real life

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*Trigger warning: This post may raise issues for readers who have experience with depression or suicide.

“Sometimes life gives us hard times.”

By ANONYMOUS

Sometimes life gives us hard times. A car accident, the loss of a parent, the loss of a job, the wrong tile for the new house, a lost document we forgot to save after hours of work, a child with a reaction to nuts, no child at all, a relationship ending, no money to pay that bill.

Then for some of us life gives us an overflow of pain. As though God himself is perched on a ladder peering over the body, a large endless jug of pain in hand, pouring it in through the top of the skull. The pain does not subside, it does not ease but invades every crevice, every vein, every nook and cranny. The pain keeps coming, flowing in without any release valve to help it escape.

This pain comes in different forms; for me it has been childhood sexual abuse, watching parents separate regularly and then reconcile and then separate over and over again throughout my formative years with no explanation or understanding just fear, having a relationship crumble when 4mths into my pregnancy of our second child, losing that second baby to SIDS when she was eight months old.

But even with that, God decides that she is not done, that there is more capacity for pain so she fills it by letting in a grand love, having him bring me comfort and joy and laughter and then by having him be in love with another woman, having him hit me when I confront him about her.

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And now he is gone, God has me ring and text him like an obsessive bunny boiling ex-girlfriend, just so I can hear him say over and over again “you need to move on, I have moved on”. The dagger, the dagger in the gut that I keep begging him to come at me with as if to say ‘I am not hurt enough, hurt me more – I deserve it.’

I read endless self-help and prayer books, I meditate seeking for something beyond myself to bring me out of this, nothing is enough.

I watch documentaries exploring the human spirit and hear a woman ask her guests “what would you tell your 14yr old self” and I answer “kill yourself now before life kills you.”

My nearly five year old skips in and offers me his favourite blanket to give me comfort. I feel guilt, what have I done, what am I doing, I am an unforgivable parent. Where is the room for his pain when mine fills every available space.

With those final drenchings of pain from that never ending jug pouring into me, with the dark sticky tar overflowing to encase my entire raw, sore body. I lay, my whole body trembling as if I lay naked on ice and pray to this God, I beg “When I wake up let me be dead… When I wake up let me be dead… when I wake up let me be dead.”

If you need help, please call Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636.

Editor’s Note: We run ‘group therapy’ posts regularly on Mamamia, where we share the concerns or problems of a reader with you and ask those who can, to share their advice. We have, of course, assisted this reader with the contact details of organisations who can give her the help she needs.

However we are also asking you to leave your messages of hope, support and best wishes for Anonymous. She will be reading and we’d like her to know that she is not alone. Thank you, in advance, for your help.