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Kate s Story

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"To put it simply- I've had a very hard year. On October 19th of 2015, my best friend of almost 3 years who was also my ex-boyfriend, and my first real love committed suicide. I spent his last day with him, and there's nothing that could be more devastating than that, but also nothing more comforting. I spent hours in the hospital waiting for him to come sauntering out with just a broken nose and a cast or two.

 

To hear that he didn't make it absolutely broke me like nothing has before, I'd never lost someone that close to me. I wouldn't eat, wouldn't come out of my room, wouldn't make full sentences for about two weeks. I would receive horrible messages from various people who knew him. I got called into the police station for interrogation and saw statements from other people that claimed that one of the last things he said was that I was the love of his life. It was like another massive kick to the chest while I was already down. I was passed from therapist to therapist because they couldn't or didn't want to deal with my problems.

 

They all told me I may have very severe anxiety, depression, and possibly PTSD, but I'm too scared of medication to want to take it. I've seen too many people change too quickly and drastically when they start medication, and that scares me. It scares me to have to depend on a few little pills that I take twice a day to be a somewhat functional person that can stand on the middle ground between ok and despondent.

 

Everyone says it would be worth it to get the memories and the pain out of my head, and then they think I'm crazy when I say I don't want to. Sometimes the memories and the pain is what keeps me going. Which sounds crazy, but it reminds me that I'm still alive, that there's something in me that wants to keep going, whether it's in his memory or for my betterment. The 'something' is probably all my memories of him, of how I can still hear his voice, telling me to keep going even though he can't.

 

That's the only thing I can take solace in; it's the fact that he would want me to keep pushing through it. He was strong, albeit emotional sometimes, but hell if he wasn't strong until the end. I knew that better than anyone. I knew how hard it was for him. And I was there for him.  And I learned it from him, and I won't let him down. People tell me that it gets better with time. And it does in ways, but there isn't a day that goes by that I don't want him back, that I don't wish it were me.

 

I see things all over campus all the time that make me think of him. I go to his favorite restaurants, his favorite places around town, just so I can feel like he's with me. I'm sure I sound crazy at this point. But to those who have experienced something similar, it does get better. It may be hard to believe, but it does. It gets easier to see reminders of someone, to hear things that remind you of them. You start to remember the good times more than you do the bad.

 

It's different for everyone, but I promise it'll get better. What doesn't always get better is the gnawing anxiety, the nightmares of him falling, and the crushing depression and lack of motivation that I tend to wake up with on around 5 days out of 7. I hope that'll get better with time as well."

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