I, like millions of other teenagers, had a high school sweetheart. We met at a soccer tournament when I was a freshman and he was a junior. I have no idea why he was attracted to me due to my awkward side ponytail and my prepubescent face, but hey, somehow it caught his attention (or it may have been the fact that I was the only girl playing in an all boys tournament). Either way, he went out of his way to talk to me after our game and the rest is history.

We hit it off right away. I was immediately interested in him due to the fact that he was older, attractive and he played soccer. I mean honestly what more does a girl need? The only problem was that he lived 45 minutes away from me and I didn't have a drivers license. Luckily though, I would play my soccer games at a facility that was literally five minutes away from his house. Our relationship started out with him coming to all my games. Weird, I know, but hey, I was young and enthralled at the thought of an older boy liking me. Eventually, after a couple games, my dad started to catch on which led to me telling him everything. He surprisingly took it well and even offered to drive me out to his house. Our relationship took off after that.

We started officially dating a couple months after we figured out how to hang out with each other. We would talk to each other every day, and I would get to see him just about every other weekend. I was extremely happy with him and after just a few short months of dating, we were throwing the L-word around. Our relationship was solid all throughout his final two years in high school. I was afraid that it would fall apart when he went to college but it somehow actually made us stronger. We were both completely head over heels for each other. We constantly talked about our future together; he was going to propose to me during my junior year in college, and we were going to have kids and I was going to be a stay-at-home mom. I couldn't believe I already had my whole life figured out but it just all felt so right. That is, until I reached my senior year of high school.

The semester before going to college, my feelings for him drastically began to fade. I really can't explain how or why but all I knew was that I did not feel the same way that I did in the beginning. This led me to try to break it off multiple times. However, each and every time I would tell him that I was done, he would somehow make me change my mind and stay with him.

He would make me feel guilty by saying that I lied when I told him I wanted to marry him.
He would tell me that he searched different ways to commit suicide because he was so depressed at the thought of losing me.
He would do whatever he could to get me to stay with him.

It turned into a viscous cycle of me telling him to back off and then me telling him I don't want to be with anyone else. I had no idea how to escape the cycle. I got to the point where I would try to convince myself that I didn't actually have to be happy, that I owed it to him to stay with him even though I was unhappy. How horrible is that? I let someone guilt me into staying with them at the expense of my happiness.

This went on for months and months until I got to college. After my first true weekend out at college, I decided I had to end things with him for good. However, as I mentioned before, the last time I tried to break things off with him he had threatened suicide. I was terrified that he would actually kill himself if I broke up with him for good. So, instead of breaking up with him all at once, I just told him that I needed a break and shortly after that I cut off all communication with him.

Trust me, I know I'm a horrible person but I urge you to put yourself in my shoes. I was extremely unhappy and I was only in the relationship to keep him happy. It was extremely unfair and as a college freshman, I had no clue how to handle the situation. I did what I thought was best for both of us.

A couple months went by with no communication. He had reached out to me a couple times but each time his efforts went unanswered. At this point, I was in a new relationship with a guy that I had met in college. I was finally happy and for once I felt like things were going my way. Then, one night out of the blue, I got a text from my ex. Against my better judgement, I responded to it.

The conversation started off normal and we just spent some time catching up. Then sh*t got real and he began to open up to me. He explained in detail to me exactly what happened after I broke up with him. He became extremely depressed, thought about committing suicide, sought help and got admitted to a mental hospital and then dropped out of school and moved back home. I couldn't believe it. I immediately started to bawl my eyes out because I blamed myself for everything that had happened to him. A million things rushed through my mind:

"You are such a selfish bitch. You couldn't have just stayed in the relationship?"
"Was your happiness more important than his life?"
"What if he would have killed himself? How bad would you have felt?"

I blamed myself for everything that happened to him. I blamed myself for not staying in the relationship. I blamed myself for not fighting harder for him. I can not even begin to explain how horrible all of this felt.

I tried to explain to him the remorse I felt, but that wasn't what he was looking for. To this day, I am not exactly sure what he had hoped to get out of telling me all of that. Nonetheless, a couple days after he opened up to me, he texted me again and told me that it would be best if we just pretended that we never met. That was the last time we talked.

I took this all extremely hard and I suffered in silence. I didn't want to tell my friends or family about what had happened because I was afraid that they would judge me and label me as a horrible person. I eventually learned how to cope with it, and I did my best to just forget about it all. My ex, however, was unable to do that.

We just recently started talking again. In recent months, he explained to me how he sees a therapist regularly and how he was prescribed medication for his depression. His therapist helped him learn that he has been struggling with depression since a very young age. I was just the trigger that sent him over the edge. Had he gotten help before it got to that point, all of this could have been avoided.

Thankfully though, my ex sought help before it was too late. However, this is not always the case. Many people who are struggling with depression do not speak up or seek help and end up committing suicide. It is estimated that one million people commit suicide each year. Of these one million, it is estimated that nearly 90 percent of them have a diagnosable and treatable psychiatric disorder at the time of their death. Therefore, if you are struggling or thinking about hurting yourself, I urge you to speak up. Tell someone, anyone, and seek the help that you need.

The National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. There are trained counselors working 24/7 to help you through anything you are dealing with.