Coming From Brey

Yesterday I was on the phone with my sister and she was telling me about her ex boyfriend. They have been on and off for awhile, and I guess he went from texting her being nice to threatening to kill himself. As I was on the phone just listening to her, all of a sudden it brought back all of these memories. Something that I didn’t remember for years until yesterday, was that my sister was suicidal when I was younger.  Growing up I was really into sports and a complete tomboy, I hated makeup and girlie things. My sister was either out with her older friends or in her room (that she had painted completely black) either reading or drawing. The one thing we had in common was that we both did everything we could to avoid having to be home. I remember always being at odds with her because she never wanted to hangout with me, and she was always really sad and lethargic. At that time I didn’t know what ‘depression’ was, and I thought she was just being lazy and feeling sorry for herself. I remember countless times her telling me and our family that she wanted to kill herself, she didn’t want to live anymore. And then she would disappear. Runaway. One time my Mom came home and told me she had gone for a drive looking for her (this is after she had been missing for probably weeks), and she said she saw her downtown just sitting next to the side of a building, but she wouldn’t get in the car with her. I would go to school so many days not knowing if I was going to come home and the cops were going to say my sister was found dead or not. I became so hurt and numb to it, I told her she should just do it because I was sick of everyday not knowing if my sister was going to be alive or dead. How horrible and insensitive is that of me? Thinking back, that memory just puts a sick feeling inside of me. Growing up I looked at her as being selfish for always telling me she wanted to die, without thinking about how that would affect her little sister, and more importantly our little brother. Even writing this pains me for the simple fact that I didn’t remember any of this until my phone call with her yesterday.

I know what it feels like to have someone that you love tell you that if you leave them, they will kill themselves. I know what it is like to get a text message saying that my ex boyfriend had just died, (my first love), after he had been trying to get back with me and I had told him no. Death is such a scary, real thing to me. Seeing someone you love in a casket that hasn’t even made it to their 21st birthday is no joke. Hearing that someone my sister loves is threatening to end his life, makes me want to do everything in my power to help, but you learn as you grow up that you can’t help people that don’t want to help themselves. If you really love someone, you don’t put the weight of your life in their hands.

I take everything in life as a valuable lesson. So many people preach that you should treat others the way they treat you, but I don’t believe in that at all. I always want to be nice to people, because you never know what they are going through behind closed doors. You never know if just being kind, or holding the door open for someone could make their day. It’s easy to judge people by the way they look, the pictures they post, the way they dress. As depressing as this post may seem, I wanted to write about it because the most valuable lessons I’ve learned have come from situations that at one time were painful. Your character gets built through the storms you make it through. Some people let the negative things they’ve been through define them, and use it as an excuse to treat others poorly. Regardless of what I’ve encountered in my life, I know that it made me the strong person I am today. I know that the things that I’ve gone through have served their purpose because they’re a reminder of where I’ve come from, and why I am the person I am today.

“Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind, always.”