"Everything... affects everything." - Jay Asher

(All of the stories I tell in this post are true, and it was extremely difficult to relive them. I was given permission by the people in the stories to write about them and they are aware that I am posting this on a blog accessible to the public.)

They tell us that words can never hurt us. I disagree. Words are among the most hurtful, harmful things. Words can create one of the most excruciating forms of torture. It's words that lower a person's self esteem. It's words that makes people begin to hate themselves. It's words, and the psychological torment that they inflict, that drives a person to take their own life.

Recently, I had somebody tell me that another person is a waste of my effort, because they made me sad. And that killed me. As much as I miss that person's friendship and as much as it hurts me to not be able to talk to them anymore, that person will never ever be wasted effort or time.
Very few people are a waste of time, or space, or effort. You should never tell anybody that they are, unless you have a legitimate to reason to say so. Disliking somebody is not a legitimate reason. Somebody being a jerk is not a legitimate reason. Somebody disappointing you is not a legitimate reason.

Never ever say that a person is a waste of time, effort, or space. Nobody should ever have to endure the psychological torture that is hating yourself and still trying to live with yourself. People use those terms like its no big deal. They don't realize the potential those words have for harming a person.

As a person who has hated herself, and has seen countless friends hate themselves, this topic is something that is so important to me. I've had friends kill themselves; I've had friends try to kill themselves; I've talked too many people out of killing themselves than I ever thought I could. Each one of these people were important and are important and will always be important, regardless of whether or not they have taken their life and have been gone for weeks, or months, or years. Every single one of those suicides that ended up taking place, all of those people that are still living despite their effort to take their own lives, and those people that are still convinced that they are worthless, are worth every single bit of pain I've felt on their behalf and every second spent trying to show them otherwise. All of the sleepless nights, all of the tears, all of the heartache. They were and are worth it. Despite all that, however, each of these people believed that they were actually a waste of space and time and that is the thing that connects all of the suicides and attempted suicides and suicidal thoughts that I have been affected by.

In the summer of 2012, I went to Fairbanks for the six week Rural Alaskan Honors Institute college preparatory program. There I met two people who are still involved heavily in my life. One of these people was my roommate, Natalie, and the other is my best friend, Miriah.

The first time I encountered suicide was when Miriah texted me one night (this was after RAHI ended) and told me she was thinking about killing herself. At the time she was going through a lot and sincerely thought that she wasn't worth much. I can't tell you how many times I sat up all night, texting her and talking to her so that she wouldn't do anything. Every night this happened, she would tell me about how she's not worth much and that people would be better off without her. It was heart breaking to hear because Miriah is closer to me than any other person ever has. She knows what I'm thinking before I do and knows me better than I know myself. She's shown me, in the few years I've known her, how to be myself and how to live and breath and be happy and comfortable with being me. Together we've struggled through each others mental issues and emotional impairments. We've had our hearts broken, we've had disagreements, hurt each other, and had times where we just didn't talk. She is my rock, the sweet to my tea, and my saving grace and the idea of living a life without her kills me.
For a time I couldn't convince her of any of this. She legitimately believed that she was a waste of time and space. She believed that her family and friends would be happier if she was not around to be a burden on them. Now things are infinitely better, but that entire span of time will never be less heartbreaking.

Natalie was, and is, like my sister. She texted me one night, just to say goodbye. I found out, after hours of prying, that she was going to kill herself, because her boyfriend had hurt her in such a cruel and unforgiving way. She was in love with him, and he knew it, and exploited it. He used her feelings for his own sick, twisted idea of entertainment. That night, I stayed up with her. I tried calling, but she would only text. I sat there and told her about how much she meant to me. See, Nat taught me how to box, cuss, fight, stand up for myself, and how to not let anybody walk over me. She taught me how to drink coffee properly, how to be tough, and how to be a stronger me. She was like a big sister. And the night that she said goodbye, I tried to convince her of it but she didn't believe it.
Once again, I was told by the person on the other end of the phone that she wasn't worth the space, time, or effort. I was told that people would be happier with her gone. I was told that she was worthless and that she didn't deserve to live because of the enormous waste she was.
After hours of arguing, she asked me for a favor. I told her I'd do anything for her and she told me that her boyfriend was going to kill himself too and she wanted me to try to stop him.
I already hated him. From the day I met him I disliked him and he disliked me. But then this happened and my big sister was about to kill herself because of him. I didn't know what else to do except try to do what she asked, in the hope that she wouldn't try to kill herself if he didn't.
She sent me his phone number and, after another hour or so, stopped texting back. I tried calling her, messaging people I knew she was friends with, and my dad called the Suicide Prevention line at UAF for me. But there was nothing for the next four hours.
That night, I didn't sleep. I stayed up the rest of the night with her boyfriend. I never told him who I was, or why I was trying to talk him out of suicide and, the entire time, I hated myself for helping him and for not letting him die. Eventually I convinced him that, even though he felt like the POS that he is, it wasn't worth taking his own life when he could try to move on and improve himself as a human being. After that, I told him never to contact me again and I have never heard of or from him since, which is exactly how I'd like to keep it.

At around 4am, my phone lit up. I saw it was Natalie and, heart-in-throat, opened the message.

"Beka, I love you. Be good. Goodbye, love."

And then silence.

Absolute, deadly, heartbreaking silence.

One of my best friends was gone, and I had just helped to save the person who caused that to happen. I tried called the Suicide Prevention hotline, but they told me that people had already contacted them about her. For hours and hours I sat awake and felt like I was going crazy because my big sister had just killed herself. It wasn't until the afternoon of the next day that I heard anything.

I got a text, from Natalie's number, and absolutely terrified, opened it.

"Beka, they got me. They're taking me to the hospital now. I'm sorry. I tried. I love you."

After that encounter with suicide, I decided that no matter how well I knew a person, or how much I hated a person, I would try to prevent their suicide if I could. Since then I've talked countless people out of suicide and tried and failed with others. Suicide prevention is a topic that very quickly became a passion of mine. I'm not very outspoken about it in person, but I do as much as I possibly can to actively prevent it.
Suicide is a topic that a lot of people turn away from or whisper about. It isn't talked about enough, or fought against hard enough. It's kind of a taboo subject and that fact sincerely bothers me. Another part of the topic of suicide is that it's thought of as a selfish act, when it reality, the people that go through with it are doing so in the hopes that other peoples' lives will be improved for it. It's more selfless than anything else, as far as I have personally experienced.
Rather than trying to help people that are at risk of suicide, we tell them that they have mental issues, or ignore them, or say that they're doing it for attention in an effort to convince ourselves that the problem isn't as bad as it really seems.
People, please. Try to help people. Try to build peoples' self confidence and self worth. Don't even tell a person that they are a waste of time, space, or effort, because that will very rarely ever be true. If nothing else, be aware that words do in fact cause serious damage if said to the wrong people. Most of the time, you'll never even be able to tell the people who are fine from the people who already hate themselves. Regardless, "You're a waste of my breath," or, "This world would be better without you," or, "They're not worth the effort," is something that should never be said. People are worth more than revenge, or the satisfaction of insults, or the lessened pain you'd feel by trying to dismiss them from your mind. Please put in the effort, and the time, to convince them that they aren't a waste of space.

This is a post I've been wanting to write for a long time now, and I haven't really been able to properly express my feelings on this subject. Even after having spent nearly four hours on this post I don't feel completely satisfied or like I've really covered the topic as much as I wished, but it's a start. Suicide is something that I'd like to become very outspoken and active in preventing. I would like to begin raising awareness to this subject that is killing people daily, all over the world, unnecessarily. I'm not expecting this post to really change the way people talk or think, or change how people act towards at risk people. I'm just tired of people I care about ending their lives, or trying to, because they feel that the rest of the world would be better off without them. I'm tired of having to convince people that they are important and not a waste of a life. While every second that I have spent getting to this point has been painful, it's been worth it and I honestly don't mind growing even more tired if it means making some effort to stop people from taking their own lives. And that is why I wrote this.

Also, thanks to Jef Nelson, I have an ending to this post because I don't know how to end things.

jkaefhrieKJAWDHghfkjfshklhawesLEFHADU!?


CARELINES:

Anchorage
(907) 258-7575
1-800-478-7575
(907) 563-3200

Fairbanks
(907) 452-HELP (4357)
1-877-266-HELP (4357)

Kenai
(907) 283-7511

Ketchikan
(907) 225-4135

Wasilla
(907) 376-2411

http://www.suicide.org/suicide-hotlines.html

You are not alone.

One day they'll call me Justice Lady Justice...

Around the end of the school year, in April, I was driving home from school when I got a text from my parents, asking when I'd be home.

"Where are you at?"

"I be driving."

"When will you be home?"

"Soon. I'm not stopping anywhere."

"Okay... Dad has some news about an internship."

"DSAFDSHGERHAGRDGDKFDS WAHT"

"Yup."

"IM GOING TO BE THERE VERY SOON."

I'm honestly not sure what I expected them to do, or what I expected to happen if I got there sooner. I just remember being so so SO bloody excited that I might have a chance to hear something about an internship.
See, I had been talking to my dad about interning at a law office, and he had said that he'd ask around a bit at work. I'd called a couple places, with no luck, and we had talked about a couple attorneys that might one day be interested. So. This was huge.
I GET TO THE HOUSE, RIGHT, annnnnnd Dad was not home. He had taken the kids to Civil Air Patrol. I was pretty much bouncing off the walls at this point and ran upstairs and tried to get answers from Mom, to no avail. Finally, Dad got home and gave me a business card. I stared at it for a bit and wasn't quite sure what to do with it (being the brilliant blonde I am) and eventually he told me that he had written on the back.
The card was the Deputy District Attorney's, and he had told my dad that the office would probably be interested in an intern. It wouldn't be paid, but I'd really get to see if law was what I wanted to do.
I know it doesn't sound all that exciting, but I was flipping my lid.

As soon as the next business day rolled around, I called. It took a couple days, but I finally got ahold of Campion and spoke with him about the internship, and went into the office to take a look around and to talk about when I'd start and all that tosh. To make a long story short, I got the position. I started on May 12th.

First day there I had to go through a background check, which took about two minutes, and sign a confidentiality agreement. I was then placed in the care of the leading District Attorney and assisted her with a case that she was working on. They put me in an office to work in for the day (or so I thought) and told me I'd be bored out of my mind in an hour.
Well, I wasn't. I breezed through the work they gave me and went back for more. They sent me over to the courthouse instead, to observe in the courtroom. I got to watch an entire robbery case, with multiple defendants. SO. EXCITED.

Since that first day, I've written a couple motions for the court, I've observed several trials (mainly murder trials), helped several of the attorneys with cases, and made some fantastic connections. Every single day I've learned something new, I've been shown a different aspect of the law, and I've been exposed to how a career in law actually feels.
Let me tell you... It feels freaking awesome. I have loved every single moment of it, and value it so much. The people I worked with have been fantastic, and have offered letters of recommendation and have told me that there will always be a place for me, if I ever want to go back.

I'm going to miss it all. Especially the Nesbett Courthouse. A lot of people don't really realize that you don't *have* to hang out in the downstairs lounge or cafeteria if you're not in the courtroom. As a result, the top four floors are typically silent as a ghost. Its where I've done some of my best thinking, written the best I've ever written, and felt the most at peace.
My favorite place was the sixth floor, where you can see over the balconies, down onto the street, and over the tops of most of the buildings in downtown. Each floor has these massive windows that span nearly the entire outer wall. My spot was in the very middle of the entire floor, in the middle of the largest window.
From the sixth floor you can see the couple arguing on the street corner; the mom yelling at her kids to stop teasing the younger ones; the angry cab driver leaning out of his window to yell at someone; the business men and women walking and talking fast. You know that they're making a racket. You know that, if you were outside, you'd hear all of that insanity. But, on the top floor of the courthouse, you can't hear anything except for the occasional rattle of the elevator cables. There's something extremely calming, looking out over the chaos, of the tourists, of the vehicles, of the construction going on on the next block, and knowing none of it can touch you.
On that floor, I've jammed out to my 80's rock, I've used up three whole legal pads from writing potential blog posts, which will probably never get posted because I'm lazy, and I've watched one of the most exciting murder cases I've ever seen. That case solidified my want to advocate for the death penalty in Alaska.
On the sixth floor, I've held random women in the bathroom, as they cried on my shoulder about a case they were involved in. I've watched all of the behind-the-scenes action in trials. I've drunk my weight in coffee, I've spoken to a couple judges, made friends with a defense attorney, made myself very well known to the court reporters, and just.... been there, to watch and observe and mimic. Most of the court officers know me by now, and the security officers at the entrances of the courthouses know me by name.
I've broken things, taken naps, broken things, learned so much, did menial tasks, and broke a few things. But they accepted me, and I returned the feelings.

I'm just so excited about how this internship has developed, and I'm really going to miss everyone and being a part of everything in the office. I can't wait till I get a chance to return to the office and do more in-depth and extensive work.

If anything has come from this internship, it's that I'm am 100% certain that law is what I want to do with my life. First goal is to become a prosecutor, and the next, a judge. One day, people, one day I'm going to change my name to Lady Justice, and they'll have to call me Justice Lady Justice. And it's gonna be freaking rad as heck.

I've loved my experience at the office, and I'm not looking forward to not having to wake up at 6am (which is very surprising, because I value my sleep more than food). I wish I could stay here forever and just never leave. Sadly, however, my last day is Friday, and I plan to make this last week legendary.

Well, guys.... thanks for reading. I'm not sure that I'll be able to go back to the courthouse much before the end of the internship, but if I'm not in the office, you'll know exactly where to find me. Ciao.

Dear Classmate

To the lady in Intro to Research today who was all miffed with me,

First off. You came into the classroom and sat down, right next to me. You got all of your stuff out and were sitting there for a full five minutes. You were chatting and completely at ease. I heard you when you turned to your friend and said, "I normally like to have an empty desk next to me," before you turned to me and started trying to shove my desk further from you so you could fit another in between us. I was sitting here first, so find your own space. I'm not going to just let some girl, whether or not she's bigger than me, push me around (heh heh, get it? Because she was pushing me in my chair. Heh. Heh.), just because she wants an extra desk to put her junk on.

Second, when I asked you what in the mother frickin crap you were doing, you started trying to explain about how "claustrophobic" you were. Lady. I am claustrophobic. Very very much so. I can't even wear certain clothes because I'll have a panic attack. I can't sit, for long periods of time, between people in a car. I have nightmares in which I'm trapped in some small space and, when I wake up, am wrapped super tightly in my blankets and end up having a panic attack and crying. I have to hug people a certain way, making sure my arms aren't trapped under theirs. Heck, I once had a meltdown in a dressing room because the dress I tried on didn't give my arms full range of motion, and even though it looked great on me, I couldn't help but start freaking out because it was a tiny bit too tight around my shoulders. Even thinking about somebody being trapped in a small space terrifies me, and I'm not exaggerating. My heart beat is already really fast, but then you add my fear of small spaces in the mix and my heart rate is comparable to that of a cat. I know how claustrophobia works and I know how it feels. It isn't "just wanting a bit more room." It's not a matter of preference. 


Third, I don't appreciate your lack of decency and manners. I didn't like the fact that you were sitting next to me, but I dealt with it. Why? Because my momma raised me right. I have manners, I'm not rude. If it really bothered me to the point that I wanted you to move, I would have asked you, politely. You just started pushing, as hard as you could. I have a bit of news for you though. That was not in fact a delivery room. That was a classroom.

Next time you want an extra desk, ask politely for me to move over. Don't you dare shove my desk away and then shove another desk into mine so that I'd move faster. I will make sure that I am sitting next to you when we have our next exam, and I will tell the professor that you were trying to get answers from me. I'm not a nice person and will have no remorse.

Thank you for being a butthead and giving me something to write about,

Rebekah

I've been claustrophobic since as long as I can remember. I can look at a small space and be like, "Yeah, I can fit in there." and a lot of times, I'll fit into the space. Every time, however, my heart rate will increase and I'll start sweating and I'll stop having coherent thoughts. The faster I get out of that space, the quicker I can calm down, obviously, but if I'm trapped, I will seriously just give up and cry. It's not funny, and I am actually scared of people who think it is because I don't want them to try to put in a small space. This is an irrational fear of mine.
I hate being claustrophobic. It really sucks and makes life just a bit harder. I mean, it's not like losing a limb or getting some huge scar. But it's still a bit of an issue for me.
While I hate claustrophobia, I hate it more when people try to use something like it for their own selfish means, especially when they aren't actually suffering from any kind of phobia. I mean, how rude is it to sit down next to somebody and then just start shoving them in their desk, without saying a word to them, simply because you want a bit of extra room? You can't just stand up and walk to the other side of your friend, where there are five empty desks.

Maybe it shouldn't irk me so much, but it really makes me mad when people can't just show a bit of respect to other people, when they can't just be polite. I mean, I'm not the biggest fan of people. I'm a people person, but I don't like people, in general, very much. Despite that distaste for fellow humans, I'm polite, I smile, I say "thank you," and "please" and "yes sir" and "yes ma'am". I mind my manners. And I cannot stand people who can't do the same and display basic social interaction courtesies.

Darth Vader, over and out.

An Apple A Day...

I used to be pretty into working out. The hour of insanity every day was something I never wanted to skip because I actually, really, truly enjoyed it. I was addicted to it; the burn of my calves during the initial warm up; the middle of the workout when it gets really intense; that light feeling afterwards, kind of like when you step off a treadmill after running for a while and you feel like you're walking really fast because you're too light. I was really motivated and had gotten in pretty good shape.
Theeeeeen the school year started and I started skipping days because I didn't have time, or work went too late and I didn't want to work out afterwards. For a while I worked out once or twice a week, and tried to do what I could during the days that I worked. I knew I should have been trying to do more, but I'd be tired and just not want to do anything, no matter how many times people tried to motivate me to work out with them. I'd tell them that it's not that big of a deal, because it's "just this one time I'm skipping, how much of a difference will it make?" Eventually it got to the point where I just wasn't doing anything except for the odd 50 pushups here and there, when I had a few minutes that I thought of to spare.
In the past few weeks I've been really feeling guilty about the fact that I've left off working out and getting into even better shape. My little sister, Trinity, and I have been trying to get started waking up early and working out before we start our day. She has no problem with waking up at 6am, and will get up and get ready and then come try to wake me up. I am not a morning person and, whenever she walks into my room and tells me to get up, I apparently engage her in some sort of debate as to why we should wait another half hour to an hour to work out. When I do eventually get up, she doesn't have enough time to do a full workout before her class starts and we'll end up doing Cardio Abs.
Today was actually the first day we did a full workout, plus Cardio Abs, yoga, and some meditation. And it was fricken great. I loved it. We're going to try to keep it going.

I didn't really have a point to all of this, it was really just to talk about working out. It's great. It's addicting. It definitely makes you a happier person if you're in shape and can eat like a horse and not care because of the working out that you do. When I was really into working out I ate constantly, I was more active, more outgoing. It was awesome. And I plan on getting back to that point.

Um, But Excuse You. And Me. And The Dog.

GIRLFRIEND. Or manfriend. Honestly, chances are that, if you and I were actually talking in person, I'd call you "girlfriend" regardless of your gender.

It's been a long fricken time since I wrote, and I think that I've really really missed it. I have so many opinions and ideas and thoughts and I'll be sitting in class and think, "Hey, that'd make a great blog topic," and then completely space on actually sitting down and writing something. None of those bored-of-listening-to-my-professor-talk-about-his-favorite-movie inspired topics exist in my mind anymore. But it's nearly two am, I'm listening to Eye Of The Tiger and am motivated to do everything. It doesn't matter that I was planning on being up at six am to work out with my little sister. I am motivated to write right now. (Which really sucks, I'm not gonna lie. It'd be nice to have this kind of motivation in the mornings.)

My only problem is finding an actual topic. I mean, I could tell you about what's been going on in life, but that's kind of lame. So many things have happened since I wrote last, and I deleted all of the posts that had been on this blog, except for one, and I'm not going to try to tell you about it all in some consolidated version. I have some really great stories to tell, and I don't want to shorten them.

Honestly, this post is probably going to be just a thing telling you that I'm not the greatest writer, I'm terrible at staying on topic, and my posts are typically pretty uninteresting. BUT I will do my best to keep you entertained and that's something, right? I'll tell you about my racist, rude, inappropriate Justice professor, or about the new, crazy friends I've made, or adventures I've had with my family. And it'll be awesome. I will make you love me. Maybe. Probably not. Chances are I'll weird you out and ramble and just not shut up and you'll be like, "Bro, let's get outta here, she be cray," and then I'll have to track you down and give you a cookie so you judge me less.

I'll figure it out. Tomorrow. After I get some sleep. And coffee.