TW: suicide, eating disorders, 

Reaching out for help is one of the most vulnerable things you can do as a person. You have to open yourself up to have people know you in a way that is very difficult. However if you take away anything from this piece, let it be the importance of asking for help. I would not be here today if I didn’t reach out and use new and existing resources. Letting someone see you for who you really are is tough, but it is so so worth it. This suicide prevention month, I urge you to check in on a friend that you haven’t spoken to in a while. You don’t know how much it could mean to them. 

At the end of last semester, various members of The Megaphone took to writing articles about their experiences with mental health. I wrote a piece, but procrastination led to it being done after we had passed our deadlines to post. However, the person that wrote that piece is not the person I am today. This summer has put me through challenges that I never imagined would happen. This summer was the worst time of my life; yes, even worse than being fourteen. You see so many warnings about the relationship you enter at nineteen, so much so that this is the doom I was expecting, but doom I knew I would avoid. My life changing spiral at the age of nineteen had nothing to do with a relationship. But I’m not here to talk about that, I’m here to tell you about my summer. 

Firstly, I’d like to tell you a bit about medication. From December 2025 to June 2026, I was on five different medications throughout this time. I jumped from a SSRI, to a different SSRI, to some medication that I’m not entirely sure why I was ever prescribed, to an SNRI, to a medication that had recently been FDA approved. The first SSRI made me emotionally numb, the second one made me wildly anxious, the third medication really didn’t do anything, the SNRI made me suicidal, and the last medication gave me an allergic reaction. Let this serve as a reminder that if a medication gives you full body itches, please contact your doctor immediately. That is not a normal side effect, that is a potentially dangerous allergic reaction. Now, I will also tell you to immediately contact your doctor if you experience anything like I did while on the SNRI, but I’ll get into that momentarily. 

Why was I on a medication for three months if it made me suicidal? Well, the honest truth is that I didn’t realize I was suicidal. That’s a common trait I have, the ability to not realize something I really should. I should have known the moment I had a panic attack that was so bad I ended up knocking on the door of my friend’s dorm when I usually wait them out alone. I should have known when eating and sleeping became sparse. I should have known when I felt whatever personality I had fade away. I should have known when I felt hollow, while simultaneously feeling depression buried in my bones. I should have known when I had to meet with professors to inform them about my inability to function, let alone perform well in their classes. I should have known when I dreaded the emptiness of summer more than anything else. But I didn’t know. I knew I wasn’t doing good, but I didn’t know how bad it was. I didn’t know until it hit me head on and I could no longer deny just how bad it had gotten. I didn’t know until the night I paced in circles around my apartment for three hours. I paced until my feet were blistered and my legs were weak and my body was heavy. I paced until I fell over; exhausted, defeated, and desperately wanting to just give up. I didn’t sleep much, or really at all that night. I wished to whoever was listening to just let it end. Let it end, let it be over, let me be done. I didn’t feel guilty, and I didn’t feel the need to apologize to those I would hurt. I didn’t feel anything at all. I was hurting, and I was suffering, and I wasn’t sorry. But as you may notice, I woke up the next morning, and every morning since then. This, however, was only the beginning. 

I continued for the next five or six weeks doing the same thing. Waking up and wishing I didn’t. Some days I felt okay, but 9/10 times I had the same first thought when I woke up. Wow, I wish I didn’t. During all of this, I was doing SURF research, which technically speaking, is a full time job. Was I my best self for this? Not even remotely, but it gave me something to do, and it gave me something to put effort into instead of spending my time hoping for the end. Having to tell your “boss” that you’re struggling with being alive is a hard thing, but I’d like to take this moment to thank mine for being so compassionate. To say he was understanding would be an understatement. He supported me in moments when I felt I didn’t deserve it, and I’m thankful to him for seeing my potential even when it was cracked and broken and covered in cobwebs. 

In the midst of this, I got off of the SNRI and was put on a new medication. This lasted all of five days, before my entire body was itchy in a way I didn’t know was possible. I had to get off of this medication, and the taper off of the SNRI ended, and I was suddenly unmedicated for the first time in five years. Five years, one quarter of my life had been spent taking a pill once a day. I barely knew myself on antidepressants, how was I supposed to know myself without them? How was I supposed to function without them? Well, at first the answer was that I just didn’t function. The thing they don’t tell you about SNRIs is that the withdrawal process is incredibly difficult. For two weeks, I lived with a headache, a stomach ache, nausea, extreme fatigue, loss of appetite, dizziness, insomnia, and the inability to hold my head up for more than ten seconds. I have never been weaker or felt more ill than I did during those two weeks. I couldn’t take care of myself, because quite frankly, I couldn’t stand up without feeling like I was seconds away from passing out. I’m honestly not sure how I did anything those two weeks. But ever so slowly I began to function again, and then I started IOP.

On July 7th, I started an Intensive Outpatient Program, or IOP. This decision was not one that I took lightly, but it was one I needed to make for my own wellbeing. This was a major commitment, and an expensive one at that, but something needed to change. I remember both my new psychiatrist and my new therapist recommending me for IOP, which was honestly funny because they’re at two different places with no interaction with each other, and they both were adamant about it. I didn’t know how to live, I didn’t know how to spend a day not being miserable, and I didn’t know how I was supposed to see any distance into the future. So I signed myself up for IOP. For three hours a day, four days a week, I participated in group therapy at a local clinic for six weeks. I’m not going to say that IOP saved my life, because that discounts the fact that I saved my life, but it gave me the tools to save it. Before starting, I didn’t really see how group therapy was supposed to do anything for me. How was sitting around a table for 12 hours a week going to fix me? But everyday I showed up, and I showed up with ten different people who were all in various stages of their lives. I showed up with them, and I showed up for them, and they showed up for me too. These people saw me at my most vulnerable state, and some of them got to watch me come out on the other side. IOP is best explained as summer camp. You learn the names of these people, you learn what they’re going through, you do worksheets with them, and you spend hours upon hours with them. Then they get better, and they discharge, and you never see them again. It’s hard to let go of the fact that you will never truly know them because they were only meant to have a fleeting role in your life. That has been the hardest thing for me, knowing that the closest I will ever get to seeing them again is if we pass each other in the bread aisle of the grocery store and share a knowing smile. You’re left with only a memory, and you think of them and hope they’re doing well.

After the whole antidepressant fiasco, I was officially considered to be treatment resistant to medications. A funny thing about being as mentally unwell as I was while also not being able to find a medication that works means you have to find an alternative route. That route was transcranial magnetic stimulation or TMS. This is a daily noninvasive “procedure” where a magnetic coil is placed on top of my head to stimulate the underactive areas of my brain, specifically the areas where anxiety, depression, and OCD live. When this coil is placed on my head, it sends several magnetic pulses to these areas. The best thing I can compare it to are sharp taps on the top of your head. It doesn’t feel like it’s going deep into my brain, but just on my scalp. It didn’t hurt exactly, but it was definitely uncomfortable. I mean, a machine rests against your head and taps away for fifteen minutes on the left side, and then it does the same thing on the right but for less time and quicker pulses. I often left my sessions with a headache that never exactly went away. Quite reminiscent of my time living in the mold-filled Brown Cody my freshman year, if you ask me. I did this Monday-Friday for nine weeks, in fact I’m just now wrapping up treatment at the time that you are reading this article. 

I can’t quite figure out how much this treatment has helped, which is honestly quite frustrating for me. I don’t know if I’m better because of IOP, or TMS, or getting off of the SNRI; but the most important part is that I’m better. In the depths of my suffering I never thought it would be possible. 

Finally, I’d like to talk about my diagnoses and disorders. I am diagnosed with severe anxiety, major depressive disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), avoidant/ restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID), and I have a possible diagnosis of borderline personality disorder (BPD). I have had anxiety and depression for as long as I can remember. They’re not new to me, but the severity is. However, these are both fairly well-understood disorders, so I’m not going to dive into them. My OCD is controlled by contamination, the feelings of something being off, repetition, and intrusive thoughts. All of these things combined with my other disorders can make simple things feel impossible. OCD is possibly the most exhausting disorder for me because it almost feels inescapable. My OCD also manifests itself in a way that promotes my ARFID. I have a fear of getting sick, which leads to me not trusting food. This obviously leads me to not eating in the ways that are healthy. While ARFID is considered an eating disorder, it differs from most by not being controlled by body image, but instead by lack of interest in food, or fear of consequences that may come with eating. While my BPD diagnosis is not one that all of my providers can agree on, there are still several factors that resonate with me. These factors include attachment, lack of self image, profound emptiness, and anger. I think many people would look at me and my relationships and argue the first and last point, but that is simply because I put so much of my energy into maintaining healthy relationships and not letting my anger get the better of me. Yes, I am in a healthy relationship, and yes, I have severe issues with attachment. The reason why both of these things are true is because I put a tremendous amount of effort into maintaining healthy attachment when some days it’s the last thing I want to do. Somedays, I want to spiral in insecurity and despair; I want to wallow in feelings of inadequacy. In all honesty, some days I do. But I have spent the last year or two fighting to not let my mental health and disordered thinking prevent me from having connections that I know I am worthy of. So on the days I wallow, I pull myself back up and use what therapists call “wise mind” to recognize both the reasonable and emotional thoughts, and I tell myself that I am worthy of the love that people give me. It’s not an easy skill, but I will admit it’s a useful one. I also mentioned lack of self image and profound emptiness. This is all to say that I have no clue who I am, and there are many days where I struggle to identify anything about myself that’s not negative. There are days where I can’t even list a thing I like to do, let alone a quality that I don’t hate about myself. The profound emptiness is something I’ve found hard to admit. Arguably, this is the time in my life where I have the most good things, and then I begin to enter a state of self-loathing. I have so much good, and I still can’t seem to feel a thing. It’s hard to be grateful for everything you have when you still can’t feel anything. But the days that I can feel it are some of the best days I have. Instead, I try to be extra grateful on those days. Despite it all, I have a lot to be grateful for. 

Before I wrap this up, I want to thank the people in my life. I want to thank my friends for checking on me, and sending me animal pictures, and doing my laundry, and my dishes, and cooking me a week’s worth of food when I couldn’t even manage to stand up. It felt like they were on a rotation of care, and I cannot be more grateful. I want to thank them for listening to me complain about my life for the entirety of summer, and for supporting me and standing by me during the hardest time of my life. Thank you for letting me cry on your shoulder, and holding me when I ran out of words to say just how exhausted I was. None of you owed me anything, but you all gave me everything. There are not enough words that I can say to encompass how much I appreciate each and every one of you. You know who you are, thanks for helping me when I couldn’t help myself. Thank you to my therapist who came into my life during the hardest point. Thank you to everyone at my clinic who helped me more than I can even describe. Will they read this? No, but they deserve the thanks anyways. 

A wise person once said to sit with your brokenness. That’s possibly one of the most uncomfortable things you can do, but I invite you all to do it anyway. In the words of Phoebe Bridgers, it never goes away, but it’ll all work out. This experience and pain will be a part of me for the rest of my life, but the amazing thing is that I still have the rest of my life. There will be days where I don’t want it, and days where I’ll wish for it to end, but there are days where I’m grateful I never gave up during those times I ended up on the bathroom floor. I will sit with my brokenness, and there are people that will sit with the two of us. There will be people who sit with your brokenness as well, and if there’s not, well then I’ll just be one of them. I think it’s a great honor to have that ability, it means you’re celebrating someone that didn’t give up. If any part of my story resonated with you, I am proud of you. I am proud of you for being here with me. If you need anything, you know where to find me. I’ll be there with open arms inviting you to join me and #besouthwestern. 

Resources:

Counseling Center

Bluebonnet Trails (Georgetown’s local mental health authority)

988 (National Suicide Hotline)

 NAMI Central Texas (Provides free mental health resources as well as a call center)

The Trevor Project (Provides free mental health resources for the 2SLGBTQIA+ community)