praythestars
Member
- Jan 11, 2026
- 20
It's super weird. It's just like...each and every day something happens and it's just like "oh."
I feel like I'm vaguely open to living the way most non suicidal people are vaguely open to dying, if that makes sense. I don't seek out reasons to live, but I might very occasionally think to myself for just a second "well I guess at least I get to see what happens on (show)" or something.
Having been depressed and not truly suicidal in the past it feels like the other side of the coin from "well I guess if I died I wouldn't have to deal with (thing)."
But for some reason it feels very different when your default is death instead of life. It's much harder to overcome the default of death. Being vaguely interested in seeing how a show resolves, or a current event, or reading a book that seems interesting is just not enough to surmount the desire to cease existing.
I guess because when your default is life it's easier to actually connect with the world around you, maybe your emotions are more whole or... I'm not sure.
People discuss depression as a weight, they talk about the heaviness, but for me I wonder if it's not actually lighter. Depression feels like floating away to me, more than being weighed down. It's like I'm moving further and farther away from all things that might keep other people weighed to existence.
Maybe I'm just more used to depression than I am to hope, historically, so it feels less intense than a desire to live ever did for me.
When I had a few good years, when I believed my life would at least be something akin to what vague dream I might of once had, I was plagued by anxiety. Anxiety so bad I couldn't even enjoy the best my life had ever offered. Anxiety so bad I became convinced I was constantly dying, and if I managed to concede I wasn't, then what was to stop the chance that I might die in the next hour? Or the next day? Or that the person I love wouldn't? People die all the time, right?
I slept in hospital parking lots, toted around a blood pressure cuff, oximeter, had panic attacks that caused my hand to turn into a claw due to reality alkalosis. And if I didn't die outright? Well what if I did something to ruin my life? What if I messed up, or for some reason some vague crime I had done years ago finally caught up? Had I done something really bad and just forgotten? What if someone murdered me randomly? Who knows. Logically I knew I hadn't committed some crime in my sleep or even in my past, but it didn't matter. Suddenly I felt like I had a reason to live and it was terrifying.
But now each day, like I said, something happens that just makes it painfully obvious that my existence has no true value other than a few people's fear of how they might react to me not existing. I destroyed my life in small ways each day I lived it. It didn't take some paranoid fantasy of a crime I might have committed and forgotten that I invented in my head to do so. The destruction was already happening, and had been, the entire time.
My spouse thinks he's failed me because money is tight, because things didn't go the way we were told they would if he got a PhD. Today we discovered we'd have a much smaller tax return than we thought. That's not his fault, but he feels like everything is. He feels like he's completely failed me despite us having food and shelter. I need a root canal, that's it, and we can't afford it even with insurance.
It's my fault. He hasn't failed at all. I've failed me. I've failed me my entire life. My life was never easy, but I made wrong choice after wrong choice which has led me to having no career or even shitty job at this point. I chose to be with partners that were abusive, prior to him, that didn't let me. I chose to put my life on hold to take care of my dying mother. I chose to turn to drugs as a teen instead of telling someone my older brother was abusing me for years. I chose to not put effort into school, leaving me with a tenth grade education on paper.
I chose to put all my faith into thinking what the school told us would happen, would happen, and that right about now I'd be raising a child, money would be fine, that I'd somehow have managed a full life despite my fuck ups, happy happy happy.
I was told my entire life to take it one day at a time, to hope for the best, that it'd be okay, that I'd have my chance at a full life if I just supported those around me and did my best with what I could do. So I cleaned houses when I could, budgeted, babysat, kept my apartment spotless. Cooked healthy meals, packed lunches for my partner, edited papers. Did the grocery shopping, was the human calendar, pep squad, navigated the social aspects he struggled with. Encouraged hobbies, kept up the sex life, made sure it didn't get boring, volunteered, double checked grading got done on time, reminded him of meetings, calls, whatever.
I worked hard at my own mental health, overcame my ED, cardiophobia, CSA trauma, partner abuse trauma, joined groups, helped people in my spare time, volunteered for 7cups, NAMI, all that shit. Went from being too terrified to walk down the street because it raised my heart rate to walking five miles a day. Whatever. The whole self care thing, the whole run of things expected of you, to make you have some value, when you don't work.
Doesn't matter. It's obvious now. Without me in the picture my husband's life will be easier eventually. He's been a mess for two years now. I can't keep up with his unraveling. I can't breathe. I can't exist. Nothing helps him, and it's all just money. It isn't some existential thing, just simply deep regret and feeling like a failure because he thinks he needs to provide better. To him, that means money. Without me, his income basically doubles. I might have dyscalculia but even I can see that.
Even if I got my feet fixed so I could work a cashier job, then all the other plates I have spinning are going to have to fall. He'll have to cook and clean, because even cashier work is more physically draining than his current job. Not even being snide here, he hates his job because he just sues there all day. He gets maybe two IT tickets a night, so he just spirals about regretting grad school. He'll have to self regulate...or crash and burn on his own. There's no way I'll have the emotional energy left to waste on yet another five hour pep talk that never is enough to satisfy, quell, or change anything.
So each day it becomes clearer to me. There's just no point, and it's a much lighter feeling than the heaviness of hope and peace ever was, to me at least. If something goes wrong and destroys your life, and your life was good, you lose everything. If you've already made death your default and life goes wrong, it just takes away the weight of another reason to stay. A weight is lifted.
Maybe I'm the weird one for feeling this way. Probably am.
I feel like I'm vaguely open to living the way most non suicidal people are vaguely open to dying, if that makes sense. I don't seek out reasons to live, but I might very occasionally think to myself for just a second "well I guess at least I get to see what happens on (show)" or something.
Having been depressed and not truly suicidal in the past it feels like the other side of the coin from "well I guess if I died I wouldn't have to deal with (thing)."
But for some reason it feels very different when your default is death instead of life. It's much harder to overcome the default of death. Being vaguely interested in seeing how a show resolves, or a current event, or reading a book that seems interesting is just not enough to surmount the desire to cease existing.
I guess because when your default is life it's easier to actually connect with the world around you, maybe your emotions are more whole or... I'm not sure.
People discuss depression as a weight, they talk about the heaviness, but for me I wonder if it's not actually lighter. Depression feels like floating away to me, more than being weighed down. It's like I'm moving further and farther away from all things that might keep other people weighed to existence.
Maybe I'm just more used to depression than I am to hope, historically, so it feels less intense than a desire to live ever did for me.
When I had a few good years, when I believed my life would at least be something akin to what vague dream I might of once had, I was plagued by anxiety. Anxiety so bad I couldn't even enjoy the best my life had ever offered. Anxiety so bad I became convinced I was constantly dying, and if I managed to concede I wasn't, then what was to stop the chance that I might die in the next hour? Or the next day? Or that the person I love wouldn't? People die all the time, right?
I slept in hospital parking lots, toted around a blood pressure cuff, oximeter, had panic attacks that caused my hand to turn into a claw due to reality alkalosis. And if I didn't die outright? Well what if I did something to ruin my life? What if I messed up, or for some reason some vague crime I had done years ago finally caught up? Had I done something really bad and just forgotten? What if someone murdered me randomly? Who knows. Logically I knew I hadn't committed some crime in my sleep or even in my past, but it didn't matter. Suddenly I felt like I had a reason to live and it was terrifying.
But now each day, like I said, something happens that just makes it painfully obvious that my existence has no true value other than a few people's fear of how they might react to me not existing. I destroyed my life in small ways each day I lived it. It didn't take some paranoid fantasy of a crime I might have committed and forgotten that I invented in my head to do so. The destruction was already happening, and had been, the entire time.
My spouse thinks he's failed me because money is tight, because things didn't go the way we were told they would if he got a PhD. Today we discovered we'd have a much smaller tax return than we thought. That's not his fault, but he feels like everything is. He feels like he's completely failed me despite us having food and shelter. I need a root canal, that's it, and we can't afford it even with insurance.
It's my fault. He hasn't failed at all. I've failed me. I've failed me my entire life. My life was never easy, but I made wrong choice after wrong choice which has led me to having no career or even shitty job at this point. I chose to be with partners that were abusive, prior to him, that didn't let me. I chose to put my life on hold to take care of my dying mother. I chose to turn to drugs as a teen instead of telling someone my older brother was abusing me for years. I chose to not put effort into school, leaving me with a tenth grade education on paper.
I chose to put all my faith into thinking what the school told us would happen, would happen, and that right about now I'd be raising a child, money would be fine, that I'd somehow have managed a full life despite my fuck ups, happy happy happy.
I was told my entire life to take it one day at a time, to hope for the best, that it'd be okay, that I'd have my chance at a full life if I just supported those around me and did my best with what I could do. So I cleaned houses when I could, budgeted, babysat, kept my apartment spotless. Cooked healthy meals, packed lunches for my partner, edited papers. Did the grocery shopping, was the human calendar, pep squad, navigated the social aspects he struggled with. Encouraged hobbies, kept up the sex life, made sure it didn't get boring, volunteered, double checked grading got done on time, reminded him of meetings, calls, whatever.
I worked hard at my own mental health, overcame my ED, cardiophobia, CSA trauma, partner abuse trauma, joined groups, helped people in my spare time, volunteered for 7cups, NAMI, all that shit. Went from being too terrified to walk down the street because it raised my heart rate to walking five miles a day. Whatever. The whole self care thing, the whole run of things expected of you, to make you have some value, when you don't work.
Doesn't matter. It's obvious now. Without me in the picture my husband's life will be easier eventually. He's been a mess for two years now. I can't keep up with his unraveling. I can't breathe. I can't exist. Nothing helps him, and it's all just money. It isn't some existential thing, just simply deep regret and feeling like a failure because he thinks he needs to provide better. To him, that means money. Without me, his income basically doubles. I might have dyscalculia but even I can see that.
Even if I got my feet fixed so I could work a cashier job, then all the other plates I have spinning are going to have to fall. He'll have to cook and clean, because even cashier work is more physically draining than his current job. Not even being snide here, he hates his job because he just sues there all day. He gets maybe two IT tickets a night, so he just spirals about regretting grad school. He'll have to self regulate...or crash and burn on his own. There's no way I'll have the emotional energy left to waste on yet another five hour pep talk that never is enough to satisfy, quell, or change anything.
So each day it becomes clearer to me. There's just no point, and it's a much lighter feeling than the heaviness of hope and peace ever was, to me at least. If something goes wrong and destroys your life, and your life was good, you lose everything. If you've already made death your default and life goes wrong, it just takes away the weight of another reason to stay. A weight is lifted.
Maybe I'm the weird one for feeling this way. Probably am.
