From the Devil to God

Today is going to be a beautiful, warm, fifty-degree day here in Boston and I couldn’t be happier. What a nice treat in the midst of winter’s deep freeze. I have been running four miles, two times a week and I’m looking forward to increasing my distance and my amount of weekly runs.

I have two auditions coming up for a couple of musicals and I’m going to wrap up my certificate in Web and Digital Design in the next couple of months. Monday is my first day of my new job as a Communications Specialist. After almost two years of working as an administrative assistant, the job I took to support Chris and myself and to make sure he had 100% insurance coverage throughout his chemo treatments, I am finally returning to work that I am passionate about. Making the break stung a bit as yet another piece of my beloved husband fell away from me and faded into a memory. This move is a great one for me and will put me on my feet again, pointed toward new times, new experiences and new healing.

I’m thinking clearly again. I’m tired from the antidepressant, but I’m in motion once again. I don’t mind the tradeoff because I am able to do things without guilt for the first time in a long, long time.

Taking antidepressants to aid in the grief process is a very personal choice and I would imagine it varies from person to person. I tried as hard as I could to deal with grief on my own, but my anniversary damn near killed me this year. I confessed to my therapist that on my anniversary (1/17/06) I had experienced a daydream, in a series of vignettes, about my own suicide which essentially led to my reassessment of my ability or lack thereof to continue this dance drug-free.

The following is a snapshot of my frame of mind in the early evening hours of January 17th, 2006. As you read, bear in mind that this was only a daydream and essentially what prompted me to seek the aid of a prescription and to choose to begin to take the bull by the horns and live my life.

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I sat on the couch in my apartment, a razor in my right hand and the left sleeve of my shirt rolled up. I ran my finger along my vein from the top of my forearm down to my wrist, thinking about my vein and what it would be like to cut it.

The sound of bath water filling the tub in an emulsion of pink floral suds emanated throuhought the apartment. On the bathtub wall sat a bottle of red wine, a wine glass and a razor blade. I thought about Robby and Carol and how it would take about a day and a half for them to think something was strange when I didn’t answer my phone. I supposed my failure to show up for work would have caused some alarm, as well.

My landlord would lead them upstairs to my apartment where they would find a note tacked to the door warning him not to bring his children in.

I sunk the blade into the vein at the top of my forearm with thoughts of sliding it all the way down to my wrist. The “pop” as the blade penetrated my skin surprised me and a spurt of blood shot up from the wound like a fountain, shooting two feet into the air.

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The very vivid sight of the blood spurting out of my arm shocked me out of my daydream and back into reality.

I sat on my sofa, horrified that my brain took me to such a dark place and I knew immediately that I never wanted to feel that level of despair again. I also realized that the responsibility to turn it around rested solely on my own shoulders and I decided to seek the help I needed in order to stop sinking into the depths of hopelessness.

I went to a very scary place and the scariest part of the place I went is that being there felt peaceful.

This small albeit powerful and frightening fantasy of ending my pain is essentially what lead to my realization that life is to be lived. I do not believe in suicide, in fact I have always viewed the act as one of great weakness and one thing that I am not, is weak.

I conveyed to my therapist that this was a daydream, not a plan to end my own life. I don’t know whether he believed me or not, and I suppose it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that I am feeling much better since my decision to help myself.

People talk about life being a series of tests and how God puts obstacles in your way to see how or if you will be able to overcome.

To analogize my experience of that evening is to say that I was kidnapped and held by the devil and that I escaped and ran into the safety and love of God’s bright light.

I hope this means my faith is returning.