Do we ultimately chose our end? When the pain and suffering eclipse everything in our field of vision and we no longer have an undistorted view. Is it choice then? Is it choice when the thoughts come out of the clear blue, no warning? When suffering is all that exists to a mind overwhelmed and pushed to the edge.

I don’t know why I think like I do. I couldn’t tell you exactly where the suicidal thoughts took seed. I know they have remained. Come good weeks or bad. Bottomless depression or routine day of work they remain. Sometimes I can get away with a day without them. Those are rare. Is that my choice? my doing? If it is what does that say about me and my head? Who in their right mind would want to think like that if given the choice not to? They are dark and awful. and on the worst of days beautiful and calming. As the stress climbs and the problems stack like cards my thoughts are often my only means of getting through that hour, or minute. I cannot accept life without an escape route. Virgil and Beatrice want to remove that exit. But what remains? To commit to suffering? overwhelm? fear? To leave my security behind? I know it is fucked up. I know suicide isn’t the answer. It is the permanent solution to a temporary problem. I know. I have been fed all of that. I understand that from an intellectual standpoint. It doesn’t hold when the going gets tough and the emotions and pain become too frightening. when life becomes a horror again. It gives me sanctuary. solace and peace in a cruel world.

My goal is never to harm. I do not want to hurt anyone. Most of all those that have stood by me for so long. I would not want them to suffer either. To choose to stay is to accept the suffering. To chose death is to hurt everyone. There is no okay ending here. Either way someone gets hurt. I have hurt a lot of people over the years. The relationships around me do suffer because of the choices I have made. Some more evident than others. I know that and it hurts.

In the end free will and choice is what we have. Good or bad. Right or wrong. I cannot judge a person for their choice to end their life. I know too well what type of pain leads a person to that place. It is a hard cold place where life has left you raw and used. Spent completely and unable to muster even the mildest of defenses. I understand that place. I don’t think I chose it. Maybe I just cannot see it from Virgil’s standpoint as I am so blinded by the years spent looking out from here. I don;t understand. I do know I think my survival depends on it. Sounds odd right? I need the suicidal thoughts to manage to get though life, yet those thoughts may ultimately end my life. It is a true double-edged sword so to speak.

I doubt they will ever leave me be. My thoughts will come uncalled on. They will be there in the rasp between breaths while running and on the backs of my eyelids as I slide off to sleep just as they always have been. A part of me. Can I be free of them? I don’t know.