I thought I knew what depression was.
I was so wrong.
The Dark and Lonely Night...
If you haven't been there, YOU DON'T KNOW ABOUT IT.
When it hurts to bad you don't want to exist...
That's when you know about it!
Hey Buddies,
Seth Smith here.
My dark and lonely night started when I was 50 years old. I was blessed that way.
See, I thought I knew what depression was.
I was a fairly happy chap for 5 solid decades.
Even though I had a close family member who was suicidal for years,
I HAD NO IDEA WHAT DEPRESSION REALLY FELT LIKE.
Because little did I know:
Depression is Literal, Agonizing Pain
I found myself at home with three beautiful kids who loved me. Three beautiful kids whom I would die for, but would I stay alive for?
All of a sudden, all of the suicides I'd heard about in my 50 years of life started to make sense.
I remember when author Hunter S. Thompson ⬇️ committed suicide. I was like, "Why would he do that?" He's wealthy, famous, respected writer.
Another suicide that had me stumped, before I knew better, was Dave Mirra ⬇️, X-Games BMX Legend—forty-one years old, multi-millionaire, beautiful wife and daughters.
- Admired throughout the world
- All the resources imaginable
- Most X-Game medals of anyone
- Medals every year except one from 1995-2009
Why?
Why would he drive his truck to a remote location and blow his own brains out?
Literal, agonizing pain.
When the darkness descends
one knows the pain
that drives almost one million people per year to
end. their. lives.
Like I said, If you haven't been there, you don't know about it.
I couldn't believe how much it hurt and how isolated I felt.
I'm reminded of the comedian Colin Quinn. When asked why he became a comedian, he said,
I looked out on a bright sunny day and all I saw was bleakness.
So I thought being around a bunch of people laughing would be a good thing.
Oh, the agony...
I live in Oregon—an assisted suicide state. I remember thinking, what would it take? What would it take to get assisted suicide?
That's how messed up I was.
But I wasn't going out like that.
- For my close family member who wanted to die morning, noon, and night
- For my beautiful kids and wife
I was gonna fight this MFer
Being a natural-born scientist and researcher (that's what I do, that's all I do—The Terminator reference), I set to work. That was 2011, and I'm still on the job.