When I was 17 the first boy that I ever slept with died. He died as a result of suicide and the belief that he simply could not survive the world that we lived in. He was the first person that I ever lost who was close to me, and at the time I was so scared that his life was just like my own. What you have to understand about “H” (I’m not including his actual name because he was never out to his family) is that he represented to me all that was possible in life. I was 15 when we got together. I was eager, terrified, and desperate to feel connected to someone else. He was older than me; he seemed to have a clue as to what I might end up being, and it was in his eyes that I saw desire for the very first time. That desire was directed at me and my eager 15-year-old self didn’t just lose my virginity, I lost a good portion of my fear of being alone.
When we returned to my very small, very conservative high school in Alabama after having been together, I was terrified of him. So scared in fact that I did all I could to avoid he and I being in the same places. For weeks after we returned I avoided his phone calls and spoke to him only in short curt conversations. I just knew that he would give me away and I was certain at that young age that my life would come apart if someone found out about us. When he died 2 years later all I could think about was how alone he must have felt and how many times I could have been there for him if I simply picked up a phone or walked up to him in the hall. I remember thinking at his funeral that no one really knew him at all and that I would now carry two secrets with me for the rest of my life. Now I am not narcissistic enough to believe that his decision to end his life had anything to do with me, but I carried guilt about my choice to ignore him for years.
I thought that I had put all that behind me until this past year. When my student and friend Blake died as a result of suicide it all came rushing back to me. I was stuck by feelings of helplessness, feelings of failure, and the feeling that if only I had been more diligent then they might both be alive. The guilt and shame hit me hard and I all but fell apart. I have begun to realize (with the help of my very smart and compassionate therapist) that my whole career, all of my energy to build a better community started with the loss of "H" and that I was still holding myself responsible for something that simply was not my fault. I had to forgive myself for choosing my own life over “H” and that if I let it eat me alive I would never be able to help anyone ever again.
I know now that I am always trying to save that young, desperate 19-year-old boy who felt so alone when he died. I know now that he lives inside me every day and that the world that I am trying so hard to create would have been one that he would have loved to have lived in. I know now that I can’t save everyone (and it isn’t my job to do so) but I want to keep “H’s” memory alive and see him in the faces of all my students and friends. I was able to place Blake’s name into the title of our local archive so that he will be remembered as the amazing person he was, forever and I want “H” to know that he lives on in me and in all the people I help, every day.
When we returned to my very small, very conservative high school in Alabama after having been together, I was terrified of him. So scared in fact that I did all I could to avoid he and I being in the same places. For weeks after we returned I avoided his phone calls and spoke to him only in short curt conversations. I just knew that he would give me away and I was certain at that young age that my life would come apart if someone found out about us. When he died 2 years later all I could think about was how alone he must have felt and how many times I could have been there for him if I simply picked up a phone or walked up to him in the hall. I remember thinking at his funeral that no one really knew him at all and that I would now carry two secrets with me for the rest of my life. Now I am not narcissistic enough to believe that his decision to end his life had anything to do with me, but I carried guilt about my choice to ignore him for years.
I thought that I had put all that behind me until this past year. When my student and friend Blake died as a result of suicide it all came rushing back to me. I was stuck by feelings of helplessness, feelings of failure, and the feeling that if only I had been more diligent then they might both be alive. The guilt and shame hit me hard and I all but fell apart. I have begun to realize (with the help of my very smart and compassionate therapist) that my whole career, all of my energy to build a better community started with the loss of "H" and that I was still holding myself responsible for something that simply was not my fault. I had to forgive myself for choosing my own life over “H” and that if I let it eat me alive I would never be able to help anyone ever again.
I know now that I am always trying to save that young, desperate 19-year-old boy who felt so alone when he died. I know now that he lives inside me every day and that the world that I am trying so hard to create would have been one that he would have loved to have lived in. I know now that I can’t save everyone (and it isn’t my job to do so) but I want to keep “H’s” memory alive and see him in the faces of all my students and friends. I was able to place Blake’s name into the title of our local archive so that he will be remembered as the amazing person he was, forever and I want “H” to know that he lives on in me and in all the people I help, every day.
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