Sobering thoughts......

This week, the younger sister of a very good friend committed suicide.  She left behind a 4 year old child.  Suicide is the one thing that I think is the most selfish act that anyone can do.  The decision to take your own life, while having no regard for those you leave behind, is something that I cannot comprehend.  I say that because I've been that person.  I had to take Paxil to get up in the morning.  Xanax to get through the day.  Ambien to shut my thoughts down so that I could sleep at night.  I was a shell.  I put on the ultimate facade; the porcelain face that I presented to the world was one of constant happiness.  Inside, however, I was dying.  I was in a marriage to someone who didn't want me, who belittled me, and made me feel like I was worthless.  I was overweight, and every time I looked in the mirror I didn't see any of the "good", all I saw was the bad.  No positives, only negatives.  Every single part of me had a flaw.  None of my friends would ever have guessed it.  I kept the show on the road; never letting on that I was one small straw away from having a broken back.  I started having recurring nightmares, horrible horrible ones.  Ones that nobody should ever have to have, let alone remember.  I considered ending it all, just to end the interminable pain that I was feeling inside.  Then I thought, if I go, who'll take care of my kids?  How will they go on without me?  Then I thought the inconceivable.  What if I took them with me?  What if I left a note for those who hurt me, detailing all of my anger and hurt, and then left THEM to deal with the devestation?  Then we could be together forever.  That's when I knew I had to step back off the ledge, get back in touch with my friends, my family, and most of all, my faith.  I felt that God was punishing me somehow.  That He was angry at me.  That He had forsaken me.  I realized that no matter how bad things got, no matter how dark things seemed, that nothing was worth the pain that I would inflict on my mother, my father, my sisters, my brother, my friends....if I made the selfish decision to take myself away from those who loved me.  And they do love me.  For all of my faults, my quirks, and my imperfections...I am loved.  Not only by those here, but by those who came before me, and by the Lord.  I learned that no matter how far down I get, I have an amazing network of people to pull me back into the light.  I turned that corner and I'll never look back.  As a single mother, I have to not only think about the effect my actions have on me, but on my children.  Any decision I make can irrevocably change their lives.  If I'd given in to the dark thoughts of despair that I had, my heart breaks to think of what my kids' lives would be like without me.  How they'd think that I didn't love them enough to stay.  How they'd miss me at graduations...at weddings..at the births of their children.  How they would always have questions that could never be answered.  I could never take the gift of my life away from my children.  I made the decision to have my children, and I have a duty to stick around and take care of them.  Depression is a deep, dark, abyss and nothing can minimize the effects that it can have on your life.  But before you get to the point where you feel hopeless, that there is no other way out....remember that being a mother is the ultimate gift, and that taking that gift away from your children is something that they'll never recover from.