I'm watching a video about Sanne, a woman who died by assisted suicide ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QJMrEvKwmI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QJMrEvKwmI)) in the Netherlands. She was 27 years old. She spent 9 years in treatment for BPD, chronic depression, and insomnia. Because she lived somewhere where assisted suicide for psychiatric disorders is legal, she got the go ahead to go through with assisted suicide. She made the decision after exhausting the treatments available to her and the last thing they offered her was a three-day intensive treatment program. 

I have BPD, bipolar disorder, binge eating disorder, and am really really obese etc. I am twenty-nine now and I've been in and out of treatment for over 12 years. I have a life filled with suicide attempts, a few years spent under the covers in my childhood bedroom because I was terrified to go out into the world, and a lifetime filled with near-chronic emotional pain. One of my friends is going through BPD-like symptoms as a result of C-PTSD after a particularly hard relationship issue. It's absolutely horrible; when I see it in her, it affects me because I see how hard it is. I realize, now after seeing it in her, that this has been my life for my whole life since I ever had memories. I know this is true for many of you too. The inability to connect or maintain connection with anyone. The feeling of watching life from the outside and never really being able to feel anything. Life is incredibly painful and I'm exhausted. In many ways, I really relate to this woman because I too am in hell. In fact, instead of the many treatment options I had access to (for no other reason that pure dumb luck), if what I was given was the option to die by assisted suicide...I would have done exactly what Sanne did.

I want to die...most of the time. That "most of the time" is a new development. For the vast majority of my life I wanted to die. Full stop. End of story. I wouldn't kill myself because it will hurt my parents. As an Indian woman, the idea of shaming my parents with my death was too much; so, I made a pact--I'll kill myself after my parents die. That's what I told my last therapist before I terminated with her last December. Most of me still believes that this is my plan for my life. However, over the course of the past year, there is a growing part of me that wants something else. 

When watching the video, I find myself oscillating between extreme jealousy and extreme anger. On one hand, I envy he because I do still want to die. On the other hand, I am enraged because she deserved better care and a chance at life. She deserved so much more. Everyone here deserves so much more. I deserve so much more. The answer to our problems can't be to watch us die by suicide or help us kill ourselves. This can't be how we deal with BPD (or any other mental illness, really).

I'm starting to realize that, if I were to kill myself, I will hurt a lot of people. There are whole networks of friends, loved ones, mentors, and even people who don't know me very well who would be devastated if I died. I'm not all that special; it's not like I'm the center of anyone's world or like I'm some celebrity. But, the truth is that, just as so many people have affected me in my life...I've affected them too. I feel that, if I were to go home and kill myself tonight...everyone, from the person I made a cup of tea for in the break room today, to the guy I see on the street every morning when I buy my coffee, will be hurt in some way. I would feel that way if either of them killed themselves. I also feel a sense of responsibility to my patients now, even. I can't see these beautiful people who work so hard to be their best selves every day...who come to me to help see them through these issues...and then turn around and kill myself. I can't do it.

I saw this video sometime earlier this year and brought it up with my therapist (my current therapist). I was really in a suicidal mood and said something like...there was a woman in the Netherlands who died by suicide who was around my age and had the same issues...and she got to go through assisted suicide. I remember my therapist turned red and teared up. He is actually usually incredibly (almost annoyingly) stoic. I wonder what he was thinking...I wonder if he believed that it was a waste of a life. I wonder if he was crying for all of his patients (us) who "should've died."

Sorry that was a really long rant. But I just needed to unload after watching this video. It really stirred up a lot in me. Thanks for listening.