...I thought I'd write something up myself. This wouldn't be well researched or well written, more than likely, because it's getting later in the evening and it's personal experience.
For anyone who doesn't know or can't fathom how a severely depressed person feels, imagine the following. You feel worthless. Worse than worthless. You feel every breath you take is depriving oxygen from something better, worthier than you to breathe it. The only solace you might feel is that some plant can take in the carbon dioxide you exhale and use it to live. Every mistake you've made during the day, the week, your life, is propped up as a reason you are worse than worthless, you are a negative stain on existence. That clean spoon you dropped on the dirty floor, that customer request you messed up, failing to meet a minor deadline or match up to the ideals of how a normal person should act such as cleaning the litter box or doing the laundry in a timely manner, all of them prove how you make the world a worse place to be just by existing. Everyone you know somehow tolerates your mistakes, your needs, your screw-ups, your presence, but you know they'd all live happier, better lives if you were absent from the picture. Just by existing, you are harming them, and harming countless others you tangentially deal with. You have nothing to offer the world but more misery, more burdens, more problems, and it seems the world only gives back failure and pain.
At that point, if you felt that way, wouldn't you feel a little suicidal?
I can't say this is how it feels for every person who feels suicidal or depressed, but it is as I feel. I am a person, but I've also been diagnosed with Bipolar Type II. Years ago, I ceased taking medication both in the belief I didn't need it and a hope to join the military (which, by the way, fell through. I suspect they've gotten records of my mental health history, which is long and includes one suicide attempt so pathetic the hospital didn't even bandage the scratch on my wrist).
I do have a counselor, one I've known since he was my pastor and catechism teacher years ago. He's someone who'd even accept a call from me in the middle of a night I attempted to sleep without a sedative or alcohol, where all I wished to do was die to end the misery of existence. There are some diaries I've written here when I felt in such a way, channeling my loathing into written words, conducting them outward instead of letting them fester. I know now this is a problem. I, thankfully, now am available for Medicaid after losing then gaining a low paying job, and plan to see professionals to restart the medication I should never have ceased.
I'm not entirely certain what the point of this diary is, at the moment. Perhaps I feel the sympathetic misery emanating from stories such as this and this, knowing how easily I could become one of the victims in the story.
Know that you likely know someone who is mentally ill. Someone you'd never suspect. Someone who's fantastic at faking a smile, only occasionally coming in on a day they say they "don't feel good" or "got up on the wrong side of the bed," but they are just forcing themselves through existence. If you feel you don't know someone mentally ill, you are likely wrong. Helping those with mental illness is a fight for everyone, even those like me who dare not mention how I truly am when someone asks "How are you?" due to potential repercussions.
Everyone needs help on occasion. Those with illness, cancer, injuries, all get that understanding. We need to work together so that those problems that are "all in the head" get the same respect.
Thank you for reading. I'm sorry about how this turned into a rant.