Love like you've never loved before

Every morning I check my Facebook while having breakfast. That's usually a relaxing moment, checking what my friends have been doing while I was still fast asleep (I get up quite late, compared with the average human being. Has to do with my medication). But Monday morning the bread lost its taste completely when I saw that one of my Facebook friends posted that Laura had died. Suicide. Another one... Laura is one of my friends of the CIB. Those of you who are familiar with my posts know that the CIB is the "Centrum Intensieve Behandeling", the centre for intensive treatment, in The Hague where I resided for almost a year and got out really well, despite some really nasty experiences. I fought my way out of it, you could say. Laura wasn't so lucky. When her time at the CIB was over - you cannot stay there forever, after a year more or less, they send you back to the clinic you came from - they send her back. And since then she has been in different clinics, in and out. She was currently staying in Rotterdam. However, a couple of months ago, it looked like the odds were finally in her favour. They had a spot for her in a care farm. She was really excited about it, and she would be going there really soon. So what happened that made her change her mind so suddenly?

R.I.P. Laura

Last week, there were some alarming posts on her Facebook. She posted that she was tired of fighting. That she could no longer go on. People encouraged her to hang on. Her last post was last Saturday, at 9.23 in the morning. In hindsight, action should have been taken. It was a very alarming post. It was a message from somebody who had jumped in front of a train and who said sorry to the passengers on the train and those waiting on the platforms in the stations. It was her last post. That afternoon, she committed suicide. 

Laura is the sixth friend of the CIB who commits suicide. However, I don't get used to it. It never gets easy in one way or the other. It may sound a little strange, but it confronts me with my own thoughts. I count myself lucky that I got out of the biggest misery. Been there, done that, you could say. Still, some suicidal thoughts remain. I'm a lot happier than three, four years ago. But some unhappiness and pain is still there. Still, I don't think it's a good idea to dedicate much time to it. Nor is it a good idea to go into details.

What IS important is the fact that we have to love people and ourselves. Love like you've never loved before. Because - before you know it - it can be over. I do know one thing: since I got out of the CIB and out of the biggest misery I'd ever been in, I'm a different person. I think I can honestly say that I'm a friendly person. Sometimes I'm just walking on the street and I smile to everyone. What happens is that some people smile back, while others look puzzled. "Why is she smiling to me?", I hear them think. "Does she know me from somewhere?" Nope, it's just me, being friendly. Because, before you know it, this life will be over, and while you're still here on planet Earth, it doesn't hurt to smile. Also, I try to be friendly to people I used to have a grudge against. Why is that? Well, it feels so much better to see the frustration on their faces. They know I used to feel a grudge against them and they don't know if I'm just acting or if my sympathetic attitude is for real. And guess what, it actually helps to soften the grudge. The best example is the psychiatrist who treated me really bad and who sent me to the CIB. I was really mad at that man. But somehow, he actually did me a big favour, because I came out so much better. I don't think he had expected that, because honestly, NOBODY had expected that. You know, when there's hatred in your heart, you can't live life to the fullest. I know what I'm talking about. Of course, there are still some people who give me really bad feelings, but I think that's just inherent to us, human beings. 

Why is there so much hatred in this world? In my own family there are some terrible quarrels, and I feel so helpless, because I'm so different. I don't want any quarrels, nor do I want to encourage hatred. I really think that we should love each other more. Life can be so short! Look at Laura, she didn't get older than 22. If someone commits suicide, they must feel like they're all alone, like no one loves them anymore. That's why we should love, love like we've never loved before. It can be over so fast... 

Reminiscing

Today was an important day for Belgian boys and girls between two and a half and seventeen years old: the very first day of school after summer holidays. I can imagine that not everyone was happy that school started again and that there were some mixed feelings. Every year the first day of school also gives me mixed feelings, but for different reasons. 

Until the age of 16, I loved school. I did appreciate summer holidays, but after a couple of weeks I couldn't wait until school started again. I had some really good friends back then and in those times, the Internet didn't exist yet. We still had to rely on the good, old postman to keep in touch and we saw each other only once or twice during those eight long weeks that separated us from seeing each other on an almost daily basis. I learned easily, and I was always hungry for knowledge. I was a good student. School was my habitat. Until the year 1999... 

As every year, I went to school that first day with a lot of enthusiasm. I knew that I'd end up in a newly composed class because I'd had to choose a new study package. Unfortunately, the most unexpected thing happened. I ended up in a class full of bullies. The most arrogant, conceited girls had been put together in one group. They formed about two thirds of my class. The rest were people like me: shy, hard-working students who didn't want to get into trouble and therefore kept a low profile. Those bullies all had a reason to be conceited though: mommy and daddy were doctors, lawyers, dentists... highly educated people, all of them haughty. Don't get me wrong, I'm not ashamed of my mother and father, not at all, but it was reason enough for them to look down on me. I didn't feel at ease in that group, not at all. They knew how to make me feel uncomfortable. So it didn't take them long to throw me off balance. And once this process had started, it only went down. 

I tried to hang on, but this situation had a serious impact on my exam results and not in the least on my well-being. I did pass the exams at the end of the year, with lower grades though, and for once, the summer holidays that followed were more than welcome. However, when school started again in September 2000, I couldn't handle it anymore and it was barely October when I broke down completely. As I was very depressed and I harmed myself on a regular basis, the decision was made that I would be admitted to a psychiatric hospital for a couple of weeks. After that, it was thought, things would turn back to normal. 

Alas... nothing went ever back to normal. Things got completely out of hand. I never went back to school since that day at the end of October 2000. I was admitted to a psychiatric hospital on November 3rd, 2000. As that didn't seem to be a success, they sent me to a specialized clinic for young persons with psychiatric problems. And after that to a closed ward. And that was only the beginning. You see, the last year at high school is supposed to be the most beautiful year of those first eighteen years of your life. You go to a monastery with your class for a couple of days, you go to Italy with last-year students, you celebrate the end of high school with all the last-year students, and more of those activities exclusively for last-year students. I missed everything because of this stupid illness, an illness that isn't even visible. I did the exams at the end of the year, fair enough. I passed the exams, fair enough. But at what cost? I got low grades, very low grades, whilst I was always used to high and very high grades in the years before. It hurt, it still hurts, you know. 

Because of all that happened during those last two years in high school, it feels as if I haven't finished school. People won't understand it, because they will say, "you graduated cum laude from University, right?!" Right. True. However, I can barely remember how I managed it, finishing those exams at the end of high school. During the exams, I was admitted to a psychiatric hospital, I had to use a lot of medication, from time to time I was limited in my freedom (read: they locked me up in the isolation cell). The biggest issue is that my fellow students from high school had no clue of what was going on. I missed them, I really missed their support. When I was in the first clinic, some of them visited me, but eventually, they also stayed away and I was left alone. No one can understand what it is to go through this when you're not even eighteen years old. 

The beginning of the school year makes me very sad, as does the end of the school year. People don't understand why this is such an issue for me. They think I make things unnecessarily complicated. But it's just this feeling, a feeling of having unfinished business. I have this ridiculous thought of redoing the last year of high school. Somehow, I think this would give me peace. Of course it's absurd and not realistic, but I do think a lot about this possibility. Perhaps I'd better redone the last year. But the problem back then was that I was too proud to redo the year. I didn't want to be seen as "that psychiatric patient who couldn't finish her last year because she was admitted to a psychiatric hospital". At University, there were very few fellow students who knew the truth about me, and not without reason. I didn't want to be seen as "psychiatric patient", that just doesn't feel right. 

So what to do? I think I've found the solution, but I have to admit that this one is only a partial solution. I try to study one hour every day, a different subject every day. That gives me the feeling that I'm still at school. I have a fixed schedule: Portuguese on Monday, Spanish on Tuesday, Latin on Wednesday, French on Thursday, English on Friday, astronomy and mathematics on Saturday and German on Sunday. So, I think that the bullies can now call me "blokbeest" (a really nasty word to insult someone who studies a lot and gets high grades) with reason :)

The face of depression

I might be wrong, but depression seems to be quite a hype nowadays. Only a couple of months ago, the Dutch television dedicated an entire week to depression with all kinds of TV shows and programs. They even organized a huge "deprestival". Is this wrong? No, I don't think it's wrong and either way, who am I to judge? But when I was diagnosed with depression - a looooong time ago, that's true - quite the opposite was true. Depression was a burden, a scandal even. People with a depression had to be locked away, they were different in such a sense that that difference couldn't be tolerated in society. Also, people with a depression weren't taken seriously by their family and friends. So it's good that finally, people recognize that depression is a mental illness that has te be taken seriously. Also, more and more people see that depression is a life-threatening disease. Unfortunately, I have lost too many people already, and it's been on the news so many times: famous rock stars and actors who somehow lose hope and decide to end their lives by committing suicide.

I want to invite you to Google the word "depression" and then have a look at the pictures page. What do you see? I'll post a couple of the pictures I found there.

You can already see what these pictures all have in common: darkness, loneliness, hopelessness. Fair enough, that's what people with a depression experience when they're going through the most difficult time of their lives. However, in reality, depression looks more like this, believe it or not:

Robin Williams

Chester Bennington

Who would expect that these two beautiful men decided to end their lives? They never gave any sign to the people they loved that they were unhappy. Consequently, their deaths came as an unpleasant surprise to the people around them. The picture of Chester Bennington was only taken two days before he ended his life. Can you believe it?

Those of you who have read my blogposts before will know that I've lost a few friends to suicide. When I say "a few", I actually mean "too many". I don't have pictures of all of them, but I'll post pictures of three sweet friends of mine that have accompanied me in the clinic in The Hague during one of the most difficult periods of my life. Look at these three beautiful young ladies. They show you the real face of depression. 

Daphne

Max

Saskia

Of course, I knew that my friends weren't entirely happy. They had their own problems to deal with. However, I somehow hoped that they could get enough strength and perseverance out of their friendships and their psychological treatments. Unfortunately, it turned out te be insufficient. They couldn't cope with their lives anymore. I still miss them and I think of them a lot. I often wonder how life would have been for them if they had struggled a little bit more. If they had only given life an extra chance... However, I hope that they are in a better place now. Maybe it was just a matter of time. But that doesn't mean I can't miss them. 

Take-home message: Depression is not always as obvious as people think. If you suspect that a friend or family member has a depression, please be there for him/her. Before you know it, (s)he can put on this mask and act as if everything is all right. And before you know it, (s)he can be gone forever.

RIP to all those who have chosen to end their lives. I just want to tell you that you are missed very hard here on Earth...