Recently picked by Campus Pride as
one of the Top 10 Leaders in Action (http://www.campuspride.org/5678/2013-voice-action-award-top-10-leaders-in-action/), Mark was inspired to write this open
letter in the hopes that it may help someone else and remind everyone that it
does get better.
Dear Mark,
Our thoughts are powerful—the mind is a
mighty weapon and like any weapon, can be dangerous in the wrong ‘hands’.
You were fourteen (a freshman in high school
when you realized you were not straight) and had just experienced the traumatic
loss of your half brother Kamal who had been murdered in the start of the New
Year.
You were fifteen when you finally decided
you wanted to come out of the “closet” to your mother through a text message.
You were fifteen when the thought of killing
yourself first came to mind.
You wrote a long letter for your family and
friends to read once you were gone. You ran the shower and took a razor from
the medicine cabinet, and made a few phone calls saying “goodbye” to some of your
friends, and cried your eyes out. At the time someone you did not expect to
care, convinced you not to kill yourself.
As I think about our life around that time,
a lot of it is a haze. We were grieving the loss of our brother and of the
person we thought we were. We were grieving the loss of the mother we knew, our
relationship changed drastically once she became sick and we came out as a gay
man. Remember that?
The decision not to go through with the plan
to end your life actually changed my life forever. At that point you had made a
decision that would alter the course of my life moving forward—you had decided
that your life was worth living and you were going to live it fully,
fearlessly, and without restraint. Back then there was no “It Gets Better”
campaign or discussion around bullying the way there is today. Back then you couldn’t go to
Youtube and hear political leaders, celebrities, and others telling you that your
life was worth living—you only had the small little voice inside that whispered
to you, “keep going Mark”.
In the last couple of years, I have followed
through with the decision you made to live life fully, fearlessly, and without
restraint. I have been vocal about my beliefs, with my work as an activist and
student leader, and I have been transparent about going to therapy. I have
shared the best moments of my life, the awards, recognition, and milestones
reached, the happier times.
Well a lot has happened recently and for the
first time I want to talk to you about it. I want to show you that your
decision not to kill yourself gave way to a lot of great things. I am not
fifteen anymore but this past summer, late July-early August, I felt like you
did almost seven years ago, as the
suicidal ideations began to overpower me.
I had forgotten how you felt back then, when
those thoughts kept running across your mind…when you kept thinking this was
your way out. I guess in some ways I took my happiness for granted, I had
forgotten what it was like to feel isolated and alone, what it felt like when I
couldn’t fit in. I know you felt like an outcast a lot of the time growing up,
somehow being disabled and not fitting in had a negative impact on you. But not
in the long haul, you see that impact led me to where I am today, taking my
disability and allowing it to shape my life in a major way.
But I guess behind the Facebook updates,
tweets, and smile was a small piece of you. That fourteen year old who just
wanted to be like everyone else, wanted to be accepted and understood by your
peers, loved, and respected.
I had just turned 21 and almost two months
later had found myself drowning my sorrows in alcohol. An entire bottle of
white wine, nine shots of Bacardi, two shots of vodka, and whatever else I laid
my hands on. I wanted so badly to fit in that I did what I thought I had to do
in order to do so, next thing I knew I was being sent to the hospital. I had blacked
out and vomited all over the place, the cleaning ladies thought I was dead and
the backlash from this experience changed me. I had to see the disappointment
in the eyes of those I cared about the most, I had to lose opportunities like
the resident assistant position, get suspended from one of my jobs, and endure
the challenges that would stem from my summer job.
You are probably wondering what the hell
made me drink that night. Well the truth is that I had been dealing with a lot
and did my best to bottle it all up—I was dealing with family issues, stress of
work, and the loss of people who I never imagined my life without. I was
surrounded by people who clearly didn’t like me very much and wanted so badly
to “fit in” that I lost sight of who I really was.
Since June I still feel like I am recovering
from the incident, that I am still rising out of the debris that surrounded me
after my world began to unravel before my very eyes. It was almost the end of
my summer job and one evening after an altercation with some of my co-workers,
the thoughts came about. Like a movie, my mind kept flashing scenes of how I
could end my life, our life, on rewind.
Do you know what got me through those
ideations and what stopped me from going forward? You did. I remembered how
strong you were not to go through with it, how you were able to press on and
look how well you did. I know that if you could do it, that I could do it too.
I told myself that if my fifteen-year-old self could see the light in the
shadows that I could too.
So I cried and closed my eyes tight and kept
trying to think of a time when I was my happiest. It helped me. I got through
the night unharmed. But much like depression or situation in life, it is a
constant struggle to wake up in the morning and feel happy. No, I am not
ungrateful for my life or the opportunities I have been given and no I am not
unrealistic, I know it is impossible to be happy all the time BUT I had to
struggle to get out of bed in order to work towards that happiness.
Now I wake up and tell myself I am lucky to
be alive and that whatever life throws my way, I am capable of handling it and
that I am not alone, I have you, my survivor. When most people think of
suicide, they think about the way it was done and what led to that moment.
Rarely do people discuss those who are constantly bombarded by the ideations
and the struggle that comes from having to convince oneself that suicide isn’t
the solution.
So I guess I wanted to write this letter to
thank you, thank you for leading by example. For not giving up on us and for
being able to see the future in such a way that you knew it would be worth
sticking around for. Thank you for reminding me that my life is filled with
wonder and that I can’t walk away from it.
I wrote this letter so others may read it
and know that they are not alone in their thoughts and that those thoughts don’t
need to dictate their actions.
There is help out there. There are people
who are willing and ready to help you. There are others who like you feel this
way from time to time, you are not alone. Life does get better, this all gets
better.
Thanks for reminding me of this Mark.
Best wishes,
Your older and more fabulous self!
Places
You Can Go To Get Help for You or a Friend:
Trevor
Project
It
Gets Better Project
National
Suicide Prevention Lifeline
Contact
your school or university’s wellness center for help.
Go
speak to an adult you trust.
You
can also email Mark at markedblogs@gmail.com
if you ever need someone to reach out to.
YOU
ARE NOT ALONE!
