The Undiscovered Country

The girl at the checkout counter in Walmart today had a jagged vertical scar on her left wrist.

There could be a lost of reasons for this scar.

The cut was done the right way. People think that if you’re going to slit your wrists, you make a horizontal cut across the vieny-wrist area. Not so--you want to go down a little further and make a vertical cut to really hit the artery. It’s more fool-proof and you’ll bleed out quicker.

My Nuclear Option plan in June of 2014 did not include wrist cutting. But, I knew the right way to do it. You’d be amazed what is on the internet. My plan was to be in my bed with a bowl of Vanilla Haagen-Dazs ice-cream; the Walking Dead playing on my laptop; my cat beside me; and American Spirit cigarettes to smoke as I drifted off into Mother Mary’s arms with the help of a lot of Xanax, Ambien, and Lithium. That was the plan. What I find so fucking ironic is that even in my Nuclear Option plan I was being rational—at the time my colitis was bad and I only allowed myself a small bowl of Vanilla Haagen-Dazs ice-cream once a week. Why not strawberry, my favorite, if I were going to die anyway? The cigarettes and my cat were the most important elements.

As I found out six months later--it’s pretty hard to keep all those pills down, because your body knows it’s being poisoned and reacts. If I hadn’t been with T. I would have probably asphyxiated. I’m still not sure how I feel about the end result. Next time I decided I would cut and I would succeed. And I would dress nicely and leave a note.

If you are at the point where you are ready to commit suicide—go against the very intrinsic nature of being human—you already feel like a failure. If you then fail at suicide—it’s like…fuck. I AM A FAILURE.

The girl in Walmart today had black hair, pale skin, empty blue eyes, and very little affect. I wonder what her story is?

What point to do you have to get to where the most viable option is taking cutting your own wrists? It’s different for everyone of us crazy people. Hopelessness. I think that is the nexus: nothing is going to change; there is no hope.

I cut myself once. Almost a year ago, T. and I were at a critical mass and I was here with G-Pa. The pain was so visceral and palpable—I didn’t know what to do with it. I know about cutting—the physical pain mitigates the emotional pain. I wasn’t planning on using the Nuclear Option when I cut myself in November. I just wanted to see if I could do it.

I took a serrated knife from the kitchen and made a cut about an inch long in the middle of my forearm. I had to work at it! Note to self: do not use a serrated, dull kitchen knife. Use a scalpel or a straight razor. I really had to saw to get some blood. I don’t remember if it made me feel better. I just wanted to see if I could do it. It was so rational to me. Like, can I run a five-minute mile?

I still have a small scar there—as I should, to remind myself. The Nuclear Option cannot be done on G-Pa’s couch or in G-Pa’s house.

T. yelled at me for doing it. Oh, yeah, he asked and I told him the truth because we never lied to each other. That was his rule: do not lie to me. Fucking hypocrite. He lied about everything. And at the time he was drinking Listerine and at least a twelve pack a night—so I think that’s way worse than an inch-long cut.

The Nuclear Option takes a helluva lot of courage. People say suicides are cowards. Not so, dear hearts. We are going to the “undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns.”

Today, I choose to live. We’ll see about tomorrow.

Blue-eyed girl--I hope something good happens to you today. You're not alone. I've been there.

Smoke ‘em if ya’ got ‘em. God Bless.