Damn, where to start? There's nothing special about my story, just another flavor of the same thing I imagine. I'm 46 and I'm tired. My son committed suicide in May. He was 18. I have an incurable condition called hidradenitis suppurativa, which is painful, and as its stage three its also fairly unrelenting, so I am always having to work and life through pain, which is getting harder to keep doing. I have always been very independent and self-sufficient. I have always worked hard my entire life, whether its been two jobs, three jobs, jobs with full-time school, while also raising 4 kids. I've always been the strong one, the one that everybody has always said how do you keep going? How have you gone through everything you've gone through without breaking? I'm great at self regulation. I process through trauma cleanly. My metacognition is on point. I relate well with others. I have high emotional intelligence and I survive pretty much everything that gets tossed at me and I just keep going, and in fact I keep going while retaining my softness, my empathy, my ability to see with clarity and digest reality without distortion and the usual self protective maladaptions that help people to get through this messed up life more or less intact. However, just because I haven't gained any maladaptive coping mechanisms doesn't mean that I am doing well. If anything that's a downside. I see everything and process everything raw and undiluted. I can hold the pain and wonder of all of it and stay centered. I grew the capacity to hold it well. However I think seeing too clearly is also a problem. I think there's two different kinds of breaking. I think people break when the capacity is exceeded which is literally not by choice but by wiring, and I also think there is another kind of breaking where the capacity is seemingly endless again just via whatever wiring our skin suit ended up with, but the will breaks instead. I am 100% in the later kind of breaking. I can continue on, I can handle it, but I no longer want to as a matter of choice and too much clarity. Sometimes I wish I would break in the other way. It would feel less shameful and it would have afforded me some comfort that isn't found in my way of being in the world. I just find it meaningless to be here. Just because I can do the hard things doesn't mean I want to anymore. To me life is just meant to be an experience. See, feel, taste, all of the things so to speak, and I feel I have done that. There isn't any meaning other than the meaning we give it. Yes I still enjoy the fact that I have laughs with friends/family. Yes I enjoy good food. There are good things to experience always. However, I am tired of the chaos that comes with being human and the upkeep of surviving fully intact in a world that is far from ideal. The good experiences just aren't enough to make me want to stay anymore. Working through pain for the rest of my life, watching the world slide into pure chaos, continuing to be logical and grounded with clarity while bumping up against other people who have lost their ability to stay logical, clear, and grounded and somehow try to leave them better than I found them or atleast not add to their pain, because as we all know every human failing comes from self-protection in some form. It's all taxing. So I am planning to ctb. I am worried about those I'll be leaving behind. I have told everyone in my inner circle as I do not want them blindsided. We have had deep discussions and I have allowed for them to process it and ask questions and say their goodbyes. Doesn't mean I don't worry about how they will handle it even if I have overwhelmingly been supported in my decision as a matter of respect for my own agency. They are all of course heartbroken, but also understand my reasonings and that it's not a snap decision etc. I still feel guilty however. I do have life insurance that is payable for suicide (had the policy long enough), so that the eases my mind some on the practical front, however I know how hard navigating life is and I feel like I am shortchanging them by not going through it with them together. That being said I am not saving my adult children from grieving me. Logically I will exit this life before them as a matter of how life works. They will just be going through it earlier rather than later however, if I do this myself now I will save myself suffering, and I will have the ability to leave while affording them some financial protection that I would not otherwise be able to give them as well. Overall, I'm solid in my choice, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't hurt to know that and choosing not to go through life with them while I still can. I also feel somewhat guilty that I am tossing in the towel after surviving everything I have as well as I have, like I'm tossing that gift down the drain. (Survived open brain surgery 100% intact, etc etc etc) Honestly, just wishing everybody as much peace as they can possibly get.
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