Tag: suicide

coming out as transgender

by Midnight Demon, posted in suicidality, suicide attempt, suicide attempt survivor, transgender

Coming out as a transgendered male (Female to Male) has not been an easy thing to do. It has been a very confusing road since kindergarten. The hardest part of the journey was puberty. I had a male best friend and I seriously thought that we were of the same genders up until I started developing. When I started developing breasts and he didn’t, I was confused so much that I wanted to die. But when you are eleven, the concept of killing yourself is not completely formulated. You knew you wanted to die, but didn’t know how. You knew that suffocation by a plastic bag would do the trick, but were too scared you would get into trouble with your parents. That fear prevented a lot of suicide attempts, especially during adolescence. The more I developed into something that conflicted with my brain, the more it hurt. But it wasn’t a physical pain like that of a broken limb. The psychological pain was so intense that suicide was all that I thought about. The higher the pain, the deeper the suicidal impulses would emerge. But I had to be a “good girl” and fight what was wrong. I suppressed the feelings of maleness but still acted like a “tomboy” in every fiber of my being. I wore baseball hats whenever I could. My father disliked it so much, he often threatened to cut up my hats when I got “caught” wearing one. To him I was a girl and I should act like one. My sisters did act like their gender roles, but that make up and hairspray were something I was not into nor had an interest in. Boys didn’t wear those things and neither would I.

When my menses started, that really started the hardest part of the conflict to deal with. I was bleeding and I didn’t understand why. I was welcomed into “womanhood” and I wanted nothing to do with it. I didn’t understand why I wasn’t growing a penis. It was a very confusing time and month after month, I hated myself more and more. Even the use of feminine products was abhorrent to me. The more I grew into a freaking woman, the more I hated myself. I prayed for death every night. But no one knew of this struggle. Not even my best friend. With him, we were buddies. I was “Mike” and we played pretend male gendered games such as me being a mechanic or cable repairman. When T-ball season came around, I asked my father if I could play. But he stuffed my dreams of playing saying that is only for “boys” not for girls. I was beyond hurt.

During middle school, my sisters would have boyfriends. I never had an interest in boys. I was a boy so why would I be interested in my own gender. I didn’t have feelings for girls either. For the longest time, I thought I was asexual. It wasn’t until I was in therapy after my family fell apart that my therapist asked if I was gay. I felt really uncomfortable with the question. I just was saying I hadn’t found the right “boy” for me. She didn’t have to know that I was a boy inside just waiting to come out. I had suppressed it so much that I really didn’t think about it at this time.

When I first became suicidal, it was when I was fifteen. My family had fallen apart and I fell apart with it. My father called me a liar and my world ended. I was no longer a good “girl” in his eyes so there was nothing to live for. I started self-harm by cutting, thinking it would bring me to the verge of death, but all it did was bring my internal pain to the outside. After that therapist asked the “gay” question, I started thinking about it, but it was on a subconscious level. I remember being on the train and these really good looking women were on it. And I don’t know what possessed me, but I wanted to kiss them and it didn’t phase me that it was wrong. When I got hold of my senses (I made no such act toward them for fear of being called a freak), I was shocked. I grew up as an Italian Catholic and I knew homosexuality was forbidden. I knew I couldn’t bring it up in therapy. I was too proud to do so. Yet I continued to feel like I was crazy. Then things started to make sense to me. The voices that I was hearing, all were female except for one or two of them. I have been hearing voices since I was five, but that is another issue.

When I was sixteen, a therapist that I was seeing was leaving. I was very hurt. I felt I had nothing to live for with her leaving me. So in April 1993, I overdosed. The pain of living my life as what I was, was too great to bear. Subconsciously, I always wanted to die because I was in the wrong body. And I finally made an attempt to kill myself because of it. Though when I was asked the reasons, I just said I was depressed. No one figured out why I was so depressed. People never talked about being transgendered or being gay. Yet here I was, in the mix of being a confused teenager and had no one to turn to for help. Because I had suppressed so much of myself, I couldn’t even bring it to the surface. I had other issues to contend with, such as the break up of my parents.

Then suddenly women were attractive to me, something that has not happened before and I liked it. I thought I was crazy and that no one would understand. I felt isolated and despondent. There wasn’t a gay person that I knew and this was before the age of the internet so it wasn’t like I could ask Google what to do. Instead I internalized and compartmentalized. Then one day in January when I was 17, I started cutting myself and I didn’t stop until I was satisfied. But I didn’t know I did it. I knew I did it as I was holding a razor but I didn’t cut myself. I dissociated. That landed me in the hospital. I met a homosexual male and asked him about being gay. He told me that it was natural and that I wasn’t crazy. I took a chance and told the staff I was gay. I didn’t get a lifetime commitment in the psych ward. I felt a huge burden was lifted off my chest. But my Best friend that I had known since I was in diapers, didn’t like me being gay. He felt if we had sex, that would change me. But we already tried that and every time we were intimate, things turned off. I just wasn’t attracted sexually to males.

Fast forward to now. Around the time I was thirty-three, I started realizing that I wasn’t going to magically become a male. I came out in my therapist office and started crying like a baby because it was the source of my suicidality. I had been really suicidal and for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why. Then when my menses came, I immediately became suicidal. Since I put two and two together, I realized that I was a male and it was time that I stop repressing myself. I wear male clothing all the time, except for that time of the month that I am forced to endure. Trying to stop the female reproductive system has been the hardest task for me to endure.

I was recently hospitalized and am just a little over a week since I have been discharged. The reason I was in the hospital was because I had overdosed on some pills. I couldn’t take the self-hate anymore about being a transgender. There were other reasons too, but being in the wrong body took precedence over the others. I hate feeling like this. I know there are treatments out there but there is a lot of stigma that prevents it from coming to people like me. I am not sure I want the sex organs either but I do know I want a double mastectomy. There are days when I am okay with having breasts and then there are other days, I can’t stand them. I hope one day I can take the next step forward. But I got to first like myself because if I don’t have that, I won’t have anything to like or live for.

how can I keep myself away from me

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, cauda equina syndrome, chronic physical pain, depression, suicide, suicide attempt

How can I keep myself away from me

I tried the not talking approach to my therapist today. I think it works better in person than it does on the phone. I just did not want to talk today at all. She tried to get me to engage with questions and I just shot her down. I kept telling her this is all pointless. Then she went off about how much I mean to her, and on and on with things like that. I just couldn’t hear her. I tuned her out, like I have most of my friends and family lately.

She wanted me to list the reasons why I want to kill myself. I thought about sending her the blog I wrote the other day but I can’t remember which blog it was. Once I write something, I forget it. It’s like mental eraser once I put it in a blog or on paper. So I will make a new list and please don’t think this is a whine list. I am already close to the edge and it won’t take much to push me off.

I don’t want to live anymore because I am not a full human, I am not a man. I will never be accepted by the society I live in, even if I were to get hormones. The people close to me, my family, will never call me a him or he. I will never be an Uncle, though I can’t imagine after almost 21 years, I can be called that. I have gotten so used to “aunty” that it just suits me, even though it isn’t the right gender preference.

I want to end my life because CES sucks. I am tired of being in pain every single day of my life, in some way, shape, or form. I can’t even have a bowel movement without pain, even if the shit is soft, I hurt. It’s all nerve pain so I doubt anything can be done about it. Luckily it goes away but I suffer for at least 15 minutes to a half hour after every movement. I never thought my life would come to this. And peeing myself every day is no help. I thought that shaving my pubic hairs would help but it doesn’t. I still smell if I don’t shower every other day. The worse part is that I don’t even know I am wet. I don’t have normal sensation down there since my second CES diagnosis. I know people can laugh it off but it really sucks for me because unless I use a pad (which is difficult with boxers), I leak. I just don’t realize I am full until afterwards. My urge to go is not that strong.

Dealing with depression and all that comes with it. The mental pain of living every day when you hurt physically and mentally yet you can’t take a narcotic pain med to ease that ache. I have tried. I once took a handful to ease the mental pain and it did nothing, NOTHING, for me. How can you continue to see a psychiatrist or a therapist knowing they cannot ease your pain. I have tried, desperately and in vain, to find something, anything, to ease this psychache. But all I get is talk therapy to address it. I am tired of talking about it. Nothing helps. Writing used to but now I just think I am a whine bag, going on and on about my little complaints on why I want to take my life.

I never will go back to school again. I will never embrace the academia again and that hurts me more than I say. I will never earn enough or save enough to go back to school, unless I hit the lottery but you have to play to win. I don’t even have the extra buck to play. I never will get my degree that I long for. And I feel like I have let my family down because of this. If I never got sick with mental illness, things would have been different. But this damn illness always gets the best of me. I have to go into the hospital at least once a year, sometimes twice because I just can’t handle “life” and need a “vacation”. If I didn’t have yet another breakdown in 2008, I probably would have got my degree by now and I wouldn’t be fucked with my loans. I don’t blame anyone for this. I blame myself for being sick. Living on SSD is not always as it is cracked up to be.

Then we have the employment issue. Will I ever be able to hold a job again? The past two months I have been plagued with hypomanias and psychosis which if I was working, would have been worse and I would be in the hospital again. And this is without a job! How am I supposed to handle work responsibilities when I can’t even handle no responsibilities? With the Long Term Disability still hanging over me, I still cannot get a job even if I wanted to. I really would like to go back to my old job part time. I just want to feel useful again. I don’t feel like I deserve to live because I feel so worthless. And being an author didn’t exactly give me the fame I thought it would. I still fight for every sale, every month. But self-promoting is hard work, harder than I thought it would be. I thought that when my book went on Amazon, it would fly off the shelves, so to speak. Hardly that. I never thought it would reach a best 100 status, that would be impossible and an unreachable goal. But to be in the millionth rank, well, that was not what I was expecting. And then you had to create an author page. I hate the way I look so I neglected for almost a year to put a pic up. I still don’t know what to say in bio so left that blank. All these things you need to do and yet no one tells you. You just learn as you go.

I hate my body image. I hate the way I look. I always have. I really don’t think that is ever going to change. I avoid mirrors like the plague. And no matter what pic or selfie I take, I always look like a moron. I am just not photogenic, but that isn’t what drives me to kill myself. I just hate me, everything about me sucks.

I think I have listed enough reasons why I want to take my life. These are the top ones.

tired of being an outlier

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, depression

I woke up at 0530 today but was able to get back to sleep around 0600. I slept on and off until 1130. I also woke up around three but was able to go right back to sleep. I don’t know why I am having such a hard time sleeping lately. And someone from Indiana keeps calling me at fucking 0815 every single morning. I don’t know that many people in Indiana and I know they don’t have my number. I wish they would stop calling or at least leave a voicemail so I know who the fuck it is.

I need to go to my father’s today to fix his pill box and then I won’t have to go back until Thursday. I have therapy tomorrow that I am not looking forward to. I am going to try and end therapy. I just don’t see the point anymore. I know she is going to be resistant to it but that is her problem, not mine. I am tired of trying to make people happy. It’s going to be tough not having therapy but I think it’s the best course. I just can’t imagine being in therapy while planning on ending my life. It makes no sense. It will be better if I am not in therapy. The less she knows of my plans the better.

I have been trying to think of a way to let my writing partner know I am not going to be here any longer. But even if I do, she knows that I will get through this tough patch. But this isn’t a tough patch that I am going through. I have made a conscious decision to end my life so I don’t have to turn 40 and continue a sad existence. I know this will hurt her. Another loss that she just can’t face. We have been writing to one another for three years now. I am sad that this is coming to an end as she doesn’t know how much she means to me. I wish it was enough to get me to stay but I don’t think there is enough to keep me here. After all the hospitalizations and therapy I have received, I still have thoughts of ending my life. I can’t live with this knowledge that according to all the statistics, I should be dead. I am tired of being an outlier.

Just came back from my father’s. Damn bus was late both ways. Luckily today is a nice warm day. I wore shorts today as it was warm enough. First day in a LONG time that it hit 70 degrees. It has been a long winter. My father didn’t pick up his pills on Friday like I told him to so I had to go get them as he wasn’t feeling well. The walk to and fro nearly killed me. My calf muscles doesn’t want to work for me. They tighten up with each step and it is killing me. I know it is most likely atrophy as I haven’t been walking in so long. Even a short walk, a block or so, will tighten them up. The price I paid for staying in the month of February. I also know it is going to take a while to build up my strength again. I really need to walk a little every day to get the muscles moving again. I also need to build up my endurance level.

Yesterday was National Grilled Cheese Day. I think I will have one or two tonight for my dinner. Just wish I had some tomato soup to go with it. I think I will make an online order so I can order some of the items I am thinking about getting so I don’t forget. I just hope I don’t spend $130 like I did last time. It was a big order but it was all my essentials, no junk food, just stuff that I had really run out of.

Saturday blog 18

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, cauda equina syndrome, chronic physical pain, depression, suicide

Saturday Blog 18

I slept for most of the morning, which was good because I didn’t sleep good for most of the night. Pain kept waking me up. My brother in law was going to Stop and Shop so I went with him to get a few things. He told me my mother needed milk so I picked it up as well. I didn’t get my fish and chips like I wanted to because I was low on cash. I could just get the essentials, like cream, my powerade, and milk for my mother. That was all that I needed. When I get paid in two weeks, I will do real grocery shopping. I won’t be paying my cell phone bill again because it is already paid for the month. For the first time in months, I will have a little extra money so I might just get another online grocery order. It will save me time and energy from walking around the store. I can just click on what I want.

After the grocery store, I made coffee and watched the baseball game. We won 8-4. In the Bronx. Against the Skankees. HEHEHE. They made a costly error and then loaded the bases and we capitalized on it. Instead of the inning to be over, Aroid took his foot off the bag after review of the play. It was sweet that my favorite player, Brock Holt, then hit a double that cleared the bases. This guy is amazing. He was awesome last year and his awesomeness is continuing this year.

After the ball game, I watched some of my shows. I had to watch the Criminal Minds episode with Gary Sinise. I miss CSI NY so much that to see Gary again was a thrill. He still looks the same.

Other than going to the grocery store, I really haven’t done anything yet I feel really tired. I haven’t played any games all day. It was just sleep, store, baseball game, tv. I guess that is a lot of doing nothing but my ankle would beg to differ. It is hurting like I have been standing on it all day. I don’t know why, as I mostly have been sitting or reclining. But that is the pain syndrome for you. It does what it wants, with no rhyme or reason.

I wonder why is it that if you have terminal cancer and was given only a few months to live, people accept that reality more often than if someone says they are going to kill themselves. I keep thinking about things like this because cancer is held higher than suicide when it is just the same. You are going to die either way. Either through your own terms or cancer’s. And if you survive cancer, you are considered a hero. Yet you attempt suicide, you are shamed and blasted upon. I have accepted that I will probably take my life sometime this year. It is something I have thought about for sometime and though I am not thinking about suicide every day like I used to, I have a specific date that I want to end my life. Not because of shits and giggles, but because I am tired of being in pain all the time, mentally and physically. I know nothing can happen with my life. I fucked it up and there is no unfucking it, not unless I win the lottery. I will never be a therapist because I can’t go back to school. I am in the minority. I am transgendered and never will be accepted by anyone. And I just can’t live with this knowledge. My dreams went up in smoke when I became disabled, when I got diagnosed with mental illness when I was 16. I tried having a life but it just isn’t working out. I am depressed nearly every day for no good reason. I am tired of living this way. It must come to an end. I am just going to die anyway and I rather it be on my terms.