiskey. Within minutes of breathing my last breath, I was rushed to the hospital and my stomach was pumped.

My life changed that day. I was forced to stay overnight at the hospital with adolescents who were suffering like me.

But it didn’t feel right. I felt like an outsider, peeking into a life I didn’t understand. And I didn’t think I belonged. I didn’t think the others were like me. They were sad. I was happy. They were withdrawn and I was friendly.

I didn’t feel depressed but I was. I had become an expert at hiding my feelings, so much so that I almost forgot what they were.

After just a few days, I was released from the hospital. I jumped right back into my normal routine of skipping school, kicking beer bottles out in the parking lot and rebelling against the unknown.

I tried to fit in but I didn’t.

And I followed the crowd but the crowd didn’t feel right. I was different but ask me how and I’d never know. And that was the state of confusion that once again, brought me right back to the same place.

It had only been a few months. Not enough time to learn how to feel, or even work through the thoughts that had led me there, but just enough time where no one had expected I’d do it again. I picked up the same vial of pills, but this time I doubled the dose. This time I was within seconds of breathing my last breath.

And this time I knew something was wrong. This time I was ready to change.

I was rushed back to the hospital, where I sat silent for days. My experience wasn’t one that I could define, and without knowing it’s meaning, I found it impossible to approach. I didn’t think I was who I was, and being that I couldn’t understand it, had no way to define it. Talking about it, breathed life into something I wasn’t able to comprehend. Meaning to something that felt meaningless.

And this is where it hit home, I had told myself, over and over again, that who I was, and who I wanted to become was meaningless, but it wasn’t true. I had meaning. God damn it!

I was important, but I was too young to fully understand how deep my meaning would become. I had allowed my lonely thoughts to become my reality but my thoughts weren’t real, regardless, of how many times I had repeated them over to myself.

At the hospital they questioned and prodded at me. They made me feel dirtier than I had ever felt. Not physically dirty, but emotionally, as all of my thoughts were dirty and wrong.

Then one day, I started to talk. It was slow and meaningless but eventually, some of the words begin to carry weight. After a few weeks, I found that I had no idea who I was, and with that, tremendous insecurity had formed inside of me and it encouraged me to be like everyone else. Follow the crowd. Do as they do my insecurity would say. But I wasn’t them. Nor did I want to be either. I wanted to be me I just had no idea how to dig deep and find the person inside.

And this is where I fear so many of us get lost.

Now I know, that not everyone has the same story BUT since I’ve owned mine I’ve realized that I have met many amazing men and women who share a similar one. And having met them, I can’t imagine my life, having not crossed paths with each and every one.

The person I am today is nothing like the person I was back then. I often share my story out loud and if someone who knows me hears it for the first time I often get “I would never have imagined that Melissa” or “ Melissa. How?” I’m typically met with bewildered stares and confused faces and to that I always say you never know what happens behind closed doors.

I’m one of the lucky ones.

Gifted another opportunity to breathe life and take it all in. And that’s what I did. Today, I work with women and teach them how to not only feel their feelings but also feel their days. How to overcome shame, uncover their worth and love the life they’re lucky to live because I know how that precious that life really is.

Every forty seconds one person dies by suicide. Someone’s daughter, mother, brother or son takes their life and leaves behind unfathomable heartbreak: one that all of us can only hope to never feel. I think about the beautiful gifts they take with them that we’re never revealed. The truths the kept secret and the lies they told. And then I wonder how different their life would have been had they known that they were not alone.

There’s also something else that I share with most women and men that have attempted to take their own life, I tried again. Most people who attempt suicide don’t only try once, and this means that the second time could also be the last. So please remember this fact, and keep it close to your heart, just as I do.