Considerations and Consolations

Letter to a Suicidal Self

Dear me:

It’s a bit difficult to know you, a tad more intriguing albeit in some way. For countless times you have been an object of neglect, sometimes with false assurances of something greater, bolder that you can do. Years have passed always with a lingering desire to achieve, because you felt as if nothing actually comes to fruition, what with the very efforts that you do and the energies expended towards things futile. Everything about you appears as though a mishap of sorts: failures in friendships, relationships, connexion with family members, even undesirable circumstances in your search for God. Nothing appears as it ought:–happiness seems to escape you, your world bleak as Scrooge’s version of Christmas. Everything is as though a false sense of comfort, what with the pandemonium of bipolar mood swings where you run towards something to bequeath you stability but in the end fails to assist you and instead rams you to the pit. Then you begin to question your existence, and eventually, your mortality: why am I still here? Why do I still live? It seems that answers to such questions are so remote you begin wailing in despair. For why not? Nobody’s there to catch you when you fall; you are left with individuals surrounding you but who morph into shadows instead of real, tangible entities to whom you may take refuge with. Then along the sidelines, the music fades, then your own decrepit self trudges towards dark alleys in search for the unknown or that who has taken your identity in the hope of stealing it away from that it who scourges you. You have suffered for so long; and far back, through elementary then high school then college—everything has been a journey you never wished to take for it is labourious as it is exasperating. Through the waysides, there are pithy little dogs yet formidable enough to pounce on your sanity as you go through each of those alleys in search of yourself, but even as you triumph over each of their threats, there is still that burgeoning burden that escalates in the same way as you try to unravel all those that strangle you. Being you could not be easy for it is as if nothing gets achieved nor celebrated upon. You’re alone, the sun setting on your most august dreams, and the moon waning its most coveted light in the midst of the darkness. Where do you turn to? You have yourself as both friend and foe, and nothing matters anymore at all whether you die or lie in desolation because of a life filled with regrets.

Yes, you have become obsessed with death.

But this, your other self, would like to ask your other faction: do you really want to? And if yes, by what manner?

You have said you have given up long ago. You have had four suicide attempts—overdosing, cutting, drowning. However, what mystery does it suffice Sherlock Holmes to abandon his sole profession over your own ironies of surviving each attempt? You have not gone. You’re still here.


Of course, you cannot proffer an answer, and the only utterance you could make next is, “When might I die another time?” But then again, I would like to ask you: Is it even worth the effort? You, yourself, had admitted that dying prematurely can be that painful, or even more than you would in your appointed time. Why still exert effort? Why can’t you live and let live, and let Fate take its course, crown you with perennial perseverance and fortitude?

Is it because you are selfish?

I know you are not; for you, though suicidal, know at the most that doing the deed eventually does not account for being inherently foolish nor selfish at that. It’s just because you don’t want to live any longer and that someone else who might be born after you die would fill the void instead. What difference would it make when you die? Yes! That is it, the idea that nothing will change even after your demise.

But is that true?

Yea, indeed. You might be ambivalent on the truthfulness of this speech I make towards you for no concrete answer is adequate to create a bridge between the ironies of your life and the will to die.

Please don’t say that I am accusing you. I am that very self, thus why ought I accuse the very being that speaks to you? (Have I no empathy enough that I should pummel you with various imputations of guilt?)

No. All these is because you are lost, and what you need is empathy. Help. Consideration.


Believe me, dear self, you want to be loved. You have hated yourself for so long that is already been a habit to accuse you of supposed wrongdoings that actually do not exist. You are worthwhile. You are lovable. You are unique; and no one compares with you. You ought to know that, despite the persecutions heaped upon your fragility, you still have been brave enough to surpass everything that hinders you. You have had laurels against the backdrop of suffering, and some adulation because of your temerity and fortitude. You are brave. You are RESILIENT. So I trust you that you can still live long, only with some modifications to your life so you could be happier and more content. There’s still hope for you, a lot of it in a box if only to compare it with Pandora’s mishap of setting forth all good qualities into the air. So you could still make it because I trust the way on how, in spite of the tumultuous relationship you have had with Life for the past 34 years of your existence, with mental illness to boot, you have never bowed down totally to menacing threats. You have always managed to lift yourself up in the midst of struggle in order to wade against the waters of trepidation. And with that I applaud you. You are AUDACIOUS.

Just promise me that, in the midst of everything, always remember to THANK YOURSELF and the Giver of yourself—the Almighty—for the gift of you. You are unlike any other, and with such, a means for celebration. You are a gift, dear friend. Cherish yourself. Don’t let your inner demons bring you down but instead face them fiercely. You can do it, my friend. Why? Because you alone have the power to steer the ship, with the Lord as your aid. So, if you are ready to bog down, look up. Try to float and swim.

You will get there.




Choleric-melancholic, blogger, teacher, mental health advocate, book lover.

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