A Response to the Suicide Note I Wrote 15 Years Ago

By Ashleigh Campora • December 8, 2016

This month, we’re looking back on the top 10 blog posts of 2016. This post was originally published on June 9, 2016

Breathe.

Your pain will not go unnoticed.

Flush the pills. Dump the vodka down the drain. Throw away the razor blades. You will not be leaving here in a body bag and certainly not by the fault of your own hand. You are going to get through this.

Please, for me, just take a breath.

There is no need to feel so hopeless. You are just so desperate for relief that you can’t see what’s real. Your heart is not as delicate as it feels, and you will soon see that you are capable of so much more, something so much bigger.

So breathe.

Let yourself feel. Tears are the soul’s way of cleansing itself. Cry. Scream. Get angry. Be sad. Just allow yourself to feel it. Don’t waste over half of your life running. Drugs will not vaporize your heartache. It will lay there, dormant in the corner of every room, for your return. When you succeed in becoming an addict, you will sacrifice all that’s good in an attempt to drown out all that’s bad. You’re going to hurt to a point that will bring you to your knees. Let it. You’re not a quitter, but it’s time to give up plotting your own demise. You will fail, and, for the first time, that failure will be beautiful.

You deserve to keep breathing.

Stop setting such unreasonable expectations for yourself. You keep setting yourself up to fail because perfection is unattainable. There will always be someone who is prettier, skinnier, or funnier. Stop starving yourself of sustenance. The number on the scale is unreliable. Beauty is measured in heart, not pounds. And, my god, your heart is beautiful. Let go of the belief that they’d be better off without you.

And breathe.

You’re scared, and that’s OK too. Soon a day will come when you are the fixture of somebody’s universe. The sun, in her eyes, will rise and set by you. And she’ll call you Mommy. I know it doesn’t make much sense right now, but it will, I promise. Yours is not the only ship you’d sink by checking out of here. You have angels on both sides of the line fighting hard to show you that you cannot simply just “disappear.” Your thinking is so clouded you cannot see that even the worst of the pain eventually subsides. But death does not. Death is a permanent fixture in life. Death does not turn back.

Take a breath.

Fifteen years from now you’re going to look back on this. With a sigh, you’re going to ask yourself, “Why?” Fifteen years from now you’ll find yourself sitting in that same darkness you’ve always feared. But this time you’ll be quietly watching as your daughter’s chest rises and falls as she sleeps. You’ll smile and think to yourself, “My god, I almost missed this.”

So please. I’m begging you.

Don’t forget to breathe.

Leave a Reply

Comments (36)

All Topics Authors News + Events
Get Email Updates

Sign up for our newsletter to hear updates from our team and how you can help share the message of hope and help.