Wife Still in MLC but has now left #7

[tadpole1025]

Hi Matt. I know (and a lot of us do) what you are going through. I can read your thread and feel like I wrote it. I had a lot of the same feelings and even contemplated suicide for a very long time. You WILL get through this. I promise. I wanted to share something that I wrote recently about my XW's MLC and my own experience with depression:

"Before bomb drop, I can say that I never thought of it. Ever. I had a great life: awesome wife and kids, wonderful career, plenty of money, you name it.

When my brother did it at the end of 2008, I began to think about it a lot, but not in the sense that many would probably think. It was more of a curious thing. I wondered what could have possibly been going through his head in the last weeks/days/hours/minutes before he did it. How could he possibly be so low that he figured that ending it was the best way out? I was very angry at him for a long time. I thought it was one of the most selfish acts that a person could commit. I didn't understand why. How could he do that....especially to his three kids and his mom? I just didn't get it. I had a radio buddy at the time that confided in me that he was at a point once when he considered it. He told me to quit trying to figure it out. (Sound familiar?) He said that unless I've ever been to that point, I'd never understand. He said that NOBODY would ever know what it is like to be that low unless they've been there themselves. Over time, I began to slowly let it go.

Then, bomb drop at the end of 2010.

Once XW left, I was a mess. I started to think about my brother again and started thinking about suicide A LOT. I mean....A LOT. I would get up in the morning, pour a rum and Coke, and jump in the shower. I would sit in there in the dark until the water got cold. When I got out, I would sit in my bedroom until I thought the water was hot again and I would repeat the process. I did this 5, 6 even 7 times a day. That is when I would think about it. How? When?

I worked evenings so I would sober up a little bit, go to work and do my show. I tried to sound like the fun, party guy that I was supposed to be, but I knew I wasn't pulling my weight. I was a really big mess and looking back, I'm surprised that I didn't lose my radio job sooner. When I got home around midnight, the drinking and showers would start again until I passed out. When I got up in the morning, I did it all over again. That was my ritual.

When my brother did it, he hung himself in the shower. I decided that if I did it, I was going to do the same. I even knew which belt I was going to tie around the showerhead. It was almost an obsession. I just couldn't imagine my life without XW. Not sure if I ever really mentioned it here, but ending it all consumed me. My mom was scared to death that I would do it. She never really came out and said it, but I could tell. I knew. She MADE me go to her doctor. He wanted to hospitalize me right then and there because my blood pressure was so high, but I refused. He put me on medication....meds for blood pressure and meds for depression. It helped take the edge off.

One day out of the blue I started to remember how my brother's suicide affected his kids. (It really messed the older one up.) Then I remembered how it just about killed my mom. Really. Then I told myself that I didn't want to put my kids through that and I didn't want my mom to have two kids kill themselves. I think a second one would have killed her. Then I started to realize that nobody (not even XW) was worth it. But....

It took a long time...a very long time...probably longer than it should have. It slowly got to where I was taking fewer showers and thinking less about it. Then it eventually got where I began to turn the light on again while showering. (Don't really know why I had to sit in the dark, but it is what I did.) It didn't happen overnight and there were times even probably as recent as a year ago that I still thought about it from time to time. The difference was that the desire or "passion" to do it slowly faded. It was a long road though. And now, I think I do "understand" how a person can be that low. Even now, I still have some bad days and some really bad days and sometimes I am still really, really sad when I think about losing my furbabies, but I survive the day and hope for a better tomorrow. There are still times when I am sad that I wonder if the sadness will ever really go away for good. I still sometimes feel like there is an elephant sitting on my chest. This time of year is the worst, but.....I'm still here. Am I out of the woods? No, but I can see the meadow through the trees."

You'll make it Matt. You WILL make it.

Tad