The pit is ruthless. Once you fall in, it feels like there is no hope.
Sometimes giving in is easier. Maybe this is the only way to truly feel.
You tripped and fell in, or you got tired and saw the dip in the soil, knowing what it was. Your feet carried you there just as much as your heart.
Your heart feels swollen. With pain, darkness, fear, sadness… the list goes on.
You see, in your minds eye, the bottle of little tan pills on the countertop. You take them, but sometimes the pull of the pit is stronger.
You don’t know if there is a way out, and quite frankly, you don’t know if you care. If someone threw a rope to you, would you catch it and hold on? You are uncertain.
Here, you sit with your pain. Your thoughts are on a repeating loop. You want to hurt, you want to feel.
The pit hasn’t always been here. This ground used to be flat and predictable. Safe. You don’t know where it came from, or what made it. An act of God? Or is it an apparition?
Maybe it’s all in your head. The twisting in your gut tells you this is real though. The hatred, the endless, fierce hatred tells you this is real. The walls are rough and crumbly. Maybe you can find a foothold.
No one told you about this place. You didn’t know a place like this even existed. Sometimes you feel a flicker of hope, but you dash it out. Better to feel dead inside, hollow.
You hear voices, shouts and hollers. It is the ones you love. Are they upset, that you have ended up here again? Are they tired of this pattern you can’t seem to break?
You know others have fallen in too, at different times. You see where they have chipped away at the rocks and scooped out dirt in an attempt to get out. They’ve survived, and you will too. It’s just a matter of how long this will last.
A few days go by, and you are so tired of this place. You make an attempt to rally your spirits, your eyes search out the handholds from years past. You think you see a way out, but it is never certain.
Believing is half the battle. The air up here is so fresh. How you’ve missed the blue sky. Everything looks better on solid ground.
Your path isn’t the same as anyone else’s. There’s no “cure,” no quick-fix. You can’t even say how you got out of that dark place.
There’s no saying when you will return to your wallowing and hiding. It creeps up on you like a shadow. It’s not the unknowns you fear though, it is the actual moments when you are down in the pit that are the worst.
You can warn someone about the dark holes they might one day find themselves in, but you can’t take their place. You can tell someone “I’ve been there too” or “it gets better,” but words don’t always heal. You can go into that pit with them, but you can’t pull them out.
Being in the pit isn’t a choice, but you can choose to try to get out, over and over.
Here’s to those who do. Here’s to those who don’t. Because this isn’t a contest, it’s an illness. Here’s to you, the hurting and broken down. Gather your strength. See yourself through another day.
You don’t have to live your whole life in the dark.
If you or someone you know needs help, visit our suicide prevention resources page.
If you need support right now, call the Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.
Image via Thinkstock.
Lydia Kenyon is a blogger and recovery advocate, and resides in a small town in Iowa. She works as a barista at a local coffee shop, and loves learning everything she can about recovery and bettering oneself. Lydia has struggled for almost ten years with a restrictive eating disorder, and began the journey to recovery in September, 2015. Lydia has also struggled with depression, anxiety, and OCD and often blogs about these topics as well. You can keep up with her story at: Papercuts and Skinned Knees
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