Radical Change
Death is maybe the most radical change that can happen to a person. I’m someone who has depression and goes through bouts of suicidal, it’s something a lot of other people do not understand. My life is pretty good. Pretty easy on paper. My material conditions mean I do not want for any of my needs. Yet, my brain, my nervous system, goes into extreme flight or fight mode at slight triggers.
It’s trauma I’m dealing with. It’s the way my brain has been wired and rewired by the coarse weathering of life. When the fog clears and I am left in a state of clarity, and I no longer want to end my own life, I am left instead with the feeling that I need a great change. I think perhaps this is what suicidal ideation is to begin with. A brain reacting drastically to an environment, mind state, circumstance, that is no longer sustainable.
It is hard sometimes to recognize you have agency over your own life, that things have to change sometimes. Suicide is either the last source of agency of the most oppressed, or a desperate attempt for change by someone who could not see they had other choices.
Radically changing your life does not come easy. It is frightening, it means you have to think about where you want to be. It means you have to change your mind. It means you have to be uncomfortable so you can build your own safety. But it is either one radical change or another. A choice between life and death. And for me at least it often feels harder, and more deliberate, to continue choosing life.