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Tell me of the ones you've lost and how they died.
My Dad died when I was 11. My grandmother was ill and either had a recent surgery, or was going to have one I can't remember. My Dad locked himself in the bathroom and overdosed on heroin. I remember knocking on the door and getting no response, then returning to my room. It's a long time ago but I remember being out in the backyard some time later and then following the grownups to the bathroom. There was no response, eventually one of them kicked the door open, and we found him. An ambulance arrived later and he was taken to the hospital but he never displayed any brain function and was taken off life support. I was already a lonely self centered kid with no friends for most of my life at that point. Before my parents got divorced, which happened when I was around 9 or 10 I think, I was already having suicidal thoughts. https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-37.7917068,144.9699272,3a,75y,304.75h,96.36t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s04YBDol0Dbd8I07TtfDr1w!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 "Tara house" is the one I used to live in. I would climb over the railing when nobody was home and think about trying to jump to the concrete to stop the pain. At the time there were 2 tree's there, so I'd have to make it all the way to the concrete. Looking at it now, it's not that far, but at the time I was about the same height as the railing. It wasn't very logical, I mean looking at it now I don't think that jump would have been enough to kill me, but at the time there were only two thoughts. How much I wanted to end the pain I was feeling, the pain of not being able to connect with people, of always screwing every social connection up, the pain of being alone and knowing that I was the reason I was alone but not knowing the solution. And how much it would hurt if I didn't make the jump and landed on the spiked railing or in one of the trees. That was the mental state I was in and hiding from my family. I was taken to see doctors and psychiatrists, but it was about my behavioral problems at school, and they never seemed to be probing me about depression or sadness, so I think I managed to hide it pretty well. I started to retreat into computers and computer and video games, they a crutch that got me through a pretty sad life. My mum was always very distrustful of gaming, but my dad was more ok with it. Then my dad od'd. I don't remember much of the interim between the night he od'd and when we found out later he was not showing any signs of life (brain waves) before we took him off life support. I remember something weird happening when I was crawled up in a ball sitting on my bedroom floor crying... I stopped crying. I couldn't feel that unique kind of pain. I felt like it was still there, and I knew that it still hurt, but I couldn't feel it, and I couldn't cry anymore that night. I don't know if I wanted to cry more and couldn't, or if I just felt like something was really wrong with me not crying.
I cried at parts of the funeral, but I was just feeling numb for a lot of it. From that point on I've had very sporadic and far spaced (months between) single crying episodes. The feeling comes up regardless of where I am but I've gotten good at hiding it until I can get alone.
I never discussed how I was feeling with people. I'd often get into arguments/fights about random shit. On very rare occasions when I was feeling a certain way towards someone I was in an argument with I would start to feel my own pain again and I would just kind of let my mask drop and look towards that person a certain way and we'd stop arguing. I don't know if I wanted them to hug me or just leave me or what but I generally ended up not talking to that person again.
Over the next few years all of my grandparents died. I remember my grandmother wanting me to write her another letter but I was too dumb and self centered to do it. Close family kept telling me to do it but I never did, and then she died. I felt guilty about that.
A couple of years later and I was saving up my lunch money to go to the internet cafe. I was still really dumb socially but I was gradually making friends there, and I learnt to get along with people playing cs:s. I used to type and joke and originally nobody liked me but I got better at it and kept joining different servers with different people learning what was banter and what was just being an asshole.
I was doing shit at school, and was still pretty bad socially, but I felt like I was finally getting it. Then when I was 16 my half brother died in a car crash halfway round the world. My full brother was the driver. We found out on the phone. My stepdad left my room to go console my mum, and I sat down and pulled my knee's up, and tried to cry, but I couldn't do it. I felt guilty about that but it wasn't working so I went and comforted my Mum.
I'm 26 now. I'm addicted to video games. I live in an apartment that varies between almost clean and filthy. I've attempted to study various things many times, and I'm going to keep attempting. At some point I've managed to lose that emotional block. If I'm alone I cry freely when I feel like I need to. If I'm in public I have to actually focus to not let it show. When I cry I feel better. I'm a sucker for movies about loss, I have anxieties, especially related to picking up my phone, my sleep is pretty bad. I'm happy sometimes, and I'm sad sometimes. I've considered trying to experiment with medications to manage my emotional state but I'd rather be struggling to make progress in a life with ups and downs, than to find myself in a situation where life is progressing but I'm taking medications to numb myself, knowing that if I stop taking them I'd likely lose control of my life again.
I am in control of my life. Sometimes I let go of the wheel, but I'm getting better at holding strong.