Beginning note: as the title suggests, I talk about suicide in this. If suicide or methods of suicide or self-harm causes anxiety or flashbacks or anything else of that nature, turn back now.
To the best friend who attempted to end her life:
I love you.
We don't talk anymore. I don't think we could try again even if we wanted, and that's okay. Clearly, our friendship wasn't helping you through your struggle, and it certainly wasn't helping me. I hope you're happier now, and I hope you've learned how to love and help yourself in the way I obviously couldn't. I knew you for so long, you were more like a sister to me than either of my sisters. We met in 6th grade.
Remember how?
I made a racist joke about how you were Asian and could help me with my math.
That sparked one of the friendships that got me through the roughest parts of my life. You were one of my rocks, one of the few things that kept me from going off the deep end, and it kills me to know that I wasn't enough to help. I could never convince you that you weren't seriously hurt in that wreck in high school because you were important. I could never convince you that your life had more meaning in it than you thought.
I could never convince you that your "Suicide Anniversary" should really be called "The Day Death Said You're Too Important" when you "celebrated" the anniversary of surviving your first suicide attempt.
Remember how you used to hate your hair being touched?
You hated when I would mess with your dyed hair and give you pats. Your hair was gorgeous and soft, and I was a little brat that enjoyed annoying people.
By the end of high school, you would lay in people's laps and want your head to be pet. You loved physical contact and constantly craved it.
When you were in your coma, our best friend gave your hand three squeezes. Because she loves you. Because we love you. Because that was the only way she could say it, and it was through your favorite form of affection, and you were put in a coma so you wouldn't choke on your own puke if you threw up again.
Remember how you said you hated the smell of the sun?
We would always tease you about that, but I could sometimes smell what you meant. It was sweat and nature and something that really only could be described as "sun" because it was only there when the sun was out.
You would refuse to go outside because you hated the smell of it, even though you knew you had extremely low levels of the happiness vitamin. You needed that sun, but you wouldn't do it.
I wonder if you've gotten over that and have figured out how soothing a simple walk outside can be.
Remember how you used to used bands to stop your self-harm?
We never really talked about your scars and whether you regretted them, but I hope that even if you do, you've come to terms with how permanent they are. We never really talked about why you had those bands, either, but I'm assuming it's because you wanted to cope with the need to cut.
At least, I'm pretty sure that's what the therapist's intention was. All of this happened during one of the times where we lost contact.
You never stuck with it for long. Those old wounds would open back up, and there would be new marks to join the ranks.
Remember how you said you don't know why you took all those pills?
You said you don't know what you were thinking or how you felt, but I don't know if that's true. I want to believe it, but maybe you just didn't want to tell us because, as you said months later, our opinions didn't matter to you.
"It's my life," you would say, "so why shouldn't I get to end it?"
I got to a point while trying to help you that I was thinking why should I bother?
Clearly you didn't care about how it would affect the people closest to you. Clearly nothing I said mattered. Clearly you wanted to die.
But then thoughts would hit: you crying on the floor, you begging for sleep, you comatose in a hospital bed. I would think about what it would have been like if those pills killed you like they should have, if we had found you dead on your bedroom floor instead of crying.
This is the point where I would have to stop because it hurt too much. How am I supposed to imagine the funeral of one of my best friends? Would it be an open casket, for us to see you as if it was just another sleepover and you were sleeping in, as always? Would it be a closed casket, so we couldn't see how young our lost friend is? Would you be cremated?
I never wanted to think about it.
I still don't.
This struggle with depression is yours, but I wanted to help you through it.
All you ever did was shut me down, shut me out, and when our friend - the one that squeezed your hand to show you love, the one that seemed so strong solely because of shock - finally called out your toxic coping mechanisms, sides were taken.
I sided with her; another friend sided with you.
We tried to reason with you, convince you that our mental health is just as important, that your coping mechanisms of talking about how much you wanted to die wasn't good for us, but we got painted as the bad guys.
So we ended it.
No more conversations.
No more checking in on you.
As much as I love and miss you, it was a relief.
I had felt like you attempting suicide was my fault. Like I had failed you as a friend. Like I couldn't do anything right. It spun me into my own spiral of depression, where I was thinking the same things as you: it's my life; I deem it doesn't matter, so why shouldn't I end it?
I never seriously contemplated it, though. I recognized I had more to do. I knew there was an end to the darkness somewhere.
I hope you've realized that, too.