Let me start by stating that I´m not expert, and I have to write this in English hoping to reach a much broader audience, if I have any. Let me also say that this post is about personal experience and I will be commenting about the latest celebrity suicide.
Unfortunately this happens a lot but we just don’t get to hear about them, because they are ordinary people like you and I.
People have commented that it was a selfish act because she left a daughter behind, and yes, it can be seen like that, but NONE of us have any right to judge. That is the last thing anyone that has gone thru any depression, or any sort of mental health problem wants to hear.
From personal experience, feeling like dying is sometimes the only thing you can think about, and you put your personal feelings above anyone else’s. If you have kids, you don’t care. If you have parents – you don´t care. If you have siblings – you don’t care.
You can be depressed but not suicidal, that I know… and it sometimes switches for no apparent reason. You can have a loving family, friends, the best job, a degree, and a life that from the outside, looks great. In reality, it is anything but.
I can now honestly say that I thank God that I went thru what I went thru. We all have our crosses (family, trauma, disease, etc…) that gives you suffering, pain, desperation, but when we don’t have a spiritual anchor, we look for ways to escape from it. We turn to sex, drugs, alcohol, and we cripple our emotions that ultimately we cease to ¨feel¨.
In my case, I was blessed to have a family that even though our actions were not catholic, or christian, we had some sliver of the holy spirit since we had been baptised. I went to catholic school when little and were dragged to church every sunday by my parents. Lived in the ¨world¨and pretended to be a good catholic once a week.
College and a real job came and it was church here and there, sinning my ass off and still taking the body and blood of christ, here and there. Completely closed off to anything that would bring me closer to God. Instead, you rely on your own power, thinking that you can change the past, that you can change yourself, that you can change your circumstances, and when you realize that you can´t – creeps in the hopelessness.
The negative, the self deprecating thoughts, the unworthiness, can’t do anything right, you are just occupying space, nobody really loves you, you´ll be better off dead. Yup…. you start with a small drop and slowly drop by drop, the hole gets bigger and bigger, and then it comes to a point, were you just want to bury yourself in it. You try and thankfully and by the grace of God, it does not happen. Meanwhile, there were family, friends, and church peeps praying for me the whole time.
After much therapy, medicine, church, prayers, and a lot of just looking for the things of God instead of following what the world sells me I should be looking for.
My church community (neocatechumenal way) just went thru a step were they teach us the meaning of accepting our cross, which in my understanding and don’t quote me on this, it’s pretty much, accepting your story.
We all have had experienced some sort of pain. The worst kind is emotional, that embeds in inside your heart and since we live with our backs turned to God, then we just add layer to layer, on top of layers of bricks. We use like I said: sex, drugs, alcohol, or any other vice to live with that pain, and it takes an extreme low, to even look for help.
Unfortunately, without any guidance, if you have lived your life thinking there is nothing up there, or you have no spiritual guidance whatsoever, then what is the point? Why would you want to fight for living a better life, why do you need all of this pain?
Therefore, it does not matter how much money you have in the bank, if you have a family, best of friends, nothing can really help you fixing you inside.
Do you know why it’s called a glorious cross? Because after you´ve hit the lowest of the lows, you realize that it is not within your power to make changes. We all want to change others, ourselves, our lives, our past, etc…. WE CAN´T. Therefore, you feel the pull to search outside of yourself, and hopefully by the grace of God, that search leads you to him.
Without him, it is impossible, but with him, everything is possible. You just need to open up your heart to be able to see him, because even when you have never seen him, he has ALWAYS been there, right there, just waiting for you to notice him.
With him, you can begin to see the light. You will not need to see others change, but you will change, and you will begin to hopefully accept yourself just the way you are.
God is the ONLY ONE that will ever love you, no matter what you have done, how many sins you have committed, how many times you hated him, or hated others.
He sent his only son, Jesus, to be able to die for our sins. His love is infinite and forever patient. So, this cross, that you gloriously have to bare is to bring you to him.
For his mercy for us is so great that he only wants us to love him, and he can only love us.
P.S: sorry that I just went so long… until next time
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