I will be gone

[Iwillbegone]

I have a wonderful DH (together for 13 years, married 5) and a DS (3).
I have failed as an individual all my life, I was bullied in school, I’m a complete average, I haven’t managed to achieve anything as I just drift from one job to another (I have reasonably long term jobs but by ‘drifting’ I mean none of them have been fulfilling in anyway and I’ve always found myself unhappy). I have failed as a mother, I struggled to bond with my DS when he was born. I felt depressed already when I was pregnant as I struggled with the change in my relationship to my family (parents, sisters). I’ve always been very submissive in my relationships and allowed others to define my happiness.
I had to go back to work when DS was 10 months old, which I thought was too soon. I feel like I have missed out on his life, I feel distant from him most days. As a matter of fact, I don't feel like his mum. I have felt like a provider only (first milk, now money – as my DH is a SAHD). I feel like I am not a parent, an equal parent. I suffered from PND, never officially diagnosed but I was very down and suicidal. We moved to a new city when DS was 10 months as we wanted something better for him and us as a family. I found a better paying job and my DH has stayed at home since. I know that this has been both wonderful (to get to bond and spend time with our DS) and stressful for him, as he’s trying to find work. After we moved, our relationship was under a lot of pressure and it changed. I felt like my DH changed. I tried to discuss our issues many times but felt like DH ignored me and distanced himself from me. I felt betrayed and alone. I considered suicide many times and in hindsight; I wish I had killed myself then.
Instead, I go and fail as a wife. I started an affair which lasted many months. My DH eventually found out. I had been a loyal wife to him from the very beginning. To me, I was ‘married’ to him as soon as I fell in love with him and I was never interested in even looking at anyone else. I have always been strongly against cheating. I never needed that paper, that ring, to be his ‘wife’, but was so happy and proud to marry him. Our relationship hasn't been without problems over the years, we had years of pressure and problems from his ex. Our sex life was affected by my loss of self-confidence and interest in intimacy. But I was loyal, that was something you could not take away from me. Now I have completely ruined everything. I have woken up to this nightmare, which should have never happened to us. It is so out of character for me to do something like this. I cannot emphasize this enough. I feel like I must have been possessed by evil to have done this as I would have never even considered doing something like that and would never do anything like it again.
I know my DH and DS will be better off without me. I know I am a coward to be considering suicide as I have committed something so terrible and now I’m considering leaving my DH to deal with it all. I wish I never existed. My only accomplishment is to have carried that child for my DH to cherish when I am gone.
The only reason I keep going for now is to continue to save some money to help my DH and DS carry on when I’m gone. Also, I guess, I’m not too certain yet on the method I wish to use to kill myself. I don't want it to be messy and wish I could just disappear without leaving a body as I don't see the point in all those unnecessary arrangements when I’m dead (funeral etc). I think now is a good time to go as DS will have limited memory of me and his whole life ahead to grow up without me. I used to be so scared of dying but now I look forward to it.

Hello
Please don't do anything. You are valued, you are needed. Your DH and DS will not be better off without you.

I don't know how to help you but can you talk to someone? Is there anyone you can talk to right now?

I'm sure someone with more experience will be along soon, but I'm so sorry you feel like this.
You sound as though the PND was never resolved and that you're still depressed.
Please, please see your GP, or call the Samaritans and reach out for help.
The feeling that it was 'someone else' taking those actions could be depression. This can be helped, and you can get back to being 'you' again.
Your DS needs YOU - you're the only Mum he gets. He and your DH will not be better off without you, that's the depression talking, and that can be treated.

Keep talking here, there's lots of support.

From the Samaritans website

CALL US
116 123 (UK)
116 123 (ROI)
If there's something troubling you, then get in touch.

We're here 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. If you need a response immediately, it's best to call us on the phone. This number is FREE to call.

EMAIL US
[email protected]

I have nothing else to add except that you sound very unwell, my lovely. Please go and see your GP and keep talking on here.

As others have said please call and speak to someone. It sounds very much like you have severe one that has gone untreated. Call Samaritans and call your doctors. You can find yourself again but you need help. Please ask for it xx

You can get better and you will get better. Life will be better. I can promise you that.
I was where you are now.
Please talk to someone.

I have had the blinkers on and reached tunnel vision where I believed the only way out was ending it.
The drive was strong and consumed me.
I failed to do it and ended up in hospital for 3 weeks.

I am SO SO SO releived and thankful that I did not do it.

Life can turn around.

Please don't do it. You are valued, loved and important. You will come through this a stronger person.

You are your son's mother - he will never have another. He will spend his adult life missing you and wondering about you. Please get some help - life is complicated and we all fall down and make mistakes, you're definitely not alone.

Please, please get some help

The trouble with mental health is that even when we are very unwell we can still feel that our chains of thought are leading to completely logical conclusions. But they are not. As people outside of what you are experiencing it easy to see that your thoughts are so desperate because you are unwell. The illness changes how you think and how you reflect on all the events of your life. I've been in that place and it's horrible and painful but I'm not there anymore and I can see how close I came to making a very terrible decision on grounds that seemed very rational at the time but looking back were a very bad bout of depression skewing everything. I was completely wrong but I thought I was right at the time. I thought I was causing untold damage and that everyone would be better off without me. The idea of being a rubbish mother was, to the very brink, almost too much to bear. I wasn't bad or damaging my children or a terrible mother. I was ill.

Please speak to someone about these feelings. There is a way back from the place that you are at but you need some help getting there. Please get that help. I was in your position three years ago and I'm not there anymore. Things that I didn't think, at the time, could ever be fixed got better. Life got better. Don't give up hope.

Thank you all for your responses, I really appreciate them.
I don't really have anyone to talk to. We don't live in UK anymore, but I guess I could email Samaritans. What would I even tell my doctor?

And you see, my DH is a very handsome, charming man and would have no trouble finding someone who is more beautiful, loving and loyal than me, someone who could be a good mum to our DS. I have nothing to live for now that I have ruined everything. I used to live for my DH and DS but now that I've let them down....I've lost everything, failed everything.

Forgiveness is a powerful and beautiful thing.
Your DH may well forgive you, but you need to forgive yourself.
People screw up all the time. I've screwed up big time too. Hurt people, done some terrible things.

But you move on, you learn, you forgive, you try again.

Ending it is never the answer. You need to speak to someone. Yes a GP can help. Your family need you.

None of the things you have said are an excuse for going. Your children need you, even if you cannot take as full a role as you would like in their lives. They want you, they love you, no-one else will ever be their mum. My mum was suicidal and had a few goes at killing herself. Even though our relationship was far from perfect, I'm glad she lived her whole life, not just part of it.

Show your doctor your opening post. He will know what to do. You take the medication and other help offered. You will gradually get a bit better.

Get some hypnotherapy, not from someone who has watched a dvd about it, but from a clinical psychologist. I had that, about six sessions, it was hell but it took away the urge to commit suicide almost completely. and I was further down the line than you, I knew how, I had the equipment, I was just waiting for the 'right' time. the hypnotherapy also programmed me to recognise joy when I feel it. it was a horrible experience, I lost a lot of my personality but the new me - the dippy, happy, glad to be alive me - I like her. Accept change, accept life, for your children and for yourself.

is, not are.

It's part of being a human to make mistakes, sometimes big, messy ones. It doesn't make you a terrible human being. It makes you a human being.

And your son will never have another you. You are not something that can be replaced in his life. Ever. He may be young but that doesn't mean that he's too young to be affected by the lose of a parent. He doesn't want a perfect mother. He wants you and that is much better.

If you can't find the words to use with your doctor, print out or write down what you've said in your post - you can take out some detail if you like, but the basics are that since the birth of your son, you have been depressed, have acted out of character and are now having suicidal thoughts.
Let your doctor take it from there - you're not the first to feel this way, and you won't be the last. There is a path through it, you just need to take the first step.
Actually, you've already taken the first step by posting on here, which was very, very brave. Now, the second step - make an appointment with your GP and email the Samaritans.
Let those that are there to help you, help.

Hi Iwillbegone,

We're so sorry you're feeling this way.

We've had a lot of reports from other MNers who are very concerned for you. We hope you don't mind, but when these threads are flagged up to us we usually add a link to our Mental Health resources - here. You can also go to the Samaritans' website here, or email them on [email protected]. Support from other Mumsnetters is great and we really hope you will be able to take some comfort from your fellow posters, but as other MNers will tell you, it's really a good idea to seek RL help and support as well.

We also like to remind everyone that, although we're awed daily by the astonishing support our members give each other through life's trickier twists and turns, we'd always caution anyone never to give more of themselves to another poster, emotionally or financially, than they can afford to spare.

We're sorry for hijacking your thread, Iwillbegone, and we really hope things start to look up for you soon.

Thank you all, your support and words have really touched me. I will get in touch with professional support too, as you have suggested.

I used to be so afraid of dying and missing out on life, my DH, and seeing our DS grow. I had hopes and dreams for a bigger family, loving home. I have lost it all with my own actions, behaviour I cannot even recognize. Our DS kept me alive, before it all fell apart, I did not want him to grow up and in any way feel guilt or sadness. I think I need to find that way of thinking again. I just don't know how. I wish I could go back in time and undo things. I wish everything hadn't deteriorated so much in our marriage after our move. It all changed so much and shocked me and shattered my world. I would give everything to be back in our old home, old life - with less money but happy.

I'm sorry you're feeling like this op. The feelings of desperation, despair and failure are very hard to bare and sometimes you feel like you have no way out... I'd like to share with you what kept me going through the darkest and saddest of times and stopped me from doing something to myself.

I pictured my DS, looking around for me in his school plays. Looking for the loving and proud glances only his mother could give.
I pictured him falling over and scraping his knee, then looking for me to make things all better. To kiss his tears away and pop a plaster on.

I imagined him and his first heartbreak. How i consoled him and reassured him that this wasn't the end of the world for him.
The first child he has, making me a nana. Being there for him when he needed me, to give advice, support and love. To be the one he could turn too. To be there when he got married.

All those scenarios are surely worth living for? I have friends who's mother cs and every day they go through motions they wish their mother could see and experience with them. I'm not trying to lay a guilt trip on you by any means. I'm just sharing an experience that I have gone through which actually brought me comfort to make a change in things.

It sounds to me like you're stuck in such a rut that you have no other way out, but honestly you have so much to go on for, but because of your overwhelming emotions it doesn't seem that way. I honestly believe you would benefit from counselling and possibly medical intervention?! Does DH know you feel like this?
I send you all the virtual love and cuddles you could ever need.

Op it may look to your eyes that you have "lost it all" but you really, really haven't. You just have a starting point to move from. That sense of hopelessness and despair will not be with you forever please take my word for it.

What would I even tell my doctor?

You OP would be a start. If you couldn't say it you could print it out.

Hi,

I have taken the first step and emailed Samaritans but haven’t yet done anything about seeing a doctor. I don't know why I feel like I cannot do it.
I wish I had spoken to someone when I needed help. Now it’s too late and it is all for selfish reasons. Who cares if I feel better, when my DH feels so bad??

Indeed, MrsP, when we moved here and I was going through the low period at the time, what saved me was picturing my son without me. What devastates me now is picturing my son with me. The mother who destroyed his father, the mother who destroyed his happy home, happy family. The mother who is so evil that she would do that to his dad and to him. I am so bad and such a coward.

Those of you, who said you have been through times like this, Getyercoat, Squidzin, Misnomer – how did you get through it?

Time is a healer. I lived day-to-day.

I actually distracted myself from depressive cyclical thinking by focusing on being creative. (I made shit with beads lol) but the more I made shit, the better I got at it and now manage to support myself financially selling jewellery.

Your son, your DH do not think you are "evil". You aren't you are human.

Are you on the way to repairing your relationship with your dh or are you separated for the moment?

Try not to punish yourself further by imagining you know exactly what they think.

Funny that, Squidzin, jewellery making is something I have wanted to do. I even bought some beads but gave up soon after I started as I wasn't very good at it.
Well done for making it a success!

We still live together and have not made any plans to separate completely. DH wants a divorce but – at least for the moment – still wants to have a relationship with me. He just really needs that divorce. He says he loves me (but obviously not like before) and likes being with me but trust is obviously completely gone and our marriage is ruined. I keep holding on to the good moments we have and keep trying not to upset the balance any further.

I take full responsibility of course, for what has happened. Looking back, I just keep thinking, I was not myself. I don’t recognize the actions of that person. This naturally looks like I’m going to blame it on something or someone else but I am also trying to understand my behaviour at the time.

Well done on emailing the Samaritans - each step you take is a step towards recovering.
Please believe that reading this, it doesn't sound as though you're blaming anyone else - it sounds as though you are being too hard on yourself if anything. You were not yourself, those actions weren't you.
It's not too late to speak to somebody, and it's not selfish at all. Please be as kind to yourself as you would be to anyone else who is ill.

I'm sorry, I'm not saying this well, but you deserve to be well again, and your DH and DS deserve to have you back again. Whether you and DH stay together or not, you can make this work. Families come in all shapes and sizes for all sorts of reasons. Co parenting with 2 healthy parents may be the outcome, or, once you're well, you may be able to work your relationship with DH out. Either way, you being healthy is so important. Your son needs you - you're the only Mum he will have, and whatever happens he won't see you as evil.
Please, take the next step and talk to your GP. You can do this, and we'll be holding your hand while you do.

You can still make a beautiful and wonderful contribution to your DS's life. Your his mum - nothing will change that for him, as long as you love him. He will always wonder why you didn't try to stay alive for him, if you go. So, don't go.