You matter. It's OK to ask for help.

 A few days ago, I posted on Facebook asking my friends for help regarding an assignment my son had for his high-school English class.  He was asked to write about an issue using opinions and feelings, not just using numbers and statistics.  He chose to write about suicide, and so I asked friends and family for their opinions on how prevalent suicide is as an issue, and whether or not they had been affected by it and how.  

The responses I got floored me.  My heart hurt so much with my friends and for my friends who responded, and I realized that this problem is much bigger than I thought.  Many of my friends have family members who have attempted or committed suicide.  A few of my friends have attempted it themselves, and some just thought about it during their darkest, bleakest times. Almost all my friends have been personally impacted: themselves, a friend, a family member, a student, a teacher--someone they cared about either seriously considered, attempted, or committed suicide. 

As I lie awake at 3 AM this morning, a million thoughts fill my head, but one that I can't shake is that people need to know about this.  I have drawn a few conclusions, and I think it would help me go back to sleep if I write them out, and share them with whoever is willing to read them.  More people need to be comfortable talking about the times when they struggle or feel really alone, and also about mental health problems.

I'm sad that there is now a stigma associated with the phrase "all lives matter", as if it is an anti-black sentiment or a banner to ignore the fact that many people aren't given fair chances.  (I say fact because I've seen it first-hand.  If you've ever known someone who was raised in a "ghetto" area, you'll know that they really do face challenges that many regular middle class families don't.  Fact.)  The reason I am writing this, though is because all lives really do matter.  And every person needs to know that they are a part of that.

There is a really great explanation for the basic needs of all human beings, and I didn't create it.  It was identified by Abraham Maslow years ago.  The basic gist: we all have a very similar set of needs, but where we all lie on the pyramid of needs is different, depending on our personal circumstances.  If our baser needs are not met, we can not address needs higher up on the pyramid.  So those of us who have been so blessed to have lived our whole lives feeling safe, not wondering where our next meal will come from, having clean drinking water etc. are often much more concerned with the needs higher up on the pyramid, such as our self worth, finding ways to be creative, reading about issues and forming opinions, etc.

J. Finkelstein [GFDL or CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

When we are used to being in one spot on the pyramid and something shakes us up, it can really knock us down considerably, taking us back to worrying about the barest and basest of needs. If a beloved family member dies, it can sometimes knock us down from a place of love/belonging to only worrying about our safety and physiological needs.  If a person was taken from us in a way that makes us feel unsafe (killed, kidnapped) our very basic needs feel threatened and it is hard for us to be concerned with the other needs higher up.  And many people struggle to handle a drop from one level to another, it makes us feel like we aren't worth anything if all we are worrying about is our very basic needs, when we've been used to being in a place where we felt loved, respected, and confident.  This can be one reason people want to commit suicide.  When all we worry about is our basest needs, we stop recognizing our value as an individual, we're just like any other animal or life form out there, struggling to survive and using resources (like food or shelter).  It's hard to see past the end of the struggle to a time/place when life will get better and we can be in a place where we are more "ourselves" again and not just a person struggling to survive.  

Here is a beautiful post from someone that I look up to, pointing out that she is now seeing the "better days" she almost missed.  Most people who attempted suicide and didn't succeed feel similarly.  They are glad they are still here.  They can see what they would have missed.

For some people, even people who seem "normal", their mental health issues make it hard for them to ever live beyond the base of the pyramid.  Even when they do things that should give them a sense of accomplishment, they struggle.  Some people feel anxious and nervous all the time.  For some people with depression, just doing those basic things (taking care of food, shelter, etc) feels like such an insurmountable task, doomed to failure, that they just don't/can't.  Their brain and body have a literal chemical imbalance where they need help to be able to function.  We need the right balance of chemicals in our bodies.  Many people need either therapy or medication or both.  Therapy works when our body is actually capable of producing the right chemicals, perhaps a person may just need some training on how to recognize and solve problems in their life, or how to recognize and root out insecurities or issues, isolate them, and realize their worth as a person goes above and beyond that, but sometimes medication is needed because a person literally can not make the right balance of chemicals their body needs. There should never be any shame in this.  Somehow, there seems to be a stigma, a shame associated with needing therapy or needing medication for depression or anxiety or other mental illnesses.  If there is no stigma for needing insulin, if there is no stigma for needing thyroid medication, then there should not be a stigma for needing medication for mental health.  I do understand that sometimes people who probably don't need medication (particularly drugs prescribed for anxiety or depression) are abusing it, or are prescribed it as a band-aid for a problem that may be better solved through therapy or other life changes, and perhaps that is where the negative stigma comes from.  I believe that stigma does more harm than good though. 

Here's another weird thing that does more harm than good.  Why do we consider it such a bad thing to ask for help?  Or even worse, when someone offers us help, why do we so frequently turn them down, instead of actually saying "I could use the help, but I don't even know what to ask for."  Many of us are blessed with friends and family who sincerely want to help us through our hard times, and it's OK to admit that we are human and can use help sometimes.  We are all human, and in this world of "I have a perfect life" on social media posting, we hvae lost touch with reality.  Most of us are so fiercely independent and don't want to be looked down on, so we just won't ask for help when we could truly use it, or even acknowledge that we are struggling until we are nearly drowning in struggles.  I'm sure we've all known a few people in life who seemed like "takers", and none of us want to be "that guy".  Really, though, while independence is a really great thing and something most of us are striving for as human beings, we've forgotten that no man is an island and we are all truly interdependent.  There is nothing wrong with needing help, that's part of being a human being.  It's OK to ask for a listening ear, or a hug.  It's OK to ask for help running an errand, or for help on a project that's too big to handle alone.  And sometimes "ourselves" are a project that is too big to handle alone.  We need to give ourselves some grace, to allow others to make up the difference when we are having a hard time.  It's OK to not be OK sometimes.  

If a friend asks what they can do to help, don't tell them "I'm fine" or "Thanks, but I got this."  Things you (and I) could and probably should respond.  "I could use help, but I don't want to take up too much of your time.  If you don't have a lot of time, could we chat for 5 minutes?" "I think I'm OK right now, but it is hard, please text me in a week to check on me."  (Or if you're a hugger like me, you may ask for a hug instead.)  "I could use help, but I am so overwhelmed that I honestly don't know what I need."  "Thank you for noticing that I am struggling.  This is a really hard time in my life." "I want to take you up on your offer to help, do you have something in mind?"  Seriously, I've been in a place (more than once) where I needed help, and I had NO IDEA what kind of help I needed.  I think it's not always easy for us to identify what is happening (we're pretty multi-faceted) and so pinpointing some exact way someone could help isn't easy.  Admitting that you could use help, though, is an incredibly liberating thing, and it's HUMAN.   

I've had good friends who offered help and when I said "thank you, I do feel overwhelmed and I need help, but I don't know what to ask for", I've had people step up and help in the ways they are most comfortable.  For example, when I went to the hospital to have Gideon, they had seen in an ultrasound that he wasn't doing well, and then we had the week where he was in the NICU, and then he passed away and we planned a funeral, and then the grief afterward.  It was a very difficult road for months.  Many people wanted to help, and I didn't have the wherewithal to coordinate what people could do to help me.  I appreciated people reaching out and offering, and I let many of them come up with their own idea of what they could do.  One friend asked for my kids lists of school supplies and she bought all their back-to-school stuff for me.  Meals were brought in (some very thoughtful friends created freezer meals for us, so that when I was feeling overwhelmed, I could throw one in the oven for a few hours and have a yummy meal, made at home, but not through much effort of my own.) Some neighbors and family babysat my other kids for me while I went to the hospital, and some people came in and helped my kids clean up the house while I was at the hospital.  Some people helped by giving us gift cards to restaurants (knowing we'd be overwhelmed and busy and that we could use them as needed) some people gave us money knowing medical bills and funeral expenses are a lot, and some people came and did yard work.  We had so many people rally.  And I could've felt like I was a "taker" for receiving so much help, but what I decided to do was to be willing to pay it forward.  I am still paying forward the kindness and love that we received during our hardest times.  It's OK to need things sometimes, and to decide to pay it forward one day when life looks up.  We are interdependent, not just independent.  Let people help.  Ask for help.  It is not weak to admit that you are human, it is strong.  There is so much strength in admitting that you don't have everything under control.

One other thing I observed in reading my friends' responses is that many of those who decided not to attempt suicide were able to remember that life is bigger than their own self, right here, right now.  They thought of the friends or family who might find them and how devastating or traumatic it might be.  They thought of the future and that maybe things could and would change. (Change is inevitable, we all know that.  If it's really dark right now, light is probably in your future.) Those who attempted were very stuck in their own head, very stuck in their own grief, very stuck in the moment.  They can look back now and see it, and are glad that they did not succeed.  Learning to think outside of yourself, outside of right now is a very good suicide prevention.  As a mom, this is something I want to make sure I help my kids learn, to help protect them from those dark times that will probably be a part of their lives at some point.  

Hang in there.  Ask for help.  Accept help.  Know you are loved.  You matter.  It might be dark now, but light will come.  Grief hurts and it ebbs and flows, but there are moments beyond this one.  Getting help is not weak, it takes strength.