The Darkness is There for Many
These are scary times to be a woman, to be a writer, to be a mom, to be single, to be alive.
Another horror writer has taken his own life. He was an author, a kind man, a Facebook friend.
He, like many of us writers, suffered from crippling depression and left behind a spouse and many who loved him.
These were his last words on Facebook: "No matter how I try to do the right thing, no matter how I fight and struggle, No Matter what angle I try or determination I make I will always destroy whatever is good in my life."
So many of us have those exact same feelings on a regular basis.
A few months ago, another author suffering depression whom I sort of knew took her own life even though she had a fiancée who adored her, a daughter, a wedding to plan, a new life to begin.
Many people have opted out of life and will continue to do so.
I know that dance too well myself.
I know that history shows us there are good times and bad times both on a global level and in our day-to-day lives.
The Dark Times
Some days the darkness seems just too much, too overwhelming. The air feels too heavy to move on, the future seems too bleak to imagine living another day.
When I have these minutes, and I have them a lot, especially after my second marriage breakdown, I try to imagine life when I was a teenager. How much things, especially technology, have evolved from the seventies and there are many cool reasons to be alive besides computers, games, 3D, the Who still gives concerts, and there's finally a new Star Wars that is okay.
I was a depressed teen, I'm a depressed fifty-four year old. I've always been depressed and imagine at this point in my life, I always will be.
The darkness comes and goes on its own timetable. It's mysterious and all-consuming.
In the darkest of the dark times, decisions such as those made by my friends, can have long-lasting consequences.
In my own day-to-day life, I feel a tremendous responsibility towards the children I created. Even if I may not be a good role model, I know that the very worst I could do as a role model is to let the darkness win and leave my children with no mom even though they are now adults.
But some days, it's hard to see the point of carrying on. Especially when two men promised to love me until the day I died yet here I am alone and not dead yet. It's hard to know what is a lie and what is truth.
It's been very hard to climb up this hill. It's hard for everyone. I know this. Every single person on this earth has to struggle to get through a day. And in a weird way, that is the thought that keeps me on this earth. We are all struggling.
When is It "That Bad?"
But what I'm saying is that so many people cry out for help but they are not heard. People claim to want to be empathetic but they are not. Some people say they would have helped the ones who committed suicide if they had realized it was "that bad" and of course, I'm seeing this all over Facebook today about Logan when it was clear he was depressed.
Well, if a depressed person says anything at all, it has already gotten beyond "that bad." By the time we reach out, on Facebook, blogs, ranting and raving, or crying, or screaming, or begging, we have lost it and are already on the last petal of the daisy. "Love me, love me not...nobody loves me."
It IS "that bad" right now, every day, for many people.
I won't even get into the crazy of what is going on in American politics right now. The despair I feel for the focus on the ridiculous instead of what is important consumes me.
The Meaning of Life
What is important right now in my own life, in Sèphera's life?
Trying to live a life worth living.
Trying to find a way to earn money to live in a shit hole.
Trying to find a way to survive in modern society when age, looks, and gender are not on my side.
Trying to understand how I can be useful and productive and earn my keep.
It takes money to make money. Whether you want to go to school, train, open a store, make a craft, put on a show, publish a book, make a cake, it all costs money.
This is a money society.
And not all of us are skilled at earning it or keeping it.
It's Expensive to Be Depressed
Are you depressed?
Well, if you have a hundred dollars, you can go get counselling for ONE HOUR.
If you have a few hundred dollars, you might be able to get a prescription for anti-depressants.
If you are depressed because you have no money, well, you can't get help.
You can't get a counsellor.
You can't get anti-depressants.
Your friends will tell you to buck up, things will get better, we're all in the same boat.
But are we?
If you make a little bit of money, you don't qualify for "free" government services or drugs.
If you make NO money, you might qualify for services and drugs once you get on a really long waiting list where you will likely kill yourself before you reach the top.
If you are waiting for housing in Toronto because you can't make enough money to pay your rent, get in line.
I've been on the housing list for five years, and on the list for an Artist's Co-Op for four years. Every month, I struggle to make the payment for the rent for the place where I live and if I lose this place, I will truly be homeless. There is no safety net. I'm "on the lists" for housing help, but they are only lists after all. I'm just another faceless nearly senior woman financially destroyed from divorce who can't get ahead. There are over 100,000 families on these lists.
Someone like me is lucky because I am educated, I have a couple of little jobs, I have regained a bit of sanity to start writing again, and I know deep in my bones that no matter how dark it gets, there will be light again.
Depression isn't a Choice
However, when people are shocked by suicide, they still have opportunity to help others. There are millions of depressed people who don't know why they are depressed, who want to do better, who want to hold down real big-paying jobs, who want to live in nice places, wear nice clothes, raise happy children, and enjoy their pets. Depression is a disease. We have no control when it hits and how hard.
And most people these days can't get professional help even if they manage to climb out of the darkness long enough to look for it. Money. Money. Money...
I've not made my own clinical depression a secret. I've always owned it. And it's a scary thing to deal with every day. It's hard to burst into tears at a song or an image, filled with a blackness and despair so deep that it consumes everything for a minute, an hour, a month. It's hard to keep working through blackness. But money needs to be made so that I'm not living on a grate. I have no one to count on but myself. I get no alimony. I get no government resources, I get no writing grants, I get nothing but whatever I manage to scrape together from odd jobs.
I myself don't know what to do any more. I keep doing my freelance editing, I've been writing again, I have a couple of little sporadic part time jobs at the college, I'm trying to do a Patreon that isn't horror to stretch my writing muscles and perhaps get some encouragement but no one cares since everyone has their own stuff to worry about. I'm writing a book a month for a romance series but does anyone care? Am I wasting my time? Spinning my wheels?
The world does not owe me a living but I'm finding it hard how to figure out how to carve out my niche and survive in this world.
I thought I was on the right track; got a degree, got married, had a couple of kids, but then the marriage ended when I wasn't good enough I guess, and life has been very hard ever since.
I pour my heart and soul into every word I write including these blogs. I'm not the greatest writer and I'm not the worst.
But there are days the darkness calls and it all seems pointless.
However, I will soldier on, depressed, poor, crazy, loveless, because that's what we're supposed to do, I guess. Continue on in this life until we stop.
I will attempt to leave a mark of some sort but at the end of the day, I'm pretty sure no one will notice or care.
Life Choices
And that's fine too. Life is not a race or a contest. We choose our lives in many ways and in others, life chooses us.
If there's a point, I'm not sure what it is, but I will continue to live and write, and show my children that just because things seem pointless, giving up just yet, isn't an option.
However, my heart goes out to those the darkness claims, and more so to those who are left behind.
There are no neon lights to indicate who suicide will claim next. Treat all your fellow humans with respect and love, for you don't know who will be next to fall.
Another horror writer has taken his own life. He was an author, a kind man, a Facebook friend.
He, like many of us writers, suffered from crippling depression and left behind a spouse and many who loved him.
These were his last words on Facebook: "No matter how I try to do the right thing, no matter how I fight and struggle, No Matter what angle I try or determination I make I will always destroy whatever is good in my life."
So many of us have those exact same feelings on a regular basis.
A few months ago, another author suffering depression whom I sort of knew took her own life even though she had a fiancée who adored her, a daughter, a wedding to plan, a new life to begin.
Many people have opted out of life and will continue to do so.
I know that dance too well myself.
I know that history shows us there are good times and bad times both on a global level and in our day-to-day lives.
The Dark Times
Some days the darkness seems just too much, too overwhelming. The air feels too heavy to move on, the future seems too bleak to imagine living another day.
When I have these minutes, and I have them a lot, especially after my second marriage breakdown, I try to imagine life when I was a teenager. How much things, especially technology, have evolved from the seventies and there are many cool reasons to be alive besides computers, games, 3D, the Who still gives concerts, and there's finally a new Star Wars that is okay.
I was a depressed teen, I'm a depressed fifty-four year old. I've always been depressed and imagine at this point in my life, I always will be.
The darkness comes and goes on its own timetable. It's mysterious and all-consuming.
In the darkest of the dark times, decisions such as those made by my friends, can have long-lasting consequences.
In my own day-to-day life, I feel a tremendous responsibility towards the children I created. Even if I may not be a good role model, I know that the very worst I could do as a role model is to let the darkness win and leave my children with no mom even though they are now adults.
But some days, it's hard to see the point of carrying on. Especially when two men promised to love me until the day I died yet here I am alone and not dead yet. It's hard to know what is a lie and what is truth.
It's been very hard to climb up this hill. It's hard for everyone. I know this. Every single person on this earth has to struggle to get through a day. And in a weird way, that is the thought that keeps me on this earth. We are all struggling.
When is It "That Bad?"
But what I'm saying is that so many people cry out for help but they are not heard. People claim to want to be empathetic but they are not. Some people say they would have helped the ones who committed suicide if they had realized it was "that bad" and of course, I'm seeing this all over Facebook today about Logan when it was clear he was depressed.
Well, if a depressed person says anything at all, it has already gotten beyond "that bad." By the time we reach out, on Facebook, blogs, ranting and raving, or crying, or screaming, or begging, we have lost it and are already on the last petal of the daisy. "Love me, love me not...nobody loves me."
It IS "that bad" right now, every day, for many people.
I won't even get into the crazy of what is going on in American politics right now. The despair I feel for the focus on the ridiculous instead of what is important consumes me.
The Meaning of Life
What is important right now in my own life, in Sèphera's life?
Trying to live a life worth living.
Trying to find a way to earn money to live in a shit hole.
Trying to find a way to survive in modern society when age, looks, and gender are not on my side.
Trying to understand how I can be useful and productive and earn my keep.
It takes money to make money. Whether you want to go to school, train, open a store, make a craft, put on a show, publish a book, make a cake, it all costs money.
This is a money society.
And not all of us are skilled at earning it or keeping it.
It's Expensive to Be Depressed
Are you depressed?
Well, if you have a hundred dollars, you can go get counselling for ONE HOUR.
If you have a few hundred dollars, you might be able to get a prescription for anti-depressants.
If you are depressed because you have no money, well, you can't get help.
You can't get a counsellor.
You can't get anti-depressants.
Your friends will tell you to buck up, things will get better, we're all in the same boat.
But are we?
If you make a little bit of money, you don't qualify for "free" government services or drugs.
If you make NO money, you might qualify for services and drugs once you get on a really long waiting list where you will likely kill yourself before you reach the top.
If you are waiting for housing in Toronto because you can't make enough money to pay your rent, get in line.
I've been on the housing list for five years, and on the list for an Artist's Co-Op for four years. Every month, I struggle to make the payment for the rent for the place where I live and if I lose this place, I will truly be homeless. There is no safety net. I'm "on the lists" for housing help, but they are only lists after all. I'm just another faceless nearly senior woman financially destroyed from divorce who can't get ahead. There are over 100,000 families on these lists.
Someone like me is lucky because I am educated, I have a couple of little jobs, I have regained a bit of sanity to start writing again, and I know deep in my bones that no matter how dark it gets, there will be light again.
Depression isn't a Choice
However, when people are shocked by suicide, they still have opportunity to help others. There are millions of depressed people who don't know why they are depressed, who want to do better, who want to hold down real big-paying jobs, who want to live in nice places, wear nice clothes, raise happy children, and enjoy their pets. Depression is a disease. We have no control when it hits and how hard.
And most people these days can't get professional help even if they manage to climb out of the darkness long enough to look for it. Money. Money. Money...
I've not made my own clinical depression a secret. I've always owned it. And it's a scary thing to deal with every day. It's hard to burst into tears at a song or an image, filled with a blackness and despair so deep that it consumes everything for a minute, an hour, a month. It's hard to keep working through blackness. But money needs to be made so that I'm not living on a grate. I have no one to count on but myself. I get no alimony. I get no government resources, I get no writing grants, I get nothing but whatever I manage to scrape together from odd jobs.
I myself don't know what to do any more. I keep doing my freelance editing, I've been writing again, I have a couple of little sporadic part time jobs at the college, I'm trying to do a Patreon that isn't horror to stretch my writing muscles and perhaps get some encouragement but no one cares since everyone has their own stuff to worry about. I'm writing a book a month for a romance series but does anyone care? Am I wasting my time? Spinning my wheels?
The world does not owe me a living but I'm finding it hard how to figure out how to carve out my niche and survive in this world.
I thought I was on the right track; got a degree, got married, had a couple of kids, but then the marriage ended when I wasn't good enough I guess, and life has been very hard ever since.
I pour my heart and soul into every word I write including these blogs. I'm not the greatest writer and I'm not the worst.
But there are days the darkness calls and it all seems pointless.
However, I will soldier on, depressed, poor, crazy, loveless, because that's what we're supposed to do, I guess. Continue on in this life until we stop.
I will attempt to leave a mark of some sort but at the end of the day, I'm pretty sure no one will notice or care.
Life Choices
And that's fine too. Life is not a race or a contest. We choose our lives in many ways and in others, life chooses us.
If there's a point, I'm not sure what it is, but I will continue to live and write, and show my children that just because things seem pointless, giving up just yet, isn't an option.
However, my heart goes out to those the darkness claims, and more so to those who are left behind.
There are no neon lights to indicate who suicide will claim next. Treat all your fellow humans with respect and love, for you don't know who will be next to fall.
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