why i don't tell people "it gets better"

Every Suicide Prevention Month, I prepare a bunch of posts, videos, and anecdotes to share with my audience, a group of people who, for the most part, have also experienced bouts of suicidality, struggled with their mental health, or love people who do.

I also want to be very transparent when I say: Just because I don’t want to die anymore, doesn’t mean the thoughts aren’t still there.

When I share this on the internet, I’m often met with comments like, “Then what’s the point?” or “Should just give up now, then, if I’m going to feel this way forever?”

The first time I tried to end my life, it was the day before prom, my junior year of high school. I remember everything about that night so clearly — the goodbye message I posted on Tumblr, the pills stashed underneath my mattress, the direction my bed faced in my bedroom, how it felt to close my eyes, thinking that it would be the last time I would.

Then, early the next morning, I woke up. My mother came into my room to tell me to get ready: We were going to Lowe’s to buy wall paint (I had told her that I wanted to paint my bedroom walls).

The 12 hours after waking up are a blur: An intervention led by my friends with my parents in my living room after I returned home from Lowe’s, locking myself in my bedroom in anger, painting my walls by myself, still going to prom anyway.

I don’t know why it was so important that I still went to the dance, but that’s what I remember the most. It didn’t matter that I tried not to be alive, or that I had people who loved me, or that the paint on my walls was still wet — I needed to wear my pretty, blue dress, and dance all night, and pretend to be happy with a hundred students who had no idea what I had done the night before. I was so good at pretending, and the version of myself who was fake was the version that felt the most comfortable.

It wasn’t the last time that I tried to end my life, but it was the most memorable, for logical and understandable reasons. And if, at 16, anyone had told me that I would one day be 30 and still dealing with suicidal ideation, I would probably have the same response as some of my commenters: Then what’s the point? Should I just give up now if I’m going to feel this way forever?

I’ve stopped telling people that things get better.

I think most adults would agree with me: Growing up is hard. Seeing the people or pets you love get old. Watching people get cancer or lose a child. Seeing yourself get old, your body not bending and moving in the ways it did so easily a decade ago. You understand the world more — the politics, the anger, the reason why people you’ve known your whole life suddenly turn to extreme religion or MLM schemes. Nothing about getting older has been easy, and it’s a life that my teenage and young adult self certainly wouldn’t be able to handle. That’s why, instead of telling people that things get better, I tell them that things get different.

So much of suicide prevention involves access to resources, so I want to check my privilege here by saying I had so much support that I know many people don’t have. That said, the years (and years) of work I’ve done have taught me how to navigate the world differently and understand my emotions in a way that just wasn’t possible with my teenage hormones or before my frontal lobe developed.

Now, instead of spiraling for days, I let myself feel the big feelings, and then I talk to a friend or my partner. When the “I want to die” feelings come up, I don’t ignore them or push them aside or pretend they’re not there — I let myself feel it. I ask myself which version of myself is running the show (it’s often 17 year-old me), and I ask her what she needs to feel better. If it gets to be too much, I ask for help before the feelings get unmanageable or dangerous. The way to handle suicidal thoughts and ideation is not to suffer in silence or to push it aside with thoughts like, “I’m too old to still be feeling this way.”

We feel things for a reason. Not honoring those feelings is such a quick way to fall right back into the spiral that leads us down to the bottom, where we are too tired and distanced from anyone to want to reach out for support.

I’m still trying to understand this new version of myself who doesn’t want to die. It feels like I’m in a foreign brain and body. I sometimes feel like I can’t trust my mind, and other days I feel like I can’t trust my hands. I’m having to relearn everything about myself, from the way I feel my feelings to the ways I used to push them away. And yet, I feel so, so lucky that I get to meet a version of myself who is alive to watch things change.

So on the days when the thought that I shouldn’t be alive flashes through my brain, I remind myself that while this world is still so hard, and strange, and confusing, and devastating, and difficult to exist in, everything is so, so different than it used to be. Joy that wasn’t there before is so loud and beautiful now.

Nothing is forever, not what you’re feeling as you read this, not how you’ll feel tomorrow. Wait for things to be different. I promise, they will be.

In case you missed it, Caitlin Conlon’s sophomore poetry collection, Burning the Ghost Light dropped today, Sept. 9! I know I’m biased, as Caitlin and I teach workshops together and she is also one of my best friends, but when I say this is one of the best, coolest, collections I have ever read, I am being honest. Caitlin has done something really special here.

Hayley Williams dropped a new album, and as a Paramore/Hayley fan since their earliest releases, I had no doubt that I’d love this album — but “love” is an understatement. I can’t stop listening to it.

I think the popular song recommendation from this album would be Parachute, which I also think is one of the best on the album, but because it’s Suicide Prevention Month and I myself am feeling kind of glum, I fear Glum is the obvious choice here.

all the love, all the warmth, all the light,

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who i am: a writer, a lover, and a very Black + queer person. i love deeply, forget rarely, and spend most of my time cuddling with my dog, my cat, and my partner.

who i'm not: a therapist, mental health professional, or emergency service. i love hearing the stories of your experiences, but please don't send explicit or triggering details of your story without my prior consent.

if you're in crisis, please call 911 or use any of the following resources:

• National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 988

• National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)

• Crisis Text Line: Text HELP to 741741

• S.A.F.E. (Self Abuse Finally Ends): 1-800-DONT-CUT (366-8288)

• Eating Disorders Awareness and Prevention: 1-800-931-2237

• RAINN (Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network): 1-800-656-4673