Autoimmune: This Is My Story

Tragedy

The first Monday of December that year was a significant day in my life, on two counts. Firstly, it was the day I underwent my liver biopsy, which I was hoping would provide me with some answers at long last. When I went home after it, I was quite drowsy and tired, but I felt like things were finally going to get better. I believed I was going to find out what had been causing me so much trouble in the coming weeks and that provided me with a sense of relief. I felt slightly better in myself, mentally anyway. 

It was the next day I got a very unexpected message from one of my friends. Still sore from the biopsy, I didn't go into school, so I was delivered the tragic news through a text message. A girl in my year group had made the tragic decision to end her own life the previous day. A girl who, every time I passed by her, always seemed so happy in herself. I couldn't believe it when my friend told me the name of the girl who'd done it. I was so shocked and really really upset over the news. It was hard to even comprehend the harsh reality that one day, she was there and everything seemed fine, and then, the next, she was just gone. And there was no changing that. 

I didn't really know the girl all that well, but I went to bed that night and I just burst into a fit of sobbing. It was so saddening, and I wanted to go in the next day to see how my friends were. But, I, again, was too sick. I could've pushed myself to go in, I guess, but I had heard from my friends of how down my entire year group was as a result of the sudden and shocking news. Girls were ditching class and crying for long periods of the day over the loss of their classmate, and for some of them, their friend. With everything, I was already feeling pretty bogged down, and I just thought exposing myself to that in school, as selfish as it was, I thought it would likely drag me down further if I were to go in. So, I kept sending messages to my friends, checking up on them, asking them how they were feeling, trying my best to support them in all the ways I felt I could. 

I then felt really really guilty about having complained about my illness, when this girl had obviously been going through something so bad, that she felt suicide was her only option. She felt so trapped that she deemed ending her own life the only way out. And I started to question what I could've possibly done to perhaps help her and steer her from making that tragic choice, had I known what was going on in her life. How, if I had stopped being so absorbed in my own problems for a few moments, there was a chance I could've helped this girl out, and not having ended up standing from the sidelines, entertaining these thoughts when it was sadly too late. After that, I made a promise to myself, that if I ever even got an inkling that someone was struggling, to be there for them whenever they needed it. 

I felt bad about having missed the most of that week, due to being sick. So, when it was announced that the father of the girl wanted our year group to attend the funeral, I said I would make myself go, no matter how I was feeling on the day. I would be there for my friends, especially the ones who had known her quite well, to give them some comfort, if possible. I said I'd be there to hug them if they needed it, to talk to them if they needed it. To even just sit with them through the funeral. And naturally, I went as a mark of a respect to her. To say goodbye, even though I didn't really know her that well. 

It was a really really tough day. When we took our seats in the church, the entire row of girls in front of me broke out into tears. Girls were passing packets of tissues around the year group. They were hugging their sobbing friends, holding hands, trying to bear the depressing aura that was circulating around the place. The mass hadn't even begun, and it was already overwhelming to sit there and watch as everyone in my year group tried containing themselves. 

One of my best friends, who was in the girl's English class, was really struggling to hold it in. So was I. By the time the girl's brother stood up to talk about her, the tears I had been fighting so hard escaped my eyes. They just kept rolling down my face. My friend was in pieces, and seeing her so upset really brought out the emotions I had been battling to suppress. I hugged her tightly as she continued to cry. I was trying to comfort her, so I tried really hard to blink away my tears, so that I could focus solely on doing that. 

Perhaps the hardest part of that service, was when we went outside to form a guard of honor and her coffin was brought outside and placed into the hearse, so they could transport her to the graveyard. Seeing her casket being brought outside provoked a lot of girls to break back into tears again, my friend included. She grabbed hold of my hand and squeezed it for the entire time they were carrying her coffin to the hearse. She was squeezing my hand really hard and it kind of hurt, but I wanted her to feel like I was there for her, so I allowed her to continue as we watched her coffin being placed into the hearse. Glancing around at everybody in my year group in their states of emotional turmoil, my heart was wrenching. 

When we arrived back at the school, everyone was in the lowest of spirits. We sat in the canteen for the remainder of the day, eating a meal provided to us by the school and talking to each other. Trying to comfort each other. It was really, really hard. I decided then that I was going to try even harder to be kinder to every single person I came to interact with from then on.