I receive a text at 4:30am, while I was still asleep, with news that I feared. News that I didn’t want to hear, but news that I feared deep down. The news that an old high school friend of mine took his life. I woke up at 5:30 with 30 minutes to get ready and go to work, to that message. I didn’t know what to say… how do you respond… do you? All I could send was two words… I’m sorry.
Those words that I’ve heard today from the few I’ve told about the incident. But as I sit in a discord call with a dear friend of mine that I love just weeping, there’s one question that comes to mind… why? Why did he do it? Why didn’t he reach out? Why was he so hurt and broken? Why didn’t he keep fighting? Why did he give up? Why… God why?
His sister reached back out to me after several hours, and asked me how I was doing… and the only words I could mutter was “It’s not your fault…” but here I am blaming myself. Believing there was something more I could have said or done… all the what if’s… what if I would have called him this week, would it have been enough to keep him around, for him to realize that he’s loved. I don’t know… I’ll never know
He was on a full ride scholarship to college, got kicked out after getting into drugs and letting his grades slip. I distanced myself from him recently, because of this, I needed to focus on my own recovery, and well did me being selfish and focusing on my own recovery cost him his life… because if so fuck my recovery. I don’t know what to do… What do you do? All I can do now is cry… and pray that when I wake up this will all just be a nightmare. That I can call him tomorrow, we can meet up, hug, and I can remind him of his self worth…
I am truly sorry to hear this I am here for you. It was in absolutely no way your fault and your recovery is still very important. Please don’t give up. Again I can’t express how sorry I am for your loss but please don’t lose yourself.
We talked about this already, but
We cannot change the actions of other people. We are only the masters of our own actions.
It is not your fault and you are not responsible for the recovery of another person.
I know you’re in pain. I know you’re hurting. It’s a hurtful and painful experience. I hope you know that no matter what it feels like, you are never fighting alone. You have people beside you.
You are seen, heard and loved. You matter.
It’s a story I think many of us have walked through, my dear sister. We wonder if we were in the wrong, could have done more, or were selfish. Isn’t that the irony though? We feel worse about ourselves, because of another one of their actions that hurt us? I’m in that space now with another person. While they’ve grown unhealthy, I’ve had to distance myself and I fear that one day I’ll get the call they ended their life.
This is the hard part about life and relationships, while we want to be there and help save the other person, sometimes it’s impossible. We’re not meant to wear a cape and shield or play savior. Doing so will only lead to burnout and compassion fatigue. We’ll be the ones who grow unhealthy instead. You pointed out that were you to continue on, you’re recovery would be compromised. How is it selfish that you wanted to break free of cycles when another person did not? This is a simple truth I have to remind myself—if I’m not healthy, then I can’t help others. And sometimes, not matter how healthy you are, how much you try to help, how much you give and try and show someone their infinite worth, they refuse to see it. This is the beauty and tragedy of free will.
I know it doesn’t take away the pain, but perhaps it will help you make more sense of it. When I lost my friends to suicide, I often have to remind myself that was their decision to make, not mine, therefore I can’t be at fault especially if I was there to love and support them.
I’ll leave you with a simple parable a friend once told me after I shared my grief. He told me that when a man is drowning in the ocean, they can often drown the person trying to save them. That’s why they throw out rafts and buoys for them to grasp onto. Sometimes in life, those that are proverbially drowning will still refuse the liferaft, believing they’re not drowning. So he told me this:
Sometimes all you can do is stand on the shore and hold up a mirror until they realize they’re drowning and want help.