Today is a good day to die

On August 15, 2020, a month before my 46th birthday, I picked up a knife and genuinely contemplated running it over my wrists.

I was ready to die.

As I ran through the plan in my head, the immediate consequences ran through my mind in the clearest vision – the sadness of my family, the dog left for a few days in the laundry until someone found him and weirdly, the humorous thought that the cat would probably eat me because she had been waiting a while to do that.

While that moment is forever etched in my psyche, I am so glad that I got there.

On August 15, 2020 I got to the root cause of my unhappiness and depression and felt it with the full weight of emotion.

I’ve always known on some level my deepest subconscious thoughts and feelings about myself.

Cognitively, I’d written about it in my journals. I’d even created a product with “I am enough” on it.

But on this day, I felt the pain and the sadness of my inner child fully feeling that I was not good enough. I was not worthy. I was worthless. I was the two-year-old me that couldn’t do anything right.

I grew up in a family where my efforts were never good enough, I was “too sensitive” and there were excuses about why I wasn’t the smartest when I didn’t win the academic awards at my school.

I don’t remember exactly when this first started happening to me, but I internalised it all. And on August 15 I felt it in the full expression of 45 years of holding it in. My heart was this open, gaping hole where all my love should be. All the times I was told or shown that I wasn’t good enough echoed in my ears and memories.

The consequences of this belief mindset are; an inability to make decisions, lack of confidence and a real disconnection from my body, my life and my purpose.

But it wasn’t my mother’s fault. Her father was highly critical too. How many generations of our family had grown up not feeling enough? I remember my grandfather asking if I’d got a “boyfriend yet” each time we saw him. I was seven. No wonder I internalised the idea that I’m not good enough for a relationship.

I was angry with her for a long time but until this moment, I never actually knew why. She has no idea of the damage she’s caused me and would be distressed knowing that every action and decision I have made has been a result of me thinking I’m good not enough.

But the best news is that now I’ve hit rock bottom, I’m not going back. I’m not ever going to allow that nasty inner critic – let’s call him Al – to define my choices, my reactions or my self-worth.

The past few years, I’ve been contemplating getting tattoos on my wrists – “trust” on the left and “flow” on the right, but after my incident, I knew exactly what tattoo I would get. The three dots at each end represent childhood and old age respectively – or the transition in and out of life. The middle is the pathway that life takes and the bulk of it is the Sanskrit symbol Om – the universal sound of life. I can’t find the origins of this tattoo, but when I was in the darkness that week, I found it attached to an image by The Minds Journal representing Breathe. Which is a perfect visual representation of trust. For every single day we breathe in and out without any conscious choice, we trust our breath to keep us alive.

But on August 15, my breath was what helped me to get out of the darkness. My tattoo is located on my left wrist to remind me of the day that I had a choice. I chose to sit in the darkness and get to the bottom of my lifelong depression so I could rise like the phoenix out of it. I chose to live.

I took the week off and spent hours watching motivational videos on YouTube seeking reassurance that I’m okay. But ultimately, I know that I the answers lie within me. I know that I have everything I need to, to rise out of this darkness. Now I know Al is my inner critic telling me I’m not good enough, I can call that little bastard out each time he rises his voice in my head.

I am enough.

I am worthy of a spectacular life.

And I can now trust my inner voice, because I know that Al is just a family pattern I ended. And every day my tattoo reminds me that I get to choose when I stop my breath and that day is not today.