Walking to raise awareness for suicide prevention

    Suicide wasn't an unfamiliar term growing up in my family or my life, but the impact of losing someone to suicide didn't fully hit me until I became an adult. 

On April 8th, 2015, a childhood friend of mine took his own life. We were so close growing up that I considered him like a brother. Our paths went different ways after high school, and we were fortunate enough to reconnect before his death.

After his passing, I couldn't shake the overwhelming grief. I felt immense sorrow for his family as if it were my own. I mourned for not being there for him as an adult, and I felt grief for walking away from him and his best friend, aka his “brother,” whom I loved with all my heart. The pain was soul-shattering, and words could not explain it.

Walking away was the hardest thing I ever had to do as a young adult, and it weighed heavier when he died. I felt so connected to both of them as a child, but I didn't understand why at the time. 

During all the years that I was silent in my friend’s life, I later learned that it was because I was running from my pain—pain that I felt from walking away from someone that I deeply loved. When my friend died, I could no longer run, and I was grieving two losses at once: losing a close friend and the pain of walking away from the man that I loved. 

I was never taught how to process and handle difficult emotions, so I did what I knew how to do. I partied and drank. I studied hard, and I worked tirelessly. I was doing anything I could to escape my pain. 

The anguish that I felt after my friend’s death impacted every part of my life for over a decade, wreaking havoc wherever it could. I experienced paralyzing anxiety. I was sick and self-sabotaging. I was angry at everything, and my life was imploding on itself.
 

Every adversity has its lessons, though. The biggest lesson I learned was that we cannot run from our pain; we can only prolong it.
 

After trying “all the things” to "fix" my external world, I realized that it was my soul that needed healing. It needed space to feel, and it needed time to grieve. I wasn’t progressing in life the way I wanted to because my pain was holding me back. My mind was keeping me stuck in a pain cycle because I was never taught how to release it.

When I was forced to look inward and heal from the inside out, I deepened my yoga practice, entered the world of meditation and mindfulness, and considered my inner health more carefully. I also embarked on a path that strengthened my relationship with God, Spirit, and the universe. As a result, I learned how to transform my pain into purpose, leading to the birth of a vision for my life. 

This path led me back to my authentic self, the person I had been avoiding for years. It forced me to eliminate anything unaligned with my soul’s mission in life; as of today, December 12th, 2024, I am THRIVING, regardless of my circumstances. 

It is hard to see anything outside of our pain when we feel trapped within it, but I write this story to show that the darkness doesn’t have to be the end.

Suicide is a tragic loss, and grief is an indescribable emotion. Healing from grief varies for everyone, yet our society has conditioned us to bury it, tough it out, or get over it. None of which works in the long run. 

If you are struggling to cope with grief or a loss, please don't hesitate to reach out for help and support. The effects of staying quiet, "getting over it," or "just moving on" are detrimental and can be life-altering. 

We were not put on this planet merely to survive—we are here to THRIVE!! We CAN turn our pain into purpose and come out feeling alive on the other side! 

If you are stuck or just want some information about coping with the loss of suicide, click on the link below 💞. My heart is with you, warrior 🦋!