Delusions & Suicide in Book Two: The Fifteenth Year of the Third Millennium of the Common Era

I had a good weekend with my friend… I’ll write an entry about that (with pictures) soon. But… it was a 9 hour round trip drive with far too much time to think. This was writing itself in my head as I drove. Some of it (or all of it) may be re-hashing and repeating things I’ve said here before. Or it may not. Some of it may be upsetting or disturbing. As always… don’t rush to judgement… if you have questions, concerns, or anything… ask me questions before just assuming.

I was born over a month early, very premature and a bit underdeveloped. My mother was able to go home long before I was. But… I was kept alive and (obviously) lived. And almost every year since then (until High School)… every year there was a new moment of “I can’t believe I survived that” or “Thank God there is no permanent damage.” Seriously… being alive, not having a learning disability, and going through puberty....all things that were not guaranteed for me. So, even if I didn’t come from a church-going family… I still believe strongly that I would have developed a deep faith of some kind. I’m not suggesting I would still definitely identify as Christian; but I would certainly have had a deep faith that something greater than us existed and had some kind of plan, grace, or whatever you wish to name it.

As I “matured” (using the term loosely) I grew a strong sense… a need, really… to help people. I became the guy you went to if you were having problems. Unfortunately, not just “my mom doesn’t get me” problems, either. A number of people would come to me and ask if they looked “lucid enough” for class or if they should skip. I had (if you wish to call them this) friends who were 14 year old alcoholics (new cocktail in the water bottle for every class), potheads (are my eyes dilated? became a common question), and worse. I accepted it as my duty, my responsibility, and my privilege to do what I could for them. Not to encourage or enable their activities but to let them know I was a “safe” person that cared and wanted to see them get clean so they could finish High School.

During one particularly bad bout of all of this… one individual 15 years old who only put the bottle down long enough to toke… I started dating T2. She was a half-japanese firm-breasted genius with talent. She was in all of the advanced classes; always had the Viola solos in orchestra; and seriously attractive… but much more interested in developing her mind.

Of course, T2 being my girlfriend… she started seeing all of the people I was trying to help. Particularly the 15 year old I had previously mentioned.... lets call her Jane. Unbeknownst to me… T2 started hanging out with Jane. A lot. Including, but not limited to, fake IDs to go to bars. When T2 went to Mexico that spring break… and reappeared at school looking considerably more Girls Gone Wild and became considerably less interested in developing her mind.... we broke up.

Despite what many of my colleagues and family believe… the break up didn’t bother me. The change did. I felt deeply personally responsible. It was the first time in my life that I genuinely believed a person was worse off for having known me. And the idea that my existence in someone’s life was ultimately a bad thing… made me suicidal. I started thinking about all of the people I wanted to help… and how none of them were any healthier or any closer to graduating. I started thinking about how I felt such a strong need to do good and be helpful. I started realizing that it may be likely that a number of people may be or may become worse off for having known me.

So one night while my parents were away (my brother was already in the Navy by this point)… I decided that the best thing I could do for the world was to remove myself from it. If I was going to do more harm than good; the only good I could ever do was to do nothing else. I prepared a box with a bottle of Aspirin and razors; placed it in a place I could get to should I survive my original option, and climbed to the highest point of the roof.

On that roof, I experienced the most tumultuous spiritual event of my life. The focus wasn’t even on suicide, it was on purpose and cruelty. I had unshakable faith. I believed thoroughly in the existence of Good and Evil… and I was pissed that it seemed no matter how hard I tried.... that I was simply an instrument for evil to get to other people. I repeatedly demanded answers. Why had my life been saved SO many times… why had all the medical mysteries suddenly resolved… if there was no greater good that my life could bring? I spent three hours on that roof arguing with God. And it constantly came around to that question. Because… I wanted an answer! Before I died… I wanted to know why God would intervene in my life so many times only to have all of my efforts at goodness ruin people. I genuinely don’t know why I didn’t go ahead with it… but after those three hours a calm that can only be explained as God’s intervention came over me. This is why I thoroughly believe that it was a God thing… because I was enraged at the “I have a plan, it will reveal itself in time” bullshit. Furious. Because I didn’t want to do evil. I tried my absolute hardest to bring good to the world and it wasn’t working. But despite all of that… I ended that night with a sense of calm and a renewed faith that God would not have intervened so often were there not some good… some… bigger plan that I was a part of.
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I thought a lot about that story on my drive this weekend. Because… for 30 years, I had an unflappable faith that… even if I was pissed off at God, I believed God was still there. But this past year.... I’m not as unwavering as I once was. While it is true that I’m not out there being a deviously delightful devil exuding evil everywhere.... so to is it true that I’m not out there making the world a better place. And the world is becoming a much much worse place all the time. And… I try to get a job protecting victims of crime: nothing. I try to get a job securing financial protection for children: nothing. I try to get a job protecting the rights of the disabled: nothing. I try to get a job in taxes, wills, trusts, estates.... nothing, nothing, NOTHING! And I realize… I would rather be an agent of evil than be absolutely nothing.

I’m not genuinely suicidal right now. If this lasts a few more months, I can promise you that I will be… but I’m not right now. I’m just… experiencing a deep crisis of faith.