When I was a kid, my parents were the embodiment of love. They were perfect for each other. So much so that they decided to get married just six weeks after meeting. A year and some change later, I was born.
I grew up anxious and awkward, but in a relatively happy home. My struggles with mental illness began in elementary school; my parents were very supportive and got me the help I needed. I was diagnosed with OCD, generalized anxiety and, later, depression. I’ve been medicated for years and I consider it under control, but it is still a prominent factor in my life.
By the end of high school, I had noticed my parents spending more and more time apart, occasionally fighting. By college, I noticed it even more. But even then, my perception of them as the perfect couple, made for one another, remained. I thought, it’s a phase. They’ll get past it. The d-word never crossed my mind.
Summer 2010. My aunt, her husband and their kids moved back from Oklahoma. My parents agreed to let them stay with us until they could find a place and get back on their feet.
August 2010. I began my sophomore year of college. Tension was building. My brother’s problems with Caroline began around this time, and part of me blamed her for stressing my parents’ relationship. I knew something was wrong, but I still thought they’d work past it. I moved into a dorm with Tessa, who had quickly become my best friend after meeting in freshman orientation the year before. We soon discovered that we work better as friends than roommates. There was a lot of fighting that year, but our friendship survived and is stronger than ever today.
Late August, mid-September 2010. I had the most incredible meet-cute moment with the most adorable guy at the library on main campus. I hate calling it that, because it makes it seem silly and girlish when what came from it was easily the best relationship I’ve had to date, but it’s the best way I can think to describe it. By the end of September we were officially dating, and we were together until November 2012.
September-October 2010. My oldest cousin, Leah, finally stood up to her mom about her stepfather. I’ve not been told the whole story, so I don’t know the extent of what happened, but there was sexual abuse of some kind. They split up, he moved back to Oklahoma. Since then, there has been child support and custody battles over the younger two, who are his biological children. As of now he calls them occasionally, but has not seen them in person in years.
October 2010. I heard after the fact that my dad and aunt had to pick my mom up late one night from a parking lot. She had taken more Klonopin than she should have — that is, more than was prescribed, but not enough to OD. I think this never really sank in, because years later she told me she was trying to kill herself. (Honestly, I’m not entirely sure I believe her. She knows a lot about mental health and she knows the difference between a cry for help and an honest-to-God suicide attempt, and this was clearly more a cry for help. If she’d really wanted to, she would have succeeded.) While she’s suffered from depression all her life and has been medicated on and off for it, I’m sure that the stress of fighting with my dad triggered a lot of this. She knew that something was very wrong, and she knew there was nothing she could do about it.
The next month, everything came to a head.
Dramily Matters 