Cross-posted from.: i tour the entire fall in Europe, moshing & crowdsurfing, & I don’t get a bloody fucking lip until i decide to do a clash cover at the @bittorrent offices & ask the audience to make a pit. What does this say about the future of music? (thanks Conor). Today is a new year. But it’s like breaking out from underground into a painful light. I posted this photo two weeks ago, when i was visiting my friend conor at bittorrent. He had just accidentally clocked me in the face with my own microphone and we were both really proud that i was bleeding.
Download File Desain Banner Corel Draw (cdr) Ulang Tahun Anak Umur 3 Tahun. This image is a vector illustration. Linda Slangen. Diverse felicitaties. Lihat lainnya Apa yang dikatakan orang lain. Template Kalender 2018 Vector CDR PDF Free Download - Template Kalender 2018 Vector CDR PDF Free Download. Free online file conversion for corel draw.cdr files and adobe illustrator.ai files into other respective versions, pdf or eps file. Also converts a wide variety of raster image files into other image files.
A few nights ago, conor took his own life. He left behind his wife, ava, and his four-month-old baby daughter, finn. I’m going to write a longer blog about it (including information for the san francisco community about pitching in to help ava, plus a helping-fund for finn), but i can’t let this day go by without saying something. God i miss him. And i don’t understand. To anybody else who lost anybody or anything over the holidays, to anyone who is feeling the sting of the missing through the harsh lens of this time of year, to anyone who is seeing empty places at the table or on the couch, or in the bed beside youto any and every one who barely made it through the holidays themselves.i can only say this: i love you. Whoever and wherever you are.
And i mean it. Happy new year. Hang in there. I’m a mom of three, I helped raise my teenage niece and nephew, live with BP1 depressive type and sometimes your music was the only thing to get me through.
I had to separate myself from my family Christmas of 2012 (my entire family suffers from untreated mental illness) and this year, as I set the table for only my little family, i wanted to die. I felt unanchored, alone, etc. I’m so glad I didn’t. Thank you for posting this, it’s good to be reminded that I really didn’t come out the other side just fine.
I had to do the same thing this year. It’s never a good thing, realizing the need to create boundaries within a family, but it was definitely survival driven for me. Sometimes being with our family is the exact opposite of what we need. I was alone these holidays, but I came through with my psyche and my self esteem intact.
We do what needs to be done, in order to move forward, to keep ourselves strong – to get stronger. To be able to take care of ourselves and other loved ones. To be able to keep our strength so we can find jobs, make more loving connections, endure weather, and perhaps – mend old fences one day in the future kudos and Happy New Year, sister.
That fucking sucks. It’s never fun to lose someone you love.
I’ve lost a lot of people I love, but I try to remember that I’m lucky I got to love them at all. It doesn’t make it any easier to be without them, but it does remind me why the pain is there. I wouldn’t hurt so badly when it happens if I hadn’t loved them so much, and I wouldn’t have loved them so much if they weren’t that fabulous person I knew them to be. Do what you need to do. Heal as best you can, and when it’s possible again, do something silly they would have loved to remember them. I lost my Mom 2 years ago when I was 25. Ive never healed nor do I think I ever will.
Im left with these feelings of anger and sadness that hit me out of nowhere when I least expect it. Im pregnant now, and very happy about it.but I need her and it hurts even worse knowing she will never know or see her grandbaby. Thank you for writing this. Sometimes you get lost in your own experience, and its nice to hear you understand and you send your love. Much love goes to you and your family/friends as well. This has been the hardest holiday season of my life. A couple of months ago, out of the blue, my mother was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer.
We were told we had months. We had weeks. I got home on my birthday and my mother died two weeks later. And I could go on and on about what I’m going through and feeling, but I’ll just say this, somewhere in all the sorrow was the birth of this great empathy for others, far beyond the empathy I thought I experienced before. This connection towards others, this love for every kindness and this want to hug and hold everyone and make it better for them.
So yes, I love you too Amanda. And everyone. My mum died suddenly during the summer. There is nothing and no-one than can fill the space she left behind but finding solace in each other can certainly help, and soften the edges. I too have found a greater patience and understanding for other people, and have found myself being a little kinder, and a little less judgemental.
Christmas this year wasn’t really Christmas. I was surrounded by people I love, some of whom flew from Boston to Dublin to be with me, but I didn’t really care about presents and I certainly didn’t feel the wonder and magic that I always felt at this time of year. Christmas was a three day party with dinner in the middle, but without Mum, it wasn’t Christmas. Amanda, you have no idea how much your music helped me, and continues to help me.
Your kindness, your empathy and your ability to hear what I was saying to you in Dublin in July still takes my breath away. If I can be as understanding with others as you were with me – a complete stranger who just so happened to be interviewing you – then I feel I will be doing well. The only other thing to say is, this sucks, but to all those who hurt as much as I do; you are loved, both by the person who left and those who are still here. Be strong, but don’t be afraid to cry and feel how you feel. Cry if you need to, laugh if you need to. I am reading through this much later, but I still feel I have to respond.
My mum didn’t die suddenly, but since she was, at the time, the one person who understood me, I mentally blocked the fact that her cancer was back after seven years, and this time there was noqtning to be fine done but postponing the inevitable. She lasted three more years. The day we were called to the hospital to be told she had two weeks at most, I brought my razors, having decided that if she was to die, I wanted to be dead too. When my family realised i was gone, and the staff eventually unlocked the bathroom I was in from the inside, I had almost a centimetre deep cuts in both wrists. The orderly who were first in said that I “knew exactly where to cut” and I was so far gone mentally that his comment made me proud.
However, when I came back top mums room, I started crying, for the first time in three years. My mother was still there for me, despite her being the one dying, and on top of that having her 18 year old daughter just attempting suicide. We even talked about how to get the bloodstains out of my trousers, them being my favourite pair, since she understood my need to lessen the impact of what I had tried to do just 15minutes or so earlier. Now, that wasn’t what I actually meant to write about. You see, even though she died in February 2005, Christmas was always her holiday. My grandparents came down to visit us, since she and dad owned a flower shop and woked almost 24/7 in late December, but there were some special things she always made sure to do. Like the moose meet christmas meatballs (oh yeah, I’m Swedish by the way, so even though unusual it wasn’t that odd) and especially dressing the tree.
Mum had a myriad of glass balls, and every year, she usually bought at least one new one. Almost all were unique, hand blown, a special pattern, things like that. The first year dressing the tree without her, I had an immense panic attack and then cried for hours. The first few months after she died was hard, when you did things like setting the table for four out of habit, but christmas, being her holiday, is still hard. This year, eight years later, I was proud of the fact that I didn’t have a major breakdown for the first time since she died, only a small one. Unfortunately, my brother was a mess this year. Quite understandably too, since he was the one who took care of his clinically depressed sister while dad fled by working all the time those first six months.
I am so grateful to him, but he, because of that, never got the time to mourn himself. What I am trying to say, I believe, is that no matter when people die, the holidays are always hard, especially those associated closely with the person. And lastly, I want to add, your music have helped me so much Amanda. I too pick my fingernails and cuticles apart, more than ever since I started to try to stop cutting, that I say that my nails are a sure way to see how I am doing mentally. Whenever shit is hard, they are raw sores.
Bad Habit resonated so much with me because of that. And your first solo album spoke to me in so many ways. As an artist, I would love for my paintings and sculptures to one day resonate with people the way your music resonate with me. Also, as others have said, remember that it does get easier.
I now look back and know that for 18 years, I had the best mother anyone could have. I feel a slight pain when I find some trinket I know she’d have loved, but now, almost every time something reminds me of her, the dominating feeling is happiness and gratefulness for having had the privilege of knowing and growing up with her. It will always hurt, but in time, most of the pain will be accompanied by an equal part of happy remembrance and gratefulness of having had the person in your life at all. On September 13, 2013, we were in a bad car accident. While I suffered no physical damage, my wife was bruised across her entire body and my daughter was placed in pediatric intensive care. She stayed in the hospital for a week with a small liver incision, a lung contusion, and fractures in her sacrum. The doctors cleared her for normal routines/activities (PE in school, gymnastics, stuff like that) after a month & a half and she’s now at 100%.
But I thought I’d lost her. When she was awake in the hospital I was by her side, making her laugh and playing games.
But while she slept I cried continually. I am sorry for your loss, Ava & Amanda. My daughter’s pain, and the potential of losing her forever, nearly drove me mad. I can only imagine what you both feel. Please be there for each other and know that you are loved.
Amanda, I just sent you a message on facebook. Read it if you want, but don’t force yourself – it ain’t that much This post. I mean, I hate it too because it’s so awful to hear the news, but it’s stuff like this, these smacks of reality staggered here-there-and-everywhere all over the world each day, that bring people together. It’s a community here. An art-loving, freedom-hailing, love-promoting community, and it’s all real. It helps me to hang on. I’m going to crawl away and cry now.
And what’s wonderful about being part of such an amazing community is that I don’t need to explain myself. Love to everyone x. Condolences and love to you and yours. Though it wasn’t a person, my boyfriend and I lost our 5 year old dog on the morning of the 30th rather abruptly. Three weeks ago, he had gotten really sick and we took him into our long time Vet, and three days later he was diagnosed with aggressive lymphoma.
He was getting worse the night of the 29th so we stayed up all night, and had planned to drive him in again that morning thinking we had a little more time, at the very least a week, and before we could even get ready to leave, one small sound and he was taken from us. Some won’t understand because it’s just a dog, but for those that do, they’re family, and to us, a child, and the only close family we had, because we got him when we first got together.
And now he’s gone from us just far too soon. It’s not fair at all. It’s not fair to anyone or anything that’s lost someone so quickly or without warning. Especially during a time when you’re supposed to be happy. And it will stay with us for years to come.
Thank you so much for reaching out. Big fucking hugs to everyone going through this kind of shit right now. There are times when you just don’t want to be. When you have had enough. There really isn’t anything to understand beyond that. It may have been long planned or it might be spur-of-the-moment.
I wrestle with these feelings daily and have for many years. I made a conscious decision not to use mind altering drugs, and so far that has worked for me, though please realize that’s not a recommendation, everyone needs to walk their own best path to living with mental health issues. I would say to anyone wrestling with suicidal feelings to just decide every day not to take that final step today. Let it ride another day, and another and another. Give yourself a break. I know it’s hard, but the lowest point is often the point of bounce when things are going to go up again. At the bottom, you can only go up.
Let it ride just one more day Please. Whoever you are, you are wanted and loved by someone, even if you dont recognize it, and you AREN’T making life awful for your loved ones, at least not until you take that final step. Stay with us. You will miss some of the good bits if you dont. My loss and grief is of a different sort. It was my son’s first Christmas and he is 400+ miles away with his adoptive mamas. We – myself, my partner and my daughter – couldn’t be with them over the holidays because of work schedules.
All of 2013 has been about having this child, giving him to one of my best friends to raise (who has wanted to be a mother as long as I have been a mother to 2 others), and separating myself from being his mommie, though I am very much a part of his life (I am called Amma, which means spiritual mother). I very much wish our family could have shared his first Christmas together.
Hopefully 2014 will bring me/us my dream job in their city so we can be a part of each others’ daily lives. I am actually applying for this dream job today, so I appreciate your good thoughts! And I love you Amanda, and wish you and Neil a Happy New Year, as emotionally complicated as it may be. That’s what makes us so wonderfully human. Thank you Amanda.
I needed this. I love you too. My friend took her own life and we lost a family member to cancer.
It was so difficult. I wrote this poem for my friend I hope it is as meaningful to you as this post was for me. BLACK VANILLA – Poem for a friend. Vanilla is not ordinary.
Scents of fleeting memories, Lingering sweet taste of something familiar. A fair flower wilting into black, With powerful extract.
From Orchid to vial, There is beauty in delicacy and more in complexity, As in breakfast blueberry pancakes, Brief encounters to fuel the day ahead, And form pumpkin spiced friendships, To complement compassionate notes, Like Juniper, Mint and lime, The fabulous flavours of black vanilla, Highly valued for their qualities, Needed to spice life for a longtime after, Long-after we ask why. I spent the year of 2013 watching a good friend waste away in my apartment. He just gave up on life and living. He had lost his lover (also a great friend of mine) a little over two years before, and something within him died. It just took longer for the rest of him to follow. The last three months or so, he had dementia from malnutrition and meningitis.
He gradually lost control of his body and I cleaned him, fed him and took care of him as best I could. He died two days before Halloween. His name was Kevin, not that it matters now – the person who died that day wasn’t Kevin anymore. (Doug, my friend and his lover, died two days before my birthday in 2011.) This was the first time in 23 years that I spent a holiday alone. Thanksgiving was bad.
I barely remember the day, except that I posted some random thoughts to facebook, even though I don’t really remember doing so. There is, and I’m certain always will be, a huge wound in my world where they both should be/were. That’s normal. The living, those who remain, always feel the absence of those who’ve gone. That wound, however, does grow less painful. It never completely heals, but it will scar over. It will ache sometimes, on rainy days when you see their face in a storm cloud, or on your personal anniversaries, or when you’re watching a movie they would have loved as well and you see them sitting next to you in the darkened theater.
But it will get better. I know that sounds cliche. I also know it to be true. In the mid- to late- 80’s I lost seven friends and acquaintances to AIDS. I was living in California, after being in the Navy and this was still early in the plague’s history.
I was one of only a handful of people who believed that no one – even in the face of all the fear and horror of the disease – should be abandoned. This was when a positive diagnosis was a death sentence. A very quick one.
Not to belabor the point, I watched seven people die in just over two years. I still miss them, even though I didn’t know a few of them that well before. They are scars I have that ache on occasion to this day.
I have had enough of death. I told my family and friends that no one gets to die for at least five years. We’ll see how that works. (I know my 19-year-old Tibetan Spaniel won’t follow that rule, even though I’ve told her that, too.
I can see that she’s somewhere between worlds – I know the look in her eyes. I’ve seen it before in other pets I’ve shared my life with,) Death is a part of life, and I don’t fear it – neither do I welcome it. She may be a pretty goth chick with an ankh tattoo under her eye, but I hope she hangs out somewhere else for a while. She spent too much time couch-surfing at my place. I’m not sure why I just said all that. Maybe I just needed to tell someone, anyone, about it.
It doesn’t feel particularly cathartic. Just know that what you’re feeling now will change, will get easier and less painful, You will never understand, until you walk through that door yourself.
You won’t ever not see the people you’ve lost at odd moments, or stop hearing them say things to you. Just know that they love you and will always be by your side, even if you can’t touch them or hold them. And they want you to live your life.
Do that; it is the best way you can honor them and what they were. My mother was murdered almost 2 yrs agoIt will be 2 yrs in 2 mths. We went to see your show in Zurich.
You sung LOST. We were getting ready to go back to the states for the trial. I wanted to add my note to the magic box. I listened to the words of LOST.
I listen to LOST now when I need to be reminded that “nothings ever gone forever” It doesn’t matter how someone becomes “lost” to us, what matters is that we do keep them alive in our memories and our actions and the choices we make. Loss isn’t just the passing of a close friend, lover and family member, it includes the “death” of a non-person object as well.
This past September my only sibling brother dropped dead from a heart attack. With both parents of my parents gone as well, I became the only left in my immediate family and spent the last four months cleaning out the family home in New Jersey to sell. I remember from past postings your sense of loss when your parents sold the house you grew up in. What hurts more is knowing that a builder bought it with the intention of tearing it down to build a “McMansion” on the property. My family is now all dead and someone right now is killing/destroying my family home. This holiday season I’m feeling really shitty about this recent loss and then I read your post above.
All I can do is to say thank you. Thank you for being here and now. Thank you and Neil for your art of music and words. You really do love us/me and in my eyes, you’re a true Bodisattva and I mean it. I feel your pain Amanda. My mother took her life in 08 just before Christmas. It was really tough and hard getting through.
In fact I never really did until this year. And now I’m going through it again with the loss of my wife of 3 years.
She decided she wanted better. She deserves better for the crap she put up from me as a result of not dealing with my issues that stemmed from growing up with addiction in the family and not dealing with her passing. Stay strong it’s going to be hard. I won’t bullshit you on that. Better days will come though I believe this. I never thought i could love someone, moreover a stranger, as much as i love the person you choose to show the world you are.
Ill take the risk of saying that as much as it is hard for people to understand the ones who give up being, it is hard for me to understand how you people actually want to keep on living. No one has never convinced me that anything good could grow out life.
Not everyones lives, of course – because your living for example has created so many wonderful things, and im sure that “by simply smiling”, you did save some if not many other lives. But some lives are simply not worth it.
I know that as hard as i try, i cant create anything i would be proud of, because thats who i am. No one will suffer if i cease from being, except maybe my family who dont care for me, not really, but are biologically designed to ache on my loss. The world wont be better and it wont be worse without me in it.
I already went through those long periods of suffering, of self hurting and destruction, and i think that people who kill themselves in that stage really cannot be understood, because they are temporarily insane, scientifically proven. Because if they waited just another day or year or a second, the pain would have faded away. But now i havent a hint of sadness in me. When i was in pain i knew i didnt think straight, but now i feel like i do.
And i really think theres no point in living my life. I dont want you to be sad for me, or tell me “dont do it!!!” etc, because i dont think it will help. I simply want to say that if your friend killed himself, he either suffered so badly that in a moment of insanity he made the wrong decision, and then you could do nothing; or, he logically understood that he is not enjoying his life, and that it will never be better, and you could do nothing about it too. But would you prefer if he kept on surviving with this idea in mind?
A good friend of mine, Bryan Harvey from the band House of Freaks, was savagely murdered along w/ his entire family (including his daughters ages 4 and 9) on New Year’s Day in 2006. I woke up at 3:30 a.m., realized it was New Years and started crying.
Hard work, good friends and a snuggly cat got me through the day but New Years is still the holiday I dread above all others. Amanda, I’m so very sorry for your loss. Sometimes there just is no way to rationalize things and there never will be.
You are loved. Things can get pretty crappy 2012 was our bad time. 13 deaths in just over a year, a pile-up of coincidences and tragedies not to go into detail about. It was a bleak time and it pushed me too far to properly cope.
Support services just seemed to make me angry and confused so I doubt I’ve handled it really, but I have love around me and plodded through to a calmer place. There is a place just past the border of grief, it is worth visiting and eventually you get to stay there and when you have someone great beside you it is easier to stay there, and when they are hurting it is easier still. Amanda, you got a Neil. You have family. You have friends. You have a whole heap of people you’ll stumble upon, stroll past unknowing or perhaps never get within 1,000 miles of, but they are there. It won’t impact now.
Soon it will dawn on you though and then Ava will get the best of you, with the emotional momentum of thousands behind you. Make it count. (I know you will.) Or just say ‘bollocks’ and write your book (with many words beginning with an eff) and have Neil hate it and publish it anyway. Whatever works is the right way. Dye your hair blue, tattoo ‘I’ve hugged a koala, so fxxk you!’ on your butt, ask Pope Francis out y’know, whatever works.
Hugs to all of you out there hurting right now. The L word is a bugger to throw around, but I can certainly empathise and give a damn. I hope that works enough for you. I will still have moments where I will remember chasing lizards with Hendry and wish I had got the chance to know the great guy he’d have been when he grew up and then carry on.
I love you too. And thank you. It’s hard, every year, and even more so this year.
I found out from my mother on 12/13 that my uncle D died, and during the phone conversation, mother (whom I’ve had to distance myself from due to abuse) let drop that there were only 3 of the original 9 siblings left. I asked her who else passed, and she responded that aunt B had, about a month ago, and also aunt J, about 2 years ago. She hadn’t bothered telling me about any of this previously, because it didn’t mean anything to her. I loved all of them, but I most especially loved aunt J, and I can’t share that grief with anyone. Gratitude and tears reading this. Sending you love Amanda. I’m the shining light black sheep who broke free of a sick toxic family and frequently spends the holidays alone.
My parents came to town and I didn’t visit- had i, it would have basically been “fuck you.” The day that I didn’t visit them, two back molars broke off. The shit happens, the toxicity boils up, my heart gets broken- so I can be more and more clear and free. I lost pieces of my teeth over the holidays. And I let go of a few more scarred places in my heart along the way.
There are different kinds of loss. My family fell apart this year – two family members left our nest and I am now a single mother of two young girls. Divorce is not death, but you grieve it. This was the first holiday season with this fresh wound.
I thought I would manage okay, since the split was over the summer, but it was super painful. Thank you so much Amanda, and everyone here, for providing a community and reminding me again that everyone is dealing with their own pain.
Time heals these wounds, but you never lose them completely. Although he is still alive, I “lost” my brother two summers ago when a car hit him as he rode his motor scooter for a quick errand in town. His skull was crushed in on one side, his palate separated from his skull, and his neck was broken. He lost nearly his entire volume of blood, and almost died in the medivac chopper en route to the hospital.
With major structural, neurological, and cognitive difficulties that will never heal, the life as he knew it is now no longer his. Due to nerve damage in one of the main nerves that run across the face, he has to suffer daily with trigeminal neuropathy, a condition nicknamed “the suicide disease” because it drives people to the brink of suicide.
Things such as a light breeze on his cheek triggers his nerve to misfire. He describes it as being tasered repeatedly in the face, sometimes for weeks on end. He often says that if it weren’t for his young daughter, he doesn’t know how he would go on and i truly believe it. Some days he is so bad he just says i don’t know how i can live the rest of my life like this. It is these times that we worry about suicide. Should we feel selfish when we plead with him not to do anything rash? The worst part is that my mom and i only get to see him once or twice a year, time and money permitting.
He is unable to fly or travel for long periods of time, so travel to Boston is out of the question (he lives in the Florida Keys). My mom has to stay here in Boston to work to support him, as he is unable to work.
We miss him so much and worry every day if today is the day that his relentless pain is going to be so bad that it pushes him to the brink of death. In many ways, he is already dead. The worry is killing us slowly too.
Thank you for sharing this. I have seen 2 suicides with my own eyes. The first one was my brother – I was 11 at the time, playing a computer game in a room next to him. We could not save him.
And after it I was in depression for over 10 years. The second one was a gf of my good friend just a few years ago. I was the one who was called for help.
I helped the ambulance to take her to the hospital and stayed there with my friend for a long time – so he would not go mad with his thoughts. You have to share. I was in depression and I got help (this was not easy) I do a lot of art to balance the life. I have a great sense of humor (or at least I think so) I am happy for most of the time and have a sort of inner peace now.
And ironically, as it is so easy to go back to the old habits and thoughts, I still time to time get the feeling that I have had enough, or I am just so bored with life and think “is that all there is”? (I woke up with this feeling today, so this post was a good reminder). In my home country there is 100-450 suicides in a year this is way too much and talking about it is a taboo. When I was younger I never understood how suicide deaths were different from “normal” deaths.
At least, not until a man I looked to as a positive role model and loved as a father took his own life. The pain, guilt, anger, grief, confusion and hollowness I experienced after the news of his death made moving on impossible for a very long time. Even years later, and after endless soul searching, I still continue to simultaneously love AND hate that man. I will always love him for being a wonderful and caring man who had been good to me, and I will always hate him for hurting us all so irreparably. It’s a paradox of irreconcilable and agonising emotions.
Even though I have lost so many other people in the years after his suicide, it is his death that I can’t stop thinking of. His face that continues to invade my thoughts on a daily basis, unbidden. Bereavement is always a painful journey. I’m not convinced it ever really stops hurting, actually. But I believe that the new loves you find in life help to soothe the raw edges of that mourning pain that has haunted your steps for so long.
My heart truly goes out to you, Amanda. I hope you’re receiving the love and support you need to help you through this experience. I know you don’t understand. Be prepared to accept that you may never understand.
Take care of yourself, and take care of the ones you love. One day, it won’t be so bad anymore. I lost people i love in 2013 and i lost myself. I could’ve died and was close to it, but i’m glad i didn’t, and you are responsible for that gladness. Not because you music is therapeutic, though it is.
Not because seeing you live is a holiday from my vicious mind, though it is. Not because if i killed myself i’d miss out on something rad, though i would but i didn’t care. Because you gave me reason to stick around you gave me a community full of amazingly beautiful fans that i have made such strong connections with. I made a commitment and i had to keep it.
It would have been selfish of me not to. And i know suicidal people rarely think of others when they make that decision to go through with it, but for some reason i just can’t not think of others. You brought people into my life that love me and respect me and i love and respect in return. I’ve lost so much but i’ve gained so much being a part of your community. I can’t say that i’m going to survive 2014. Whether i die from a freak accident, illness or at my own hand, or whether i live another year no one can know. I never thought i’d make it to 30!
But sitting here right now, a week out from another run of shows i’ll see you in and be with the people i’ve connected with through you, i WANT to make it to 30. I love you.
At 2am on Monday morning (Dec 30), my boyfriend had a heart attack at his home while I was there. I gave him CPR as he turned blue. Within 30 minutes, the hospital pronounced him dead. The funeral is tomorrow and I’m no way prepared for this. I can’t express how much this post touched me and how it came at the perfect time. I’m sincerely sorry for the loss of everyone mentioned, but we are never alone.
“No man is an island, Entire of itself, Every man is a piece of the continent, A part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less. As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend’s Or of thine own were: Any man’s death diminishes me, Because I am involved in mankind, And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee. ” – John Donne. As a person who has lost friends to suicide, seen friends’ lives irreversably changed for the worse due to suicide attempts and experienced periods of very deep depression myself, I would like to add this: if you are in a strong position, try to be available and open to those who might be experiencing difficult times. Lend them an ear, lend them a hand, maybe even lend them a safe place to stay for awhile if you are able. If you are experiencing difficult times, try to reach out for help in any way you can.
Reach out to friends, family, neighbors, call a crisis line or try to find a community service that can help you. Good, kind, caring people that enjoy helping others exist everywhere.
Even if you happen not to have any in your immediate family or don’t feel safe sharing how you are feeling with friends, try and find someone to reach out to who can help you. Everyone needs help from time to time.
Don’t be afraid or ashamed to ask for it if you need it and don’t hesitate to offer it if you can. I think one of the most beautiful aspects of community is helping each other up when we have fallen. That requires reaching out in both directions. Please don’t hesitate to do it. It can make all the difference.
I am incredibly sorry for your loss. I admire you and everyone on here for sharing and allowing me to have a glimpse into your soul. I have lost a couple people to suicide.
My best friend when we were 15 and my friend that I lived with last year. Mental illnesses are very hard to comprehend. Someone said something at my roomates funeral that explained how someone with anxiety and bipolar disorder view the world: “we all have a filter. This filter is what helps us deal with the ugliness of the world. If someone does or says something that is hurtful or difficult for us to handle, we filter it out and move on as best as we can.
Then there’s people like Shane who even though they may be the most loving and caring and person in the world, their filter is broken. They let all of the ugliness in the world build up and fill their huge hearts until its no longer bearable. If love could have saved him, he would have lived forever.” I thought that was really helpful for those people who were feeling angry and confused about his decision. Following Shane’s death, my grandmother passed away on Dec 23rd. We had the funeral and calling hours on Christmas eveChristmas was her favorite holiday.
I found out shortly after her passing that I was expecting my first child and it still breaks my heart that she isn’t here to meet my daughter Rowan. Many people on here have said it, but it’s truetime heals. But take your time.
3 years ago I attempted suicide on Christmas night. I was living with my aunt&uncle. We had been fighting quite a bit, and she was going to kick me out when she found out I was talking with my sisters.
She felt that I betrayed her. I found out that night that she had my mother’s wedding ring, and I’ll never forget how she said “I was told to not give this to you until you’re older, more mature” I found out later the person who gave it to her said nothing of the sort. My cousins were all outside listening. When I went outside, they all looked at me and turned their heads to the ground. I may have been young and stupid, but she tried to force me to be institutionalized before that.
I haven’t cut in 3 years, and I haven’t attempted suicide since that night. It took me until this year to start feeling good about the holidays again.
I celebrated Yule with my pagan group. It was the first time I felt like I could celebrate a holiday without persecution of religion, past, or wealth status. The holidays are not about buying things to make other people happy, nor is it about thinking of what you do not have. It’s about huddling together for warmth with the people you do have, and rejoicing in song that we made it through the harsh winter. Some fell from the group for one reason or another, but we do not mourn their ends.
We’ve all had 1 really crappy X-mas at one point, and that is okay. We should rejoice that we all at least have 1 thing to hold on to for warmth.
If we don’t have anything, we laugh at the fact that it can’t get much worse, and raise a toast to making the next year better. But please, do not let loss affect the holiday. If we can’t put all of our sadness aside for 1 day together, we’ll never be happy. I propose we all join in in a group hug. Here we all are together with our arms open for love, so let us give hugs and thanks for being here together. /.hugs everyone on this thread. I am reading this through a veil of tears and tears are good.
I lost my big sister 11 years ago. She died of a splenetic arterial rupture. Nothing could have stopped it she just died. I can sometimes touch a place where I don’t want to be here any more and the thought of someone I love being there, touching it and choosing to leave is impossible to describe. My thoughts are with you and your friends wife and daughter. My brother in law Steve lost his wife and a baby in one night (my sister was heavily pregnant at the time and they both died) At first I couldn’t see how he could bare it but he did. Steve was a lot older than my sister and she was convinced that he was going to die before her so she had been carrying around this Buddhist passage about loss.
She thought she had been preparing herself for loosing him but in fact on the night that she died it was one of the only things she had on her and she made sure it was there for Steve. I’m afraid I don’t have the passage I just remember the last line: ‘after winter must come spring’ I think I like the must part best. Been sitting here in a hospital room since Dec 8th watching my mom fight a hard battle against a horrible illness not knowing if I’ll ever talk to her again.