I think my mistake was staying so close to home. Maybe if I had gone to a college further away, things would have been different. I was never able to fully escape the misery of high school, the people who made it so, and the family I was afraid of shaming.
I guess that’s water under the bridge now.
I was 23 and beginning my final year of college, a small liberal arts college in a rural community in the county where I grew up. My grades were really good. I had the respect of my professors and my academic peers. I had some school trips to look forward to. After years of dealing with bullying, depression and shame—the latter a consequence of my religious upbringing—I felt that I was finally in a place where I could really begin to love myself and enjoy my life.
I didn’t know it at the time, but an evening watching TV at my friend’s house would launch my torment. We were sitting in her living room, in a large house she shared with several others, when her roommate came home, her middle school-aged younger brother in tow. She came into the living room and introduced him to the two of us before heading to her room. As she walked up the stairs, I heard him say something about “that faggot”. My friend was so angry she wanted to confront her roommate, but I insisted it wasn’t worth it, that the boy was growing up in a world where his attitudes were becoming a thing of the past. Just forget about it, I said.
The next Monday morning, I was walking from my off-campus apartment to my 8am class. As I walked down the block, I noticed a group of children waiting for their school bus, among them, the homophobic little brother of my friend’s roommate. He saw me, too. Just as I walked by, he pointed his finger and yelled, “Hey look, its Bobby, the faggot.”
I didn’t pause. I didn’t blink. I acted as though I didn’t hear what was said. I just kept going. Fortunately, it was early in the morning—around 7:30am—and no one was around to hear their taunting. I tried to shake it off, but it really bothered me.
Two days later, I had my 8am class again. I left at my usual time, but this time I walked down the other side of the street. Once again, as I walked by on the other side of the street, the boy called out, “Hey Bobby, are you gay? Why are you gay?” The other children laughed, as I continued on, pretending that I hadn’t heard a thing. At first I thought if I ignored them, they would get bored with it, so two days later, on Friday morning, I followed the same path on the opposite side of the street. This time, two of the children yelled at me as I walked by.
I continued on to class, but the weekend was difficult. I was very upset about what was happening to me, but to whom could I confide? How could I tell someone that I was being taunted by children at the age of 23? I was a grown man, but I was being tormented by children?
On Monday morning, I decided to take a different route to class. I walked out the back door of my apartment and walked down the alley. If the children didn’t notice me as I crossed the street near the intersection by their bus stop, I would be okay. But they did. And they knew I was hiding from them.
Twenty-three years old and I was hiding from children for taunting me about my perceived sexual orientation. That night, in the privacy of my home, I wept uncontrollably. Two realizations hit me at the same time. First, they were taunting me because I was gay. And that was the first time I really understood the treatment as an act of discrimination. If you’ve never been the victim of discrimination, if you’ve never had that realization, you won’t understand that feeling, that feeling of despair, of helplessness, of confusion.
Second, I was being bullied by school children at the age of 23. I’d dealt with this before, in middle school and high school. But as an adult? A grown man in his senior year of college? When would it end? Would it ever end?
When I was in middle school, I told myself that high school would be better. And it wasn’t. In high school, I told myself that college would be better. And it was, for the most part. My first year in the dorms was rough, but things were better when I lived off-campus. And now I wondered, “Would it ever end? Is this my life?”
I sunk into a deep depression.
I’d been treated for depression before, but this time was different. Before, I just needed to see that it could get better. Now I was dealing with the possibility that it never would. And if I couldn’t deal with a bunch of children, how could I ever cope with the rest of the world.
There was a tree. I passed it every day coming home from work. It was just off a stretch of road coming off a tight bend near my school. My college was way out in the sticks.
There was a tree. A couple of people—drunk drivers—had lost control of their cars coming out of the tight turn and crashed into the tree. Nobody ever died. One person missed the tree and ended up in some guy’s corn field.
Every day I passed the tree and I stared at it.
Would the tree be my redemption? I could drive fast coming out of the bend and make it look like an accident…
One night coming home from work, I stopped my car and I stared at the tree. The leaves had just begun to fall. I felt so safe under the tree. I ran my hands along the bark. I decided that my next trip would be it.
The next evening, I had a family event. By this point, I was carrying a flask and spiking everything with vodka. I told my parents I was too tired to drive back to school, but I was drunk and I didn’t want to see the tree. I hugged my father before I went to bed and he said, “I love you, son.” I ran into my bedroom and wept. “Oh my God,” I thought, ”I want to kill my father’s son.”
The next day was the day. I had to go to work. I had my 8am class—by now, to avoid the children, I was driving to a parking lot that created an even longer trek than walking from home.
Who goes to an 8am class on the day he is going to kill himself? Or an evening shift at the restaurant?
I had a strange sense of peace that day. My colleagues even noted that they hadn’t seen me so relaxed in a while.
I didn’t usually smoke in my car, but I had one on my home that evening. I was more nervous than I wanted to admit.
I stopped as I approached the turn and began to cry. I wasn’t sure if I could do this. I began to ask myself if it was the right thing. Without really thinking, I pressed the gas pedal.
I accelerated out of the turn and then slammed on the brakes. I pulled my car off the side of the road, got out, and sat down in front of the tree. I sat there weeping for a while. I realized that my desire to stop living had been defeated by my instinct to survive. I was powerless to overcome it.
I know they say that suicide is the easy way out; that only cowards do it. But since that night, I’ve had trouble saying that anyone who takes his/her life is a coward. It’s hard to take a human life, even your own.
For a while I hated myself even more. I was too chickenshit to stand up to the children and I was too weak to end my worthless life.
A few days later, I had nightmare. I saw my future. Alcoholism. Loneliness. A dead-end job. For a long time, I’d had little hope for my future, but that night I lived it in the most vivid and frightening manner possible. When I woke the next morning, I picked up the phone and I got help.
The road back wasn’t easy. It’s been many years since the night I wept under that tree. The despair and hopelessness seem so far away. But if I close my eyes, I can smell the crisp air of that October evening. And I can feel the tears rolling down my cheeks.
This is what shame can do to a person.
I’m sorry I can’t share my story in my own name, but I just couldn’t muster the courage.
Note from psychodrew: The author of tonight's diary has chosen to remain anonymous.