I have been where you are. Maybe farther, because I remember waking up in the hospital where the first words I could make out were that I was being transferred to psych based on the severity of my attempt. What they didn't understand is that it wasn't an attempt more than a failure.

For me, there was no hope. I suffered for years from a debilitating panic disorder which cost me my family, my friends, my home, my cars, my life. I had nothing left. The world to me was as it seems to you, made up. It was made for the chosen ones, the lucky ones, the ones who got the lives they wanted and the love the needed. The ones who didn't live their days in fear. But that's not us, is it?

After being crafty enough to convince my care-takers that I was no longer a threat, I was released. I left with a bags of pills to manage my depression and as I walked out of the building, I threw them in the first can I saw. Then I went home to try again. I wouldn't reach out, as you have. I wouldn't make any calls or write any notes. I was done.

But something occurred to me as I sat in my borrowed apartment, concocting the apparatus of my demise. It was a voice, only it wasn't in my head, it was a real voice, the voice of a young man that was in the ward with me just a day before. I remembered him as the one who brought me a pillow on my first day in the unit. He tucked it near my head as I lay in a ball on the bed and he rubbed my shoulder for a second and he said, "You're going to be okay. I promise." I wouldn't feel it for a few days, but when I did, I realized that it was the most astonishing acts of compassion I'd ever known. Because it wasn't simply what he said, it was what he meant.

I got to know Rob over the course of my stay and I learned that he was a lot like me. He was there for the same reason. We talked about our reasons, and he shared an impossibly sad story of a life that had never been right. He never belonged. He never got what he wanted or had the love he needed. And so when he made the decision to leave, he did so without much fanfare. His method was admittedly ill-conceived and he laughed about it then. He was going to throw himself from a rail bridge onto a set of tracks below just as a train came through. The fall itself likely wouldn't have done it, but the train sure would have. He crossed his eyes, grew a funny grin and said, "How did I know those tracks were out of service".

He told me about the man that found him there. He was a cop, but he wasn't a cop, he worked for the police department, but not as an officer. It didn't matter. He sat on that rail bridge with Rob all night, and he listened to him. He didn't judge. He didn't tell him that things would be better in the morning. He didn't make any promises at all. He just sat with him.

By dawn, they agreed that Rob would go with him for help. The man stayed with Rob through the process and had visited him since. Rob choked up a bit when he assured me, "He's a good man".

The difference between Rob and me at that point wasn't clear. He was committed to the care he was getting, and not trying, as I had, to con his way out. He was interested in life again, and wanted to learn more about what it might take to be lucky. He felt, maybe for the first time, that it was possible.

So there I was, in my borrowed apartment, remembering what Rob told me. He explained the feeling of owing a debit, a very personal debit, for the first time in his life. He said of this man who saved him, "I can't let him down".

As I was leaving that day, Rob said the same thing, only he said it to me. "Don't let me down, Tony."

That was four years ago.

I haven't let Rob down. I didn't let him down that night because I knew he needed me to succeed. I knew he'd somehow find out that I failed him, and I knew he would lose a bit of hope. Hope was all he had. And so hope became all I had too.

It was a connection, a very human connection, that I had never before made in my life. These were people that may not stay close by on the road ahead, but in the moment, they loved me. It wasn't perfect. It wasn't typical. But you can never tell me that it wasn't real.

The connection was enough for me to try again. I know where you are, Donut, and I'm not going to lie to you. This isn't the time for that. But I need you to trust me when I tell you that there's hope. I couldn't have been farther gone than I was, but I'm here and I'm alive. And I feel every part of that.

I have friends now, I have a great job, a home of my own. I just bought a truck. My life isn't perfect because I still have my dragons to slay, I still suffer with GAD and I need to manage it. But I figured out how to be happy and the journey was worth it. Well, well worth it. And so is yours.

I've read the carefully written and well meaning comments in this thread and it seems to me that we all love you, donut. It may not be typical, but it's real. So please... don't let us down.