Suicide Through a Child's Eyes

This is a story I want to share with you written by:TheDotMack

I woke up, just another day as a 12 year old boy. I was living with my mother at the time, a few days after my parents first separated. I was in limbo, waiting to move in with my Father, the healthier, more stable parent of the two.

My mother was sick her entire life; mentally ill and emotionally insecure - she never had the strength to live life on life terms the way I’ve learned to today. Being 12 years old, the only thing I knew was what I experienced in my immediate family unit, I didn’t know the difference between healthy and unhealthy relationships because I was only presented with the unhealthy.

For some reason or another, whether it be her marriage ending, her maddening depression, or who knows what, my mother cried out for help. She put a knife to her throat and exclaimed “Why don’t you love me!”

This picture in my mind is very clear. I can remember seeing cuts on my mothers wrists for years and years and was haunted by this memory for a long time, before I went to treatment and started working a program to deal with it.

My sister, 15 years old at the time, had to call the police to intervene. She surely wasn’t strong enough to deal with the weight of my mother’s life on her hands, and I surely wasn’t strong enough either. Thank god my sister took that immediate action - I treasured the years I’ve had with my mother since then, albeit rocky, but still very important in my life.

You may have seen an email, a banner ad, and a bunch of posts on InTheRooms.com and our Facebook page about the organization, “To Write Love On Her Arms.” This organization is currently the front runner in the “Chase Community Giving” contest being held on Facebook this week, with a chance to win $1,000,000.

Their plan is to develop a website called IMALIVE, a place online where people can go 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and speak to certified crisis prevention counselors via instant message. A large portion of the money won from Chase Community Giving will be used to train and certify people to answer messages on IMALIVE. At InTheRooms.com, we know the power of the internet can be used to change lives, we know it can be easier to send a message online than it is to make a phone call or speak to someone in person, and we know that this can make a significant impact on the world.

This cause is very close to my heart - no one should ever live without hope.