October 2, 2005

I mixed a cocktail.
Lamictal, 200 mg, 60 pills.
Trileptal, 300 mg, 30 pills.
Trazodone, 300 mg, 60 pills.
Remeron, 30 mg, 30 pills.
Seroquel, 300 mg, 60 pills.
All taken together, at once
with 64 ounces of milk
to coat my stomach.
I thought I could make it
to the park bench by the courthouse fountain
but I collapsed 200 yards into my journey.
My legs just buckled,
my body ignoring the commands
to get up out of the middle of the road.
I vomited.
Retching, spewing pill fragments and milk
all over my face, all through my hair,
and I remember thinking
"Oh my God, I've really done it this time!"
It.
Suicide.
Death.
The end of my life.
I was instantly gripped by panic.
It's not supposed to feel like this!
Where is my sense of peace,
that amazing white light to welcome me home?
Then everything went black
and there was nothing.
I was intubated in the street
and wheeled into the ER
as a Jane Doe, suspected drug overdose.
No ID.
Just a cryptic note crumpled up in my
right front pocket of my jeans.
I awoke days later
to the hiss of the ventilator
ringing in my ears,
my eyelids fluttering in time
to the rhythm of the heart monitor.
Five bags of fluid on the IV pole.
Wires everywhere.
I tried to move
but my wrists were in restraints.
I began to cough,
choking on the tube down my throat
and I heard my mother's voice saying
"Get the nurse! She's waking up!"
Who? Me?
But that can't be!
I did it.
I really did it this time.
It.
Suicide.
Death.
Now what the fuck am I supposed to do?
Am I okay
or am I going to be a vegetable?
Why is Days of our Lives
on my hospital room TV?
My days were supposed be over
but now there is a social worker in my room
talking to my parents
about the number of days
I'll need to be under inpatient psychiatric care!
Again.
Dammit, again.
I want to say "I'm sorry", but I can't.
What am I sorry for?
For putting my family through this?
For asking them to love me anyway?
For not dying?
It,
suicide,
death
is such a mess.
I already sent out invitations to my funeral
because I wanted to be sure
someone would be there
to remember me for me
because I sure as hell
don't remember me.
My mind's long term memory
is racked with guilt and shame and pain
and my short term memory
is, well, what were we talking about?
It.
Suicide.
Death.
And the day I almost, almost died.