{"id":585,"date":"2018-08-02T17:12:41","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T07:12:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thejugular.org\/?p=585"},"modified":"2018-08-02T17:12:41","modified_gmt":"2018-08-02T07:12:41","slug":"when-r-u-ok-is-not-enough","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/2018\/08\/02\/when-r-u-ok-is-not-enough\/","title":{"rendered":"When R U OK? Is Not Enough"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>2 Minute, 43 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>

content warning: self-harm<\/em><\/p>\n

by ANONYMOUS<\/p>\n

\n

Sometimes I imagine what it would be like if it all disappeared. For a moment all the noise and chatter and colours stop.<\/p>\n

Silence.<\/p>\n

In my world I take a deep breath. Maybe this is where I can talk to you, because in this world you don\u2019t really exist.<\/p>\n

A couple years ago I dug my fingers into my wrist, little red droplets seeped out. They looked alien, like they\u2019d just haphazardly landed on my skin. Thoughts rolled around like clothes in a tumble dryer; frantic, hot and messy.<\/p>\n

I needed to clear them. I needed pain.<\/p>\n

And for a second it worked. The words on my paper cleared and I started to write an answer. I had always been a logical person: I had a problem and I found a solution. Only this one scared me. I cried because I \u2018knew better\u2019, it haunted me that it felt good.<\/p>\n

The thing is, I lived in your world too. I always gawked at how people could hurt themselves. I imagined teens with low self-esteem and bad parents. I wasn\u2019t that. I had confidence in myself, I was focused. Yet, I was caught in a recurring storm that I couldn\u2019t reconcile.<\/p>\n

How could I be so strong and so fucking weak?<\/p>\n

At its worst point I spent three days in silence. It wasn\u2019t a statement. I just had nothing to say.<\/p>\n

My mind felt like bad static. It\u2019s ineffable if you haven\u2019t experienced it, going from being so sharp and focused to immobilising sadness. Grief was a trigger, but it was always there.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s funny. I hadn\u2019t really thought about it for a while, but every time I hear someone say \u2018I\u2019m so depressed\u2019 a little thing tugs at me reminding me it was real. I don\u2019t look like a depressed person, I never did\u2026 but I was.<\/p>\n

Is it strange I\u2019ve never said that out loud? That I\u2019ve never told my best friends? You see even though we\u2019re trying to change, we haven\u2019t. The psychologist I saw told me to never tell anyone, that in medicine it wouldn\u2019t do me any good and that I shouldn\u2019t trust my colleagues. My psychologist said that. I remember being a little shocked, well shit, so much for support systems.<\/p>\n

So how do I explain to you I\u2019m not okay?<\/p>\n

Maybe I never will. Maybe I won\u2019t have to. I\u2019m happy now, I got investigations, I figured out strategies and I exercise to clear my mind. But I know I\u2019m not an exception, I\u2019d argue I\u2019m closer to the rule and I\u2019m scared for people who are still lost in that cloud that won\u2019t let them think and sucks the life away from life.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know how to fix it, but it has to be more than an \u2018R U OK?\u2019.<\/p>\n

\n

Lifeline Australia is a\u00a0confidential telephone crisis support service available 24\/7 from any landline, payphone or mobile. If you are ever experiencing a personal crisis or thinking about suicide, call them at 13 11 14 or visit\u00a0https:\/\/www.lifeline.org.au\/\u00a0<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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I hadn\u2019t really thought about it for a while, but every time I hear someone say \u2018I\u2019m so depressed\u2019 a little thing tugs at me reminding me it was real. I don\u2019t look like a depressed person, I never did\u2026 but I was.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":586,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[19],"class_list":["post-585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-featured"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}