Hi all,
I'm a new member that joined only or 5 minutes ago and this is my first post here.... best make it count :tongue: I'm a 28 year old Scot (frae Scotland) and its coming up to the 7th anniversary of my girlfriend's suicide.
What Happened:
Calamity. Disaster. Where to start? It was back at the turn of the century, we'd got together after meeting at a university club night. She'd been initially a friend of my flatmate and we sparked it off with an intensity i'd never known. Before long we were a couple with a strong burning fire in our hearts. We were happy.
New year (the big one) came and went.. great night .. and one i'll remember for all my life, it was then i told her that i loved her, for the first time, and she cried with joyous joy. It seems to me important to mention that because when i recount the day itself and the events leading up to her death, the implication seems otherwise.
The 2nd Feb was another day on campus. I'd finished being at lectures for the day and was planning to return to my flat in town (the uni was on the outskirts) and i spent the early afternoon at her place on campus at the uni halls of residence. We watched tv, talked, joked, all the usual things we got up to really. I got up to leave for my flat, with the certain knowledge that we'd be meeting later that night for drinks in the city and then she'd most likely come back to mine. It seems so childish to remember that i'd been anticipating buying a game for the playstation on my way home that day; my flatmate and i had been having a fierce driving tournament on Gran Turismo and the release of GT2 had promised us both an opportunity to reset the score and start afresh.. we'd both been looking forward to it. So i bought that game and when i got home, my flatmate and i began our new battles in earnest. Another crucial point to all this is that when i left my girlfriend's flat (her name was Carol, by the way), i'd left my mobile phone in her kitchen. This would later turn out to be a very, very significant part of the guilt that still haunts me.
Carol phoned me that evening at my flat. By then i'd realised that i'd left my phone and i'm so sure i'd said that. Looking back, its difficult to remember any part of that period with clarity. She'd forgotten that some friends from her home town were coming through to go clubbing and she was asking if i'd mind if she went out with them instead. It wasn't a problem, my flatmate and i were well entertained with our new game and as far as i was concerned, i would see her tomorrow, no problems. That was the last i ever spoke to her :sad: I didn't even say "i love you" at the end of the call because i said it to her a lot and didn't want it to lose its meaning.
So the next day i went to uni and to my lecture and then went over to her flat. Her flatmate was glad to see me because Carol had had a HUGE row with her friends from home that ended early that morning with everyone screaming at each other. I found my phone and saw i'd missed many, many calls from her and read the one text (also from Carol) saying, "I love you so much". I knocked on her bedroom door, which was locked, and assumed she was out and that she'd call again when she felt ready. I'd tried to call her so many times that day with no result. I concluded she'd gone home to her folk's place and to speak to her friends. I was so sure she'd call. On my way out to the car park, i saw her car there and that ended the thought that she'd gone home. I began to really feel something was wrong. Actually, i'd known something was wrong for a while. We texted each other a LOT (it cost a fortune) and i'd heard nothing from her since retrieving my phone, which was very odd.
So i went to the pub with my friends that night. They'd all asked where Carol was and i couldn't answer. I hated that. I wanted to know where she was and how she was and i just wanted her to be near.
I got home and somehow went to sleep feeling lost.
At sometime around 3am on the 4th Feb her flatmate called. When it transpired that she wasn't at home (her folks had called that night) the university wardens broke down her bedroom door. She'd suffocated herself.
To be honest, everything is a blur after that. I know i got a cab straight to the uni and met her folks and friends there (not her friends from home though). Like i say, everything is a haze and my next clear memory is at her folk's home just before the funeral. I'd been really confused by how they spoke about her as if we were about to see her again, then they led ne through to her room and it was an open casket. I broke down, no other word for it. I held her hand and wept like never before in my life. Broken and sick, i felt.
Words fail me.
So now, 7 years on, i ask how i feel? In many ways i feel i'll never fully recover from her... and in many ways, i don't want to. The thing is, i don't feel a better person for the experience. If asked whether i feel it damaged my life i'd answer with a resounding yes. Life took on a newer meaning, i became obsessed with never leaving my phone anywhere and i took to drugs to take me away from it all. I left my job as an intelligence clerk with the royal auxilary air force (similar to the air national guard) and, because of the drugs, got a degree that .. well, frankly, i could've done a lot better. Though i don't blame Carol for any of this, these were choices that i made.
So whats my point? I guess that why i'm here! Some days i just can't stop thinking about her. About how pointless it all was. How tragic. I can't blame myself for not having my phone with me 24/7. I can't blame myself for not being able to help her when she needed me. I can't blame myself for wanting to play a stupid game with my flatmate. Yet i do. I so do.
A couple of times, i've suffered from very bad moments of self directed violence. Self Harming, i suppose. Again, words fail me. Thats subsided now as i realised a couple of years ago that there's no point in having a physical scar to wear with my mental scar like it was some sort of jewellery.
7 years. Time flies doesn't it?
I'm not out of the woods yet. I appear to be standing in scrubland.
Jamie
I'm a new member that joined only or 5 minutes ago and this is my first post here.... best make it count :tongue: I'm a 28 year old Scot (frae Scotland) and its coming up to the 7th anniversary of my girlfriend's suicide.
What Happened:
Calamity. Disaster. Where to start? It was back at the turn of the century, we'd got together after meeting at a university club night. She'd been initially a friend of my flatmate and we sparked it off with an intensity i'd never known. Before long we were a couple with a strong burning fire in our hearts. We were happy.
New year (the big one) came and went.. great night .. and one i'll remember for all my life, it was then i told her that i loved her, for the first time, and she cried with joyous joy. It seems to me important to mention that because when i recount the day itself and the events leading up to her death, the implication seems otherwise.
The 2nd Feb was another day on campus. I'd finished being at lectures for the day and was planning to return to my flat in town (the uni was on the outskirts) and i spent the early afternoon at her place on campus at the uni halls of residence. We watched tv, talked, joked, all the usual things we got up to really. I got up to leave for my flat, with the certain knowledge that we'd be meeting later that night for drinks in the city and then she'd most likely come back to mine. It seems so childish to remember that i'd been anticipating buying a game for the playstation on my way home that day; my flatmate and i had been having a fierce driving tournament on Gran Turismo and the release of GT2 had promised us both an opportunity to reset the score and start afresh.. we'd both been looking forward to it. So i bought that game and when i got home, my flatmate and i began our new battles in earnest. Another crucial point to all this is that when i left my girlfriend's flat (her name was Carol, by the way), i'd left my mobile phone in her kitchen. This would later turn out to be a very, very significant part of the guilt that still haunts me.
Carol phoned me that evening at my flat. By then i'd realised that i'd left my phone and i'm so sure i'd said that. Looking back, its difficult to remember any part of that period with clarity. She'd forgotten that some friends from her home town were coming through to go clubbing and she was asking if i'd mind if she went out with them instead. It wasn't a problem, my flatmate and i were well entertained with our new game and as far as i was concerned, i would see her tomorrow, no problems. That was the last i ever spoke to her :sad: I didn't even say "i love you" at the end of the call because i said it to her a lot and didn't want it to lose its meaning.
So the next day i went to uni and to my lecture and then went over to her flat. Her flatmate was glad to see me because Carol had had a HUGE row with her friends from home that ended early that morning with everyone screaming at each other. I found my phone and saw i'd missed many, many calls from her and read the one text (also from Carol) saying, "I love you so much". I knocked on her bedroom door, which was locked, and assumed she was out and that she'd call again when she felt ready. I'd tried to call her so many times that day with no result. I concluded she'd gone home to her folk's place and to speak to her friends. I was so sure she'd call. On my way out to the car park, i saw her car there and that ended the thought that she'd gone home. I began to really feel something was wrong. Actually, i'd known something was wrong for a while. We texted each other a LOT (it cost a fortune) and i'd heard nothing from her since retrieving my phone, which was very odd.
So i went to the pub with my friends that night. They'd all asked where Carol was and i couldn't answer. I hated that. I wanted to know where she was and how she was and i just wanted her to be near.
I got home and somehow went to sleep feeling lost.
At sometime around 3am on the 4th Feb her flatmate called. When it transpired that she wasn't at home (her folks had called that night) the university wardens broke down her bedroom door. She'd suffocated herself.
To be honest, everything is a blur after that. I know i got a cab straight to the uni and met her folks and friends there (not her friends from home though). Like i say, everything is a haze and my next clear memory is at her folk's home just before the funeral. I'd been really confused by how they spoke about her as if we were about to see her again, then they led ne through to her room and it was an open casket. I broke down, no other word for it. I held her hand and wept like never before in my life. Broken and sick, i felt.
Words fail me.
So now, 7 years on, i ask how i feel? In many ways i feel i'll never fully recover from her... and in many ways, i don't want to. The thing is, i don't feel a better person for the experience. If asked whether i feel it damaged my life i'd answer with a resounding yes. Life took on a newer meaning, i became obsessed with never leaving my phone anywhere and i took to drugs to take me away from it all. I left my job as an intelligence clerk with the royal auxilary air force (similar to the air national guard) and, because of the drugs, got a degree that .. well, frankly, i could've done a lot better. Though i don't blame Carol for any of this, these were choices that i made.
So whats my point? I guess that why i'm here! Some days i just can't stop thinking about her. About how pointless it all was. How tragic. I can't blame myself for not having my phone with me 24/7. I can't blame myself for not being able to help her when she needed me. I can't blame myself for wanting to play a stupid game with my flatmate. Yet i do. I so do.
A couple of times, i've suffered from very bad moments of self directed violence. Self Harming, i suppose. Again, words fail me. Thats subsided now as i realised a couple of years ago that there's no point in having a physical scar to wear with my mental scar like it was some sort of jewellery.
7 years. Time flies doesn't it?
I'm not out of the woods yet. I appear to be standing in scrubland.
Jamie