2017 was the summer I didn’t kill myself

2017 was the summer I didn’t kill myself.

It was a miracle really.

And I have the robins to thank.

For no reason I can figure, a momma robin decided to build a nest in the scaffolding of my garage. I leave the door open most days and nights during the summer. Sweet. little red-belly must have thought, “Dry. High up. Perfect.” Although each time I went into the garage, she would fly out. And if I stayed too long, she would sit close by and yell at me to leave.  I’d respond, “Who told you this was a good idea?” She persisted.

I had no idea how I slipped so deeply into the depressive episode without noticing what was happening. Diagnosed endogenous depressive back in my teens, I’ve been vigilantly on guard my whole life. At the first sign of a slip, I take steps to get myself back to even. I increase my meds. I watch my sleeping and eating patterns. I become a stern guardian of my thoughts interrupting ruminations before they make deep trenches in my mind.

I think it was the flu I had in March – high temperatures can set off a depressive episode – that started me on a slow slide that ended with me trying to order my children out of the house so I could go sit in my car and shut the garage door. My daughter, who is also a depressive, cottoned on and wouldn’t leave, reminding me that we had made a deal when she was only four (a story for another day): we would always be there for each other, no matter what.

Anyhoo.

The ugly face of crazy reached up from the dark where all my faults, my secrets, my mistakes have gone to hang out together just waiting for the moment that they can rush to the fore. I was exhausted from beating back the black. I was sure there was no way things were ever going to get better. I was done.

But she was there, my baby girl. Arms wide, beaming at me, reassuring me that she was not going to let crazy get me. She took her brother for a walk, explained what was happened and told him, “We’re not leaving, no matter what she says. If she asks when we’re going, the answer is, ‘In twenty minutes.”

So they stayed. I realized what had happened and upped my meds. And then I spent the next two weeks waiting for things to get better. They did. Very slowly. Better enough, at least, that I could see the robin feathering her nest, putting one twig in next to the other, making a home where her own sweet babies would be safe. And I realized the garage would be off limits as a suicide location.

When I told friends just how much I was fighting my depression, to a man they expressed some version of the sentiment, “You could call me anytime.”  Maybe. Or maybe not. Seeing as I was trying to drive my children away so I could do myself in, picking up the phone to a friend seems like a long, long stretch.

I’ve been suicidal before. This episode was right up there in my Top Five. Not since I’ve had my kids have I come this close.

The robins were born. I watched Momma Bird feed and nurture her babies as my babies fed and nurtured me. I kept taking my meds, kept watching my thoughts, kept getting better.  The fledglings flew off and by the time I could shut the door to my garage again, I didn’t want to any more.

The old song by Elton John keeps playing through my mind: “Someone saved my life tonight, Sugar Bear. Almost got your hooks in me, didn’t you dear.” I don’t think Sir Elton was writing about depression, but it could have been my theme song for the summer of 2017.

All this is to say, suicide is the last step in depression. It’s not a selfish act. It’s not about being weak. Depression is a disease. When people die of cancer, we don’t susurrate 

about their character at their funerals. So then why do we question people’s “motives” when they die of depression?