THE STAIN


Last year...right about this time, I lost someone dear to me to suicide. It happened one random Sunday morning. In the true character of death...none of us saw it coming. It was like a sudden rainstorm..only it wasn't regular rain but a blood storm that pelleted us all hard..and there was no where to hide.

I hadn't realised how much I loved this person. The loss was deep and cruel. The pain gnawed at every part of my being. And for a minute there, my soul drowned in the bloodbath.

Suicide is like an annoying questionnaire with no end and no answers but which you must complete. There are no options to skip certain questions or write "no comment". I could not even begin to fathom how much more difficult it was for the immediate family. I woke up each morning with a sense of brokenness and helplessness. I could not have done much to help...but I could have whispered.." I love you. You matter to me. Your life counts". I don't think it would have made them stay but at least they would have known.

I understood the need to escape the pain. I have been there...and felt as if I was running crazy. I needed it to stop. One day...I made a one sentence prayer and when I woke up...the pain in my core was gone. Just like magic... Only it wasn't. If there was a time I believe in God...it was that morning.
Yet here I was again. In the midst of my grief...the monsters woke and they woke with passion! In my mind...permission had been granted.

For the next few weeks...I struggled to stay afloat....my own issues seem to multiply into a hundred fold... They suddenly graduated from pre-teens into fully grown adults with beards and serious expressions. My world became scary and grim. Til someone (in the midst of their own pain) threw me a lifeline. I grabbed at it and hang on. Things got worse before they got better...as it always is.

Heriponder - Suicide is like a black stain on a snow white dress. The blackness so deep and unending. No amount of bleaching can take it away but eventually...we learn to love our stained dress. With time...it begins to seem like it was always meant to be there...awkwardly placed. Eventually, you can look at it without pain or shame. You accept it. You accept their decision and you continue to love them anyway because the stain is just evidence of the pain they lived through and that's just life.

With time, what you thought was a stain becomes part of the beautiful pattern of life

- Herispeak

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