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"...always
talk..."
In April 1999, my best friend, Marsha, died of a drug
overdose. I remember that evening as clear as anything, it had
been raining non-stop for hours. At two o’clock that
afternoon, my mother told me what had happened and I remember
feeling nothing. I didn’t cry, I just remained silent. I could
see the compassion and sadness in my mother’s eyes as she
pulled me close, but still I felt nothing at all.
It was so embarrassing because everyone was crying at the
memorial service except me. I hadn’t got the inner strength to
cry. Since the evening of her death, I was weak and unable to speak,
unable to cry. I virtually stopped living that day, I felt as if
I had gone to heaven with Marsha. Nothing in reality made sense
anymore. Life was such a blur.
I felt so angry and confused with what had happened and I
began to withdraw from everything around me. I didn’t go to
school and I didn’t go out with my other friends. All I did
was pray that one day I would wake up and realise that this was
all a bad dream.
The harsh reality of it all was it wasn’t a bad dream, and
the only way I could get out of it was to talk to someone about
it. For a long time I had refused to talk to anyone. I always
said that they would never understand what I was going through.
My family continued to tell me that I didn’t have to go
through all this alone and that they would help me.
Eventually I agreed to see a therapist twice weekly. It didn’t
start out all that great but then I began to realise that I wasn’t
the only one who really missed Marsha and I wasn’t the only
one who questioned her death. Her family were also in emotional
turmoil over her death but I was too full of self-pity to notice
that. The therapist told me to ask myself if Marsha would have
wanted me to stop living and grieve for her every day. Quite
simply, the answer was no.
Marsha had problems, and because of these
problems she gave up and killed herself, but I can honestly say
that two years on I know in my heart that Marsha wouldn’t have
wanted me to behave as I did. She would have wanted me to
continue living my life as though she were still there.
I have now come to terms with Marsha’s death. Sometimes I
still question why Marsha is gone. But Marsha isn’t gone
forever because part of her lives on in every memory I have of
the times we spent together.
So don’t keep something like this to yourself. You are not
the only one who has to deal with a problem like this. Talk to
someone who understands. Remember the old saying:
"A
problem shared is a problem halved."
- Elizabeth Foley (age 15)
County Wicklow, Republic of Ireland.
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