Healing My Broken Story: Rising from the Ashes
By Michael Robin
The narrative arc of my story is characterized by three acts but they are in reverse order – the ending, the transitional or healing stage, and new beginnings. My story begins with an abrupt ending to what had been the first sixty-three years of my life.
On November 27, 2013, I made an attempt to end my life. For five intense months prior, the thought of suicide held me captive. A series of traumatic life events were what drove me to suicide. I had lost my job, income, and health insurance; I feared losing my professional therapy license and home; and my marriage was imploding. Isolated and cut off from the world, uncertain about who I was and why my life mattered, my ability to resist the temptation for oblivion faded rapidly. I couldn’t, in the words of F. Scott Fitzgerald, “hold in balance the sense of futility of effort and the sense of the necessity to struggle.”
Living through a suicide attempt is a unique kind of bereavement. It was after my suicide attempt that I learned that the feeling of suicidal despair is impermanent. The thought that my suffering would never end is what drove my suicidal behavior. Suspended in time and social space, my death was spiritual, not corporeal. As my old self was dying, my new self was struggling to be born. I identified with the writer Matthew Arnold who wrote, “I was wandering between two worlds, one dead/the other powerless to be born.” I had been in “limbo”, crossing an extended threshold, where I entered as one person and came out another. My suicide attempt marked the turning point in my life.
Recovering from a suicide attempt has not been simple or easy. I’ve had no self-help formula to rely on, nor have I been offered “cheap grace.” I write about the past to re-present my disparate emotions from a more enlightened present. With the passage of time, my perspective has changed and evolved many times over. Remembering and revising my story gives significance to my life. I no longer regret the past. What happened, happened. A life story can be revised, but not relived.
In my writing, I seek transcendence, a sense of insight and awareness about what is of ultimate significance. As I do so, I encounter the sacred realm which is the transition point between endings and new beginnings. It is as if my words are pulling me into new realms of existence. I am writing myself out of the deep hole I once found myself in. This is the spiritual power of transformative writing. I found light by peering into the darkness.
As a survivor of a suicide attempt, I feel responsible to share my story as a lived experience. I write to offer a singular perspective on what it feels like to be suicidal, attempt suicide, survive, and be radically transformed by the experience. While I am hardly the first person to attempt suicide, I have felt the uniqueness of my story. I am one of the few writers on suicide who has been a seasoned therapist, teacher, author, and patient. I write to comprehend the paradoxical richness of my story, the wisdom it has bequeathed to me, and the insights I might share with others.
I write to describe my inner experience; what I feel now, what I felt then, and their interconnection. In my writing, I seek transformation and transcendence, a sense of insight and awareness about what is of ultimate significance. One of the striking things about writing is how it has changed me as a person. Who I was is not who I am now, but I could not be who I am without writing about what I’ve been going through.
Nine years ago, I was suffering from the ancient sin of acedia which the thirteenth century philosopher, St. Thomas Aquinas defined as a “loss of energy to begin new things.” I felt like I was carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. In the depths of despair, I lacked perspective, unable to see the sacredness of life itself. To move forward, I had to face my suicide attempt for what it was.
At the time, I didn’t recognize my survival as the opportunity it was. It felt inauspicious, unlikely to ever be seen as a blessing. But as I leaned into the pain, I came to appreciate being a member of what Albert Schweitzer called the “brotherhood of those who bear the mark of pain.” The more I befriended my pain, the less it burdened me. My pain lessens when I am less afraid of it. The more I accept it, the less it overwhelms me.
It has been my responsibility to play an active role in finding meaning to my suffering; to learn and grow from the experience. This viewpoint has allowed me to grow into the person I am becoming. I am grateful that God graced me with the wisdom and courage to persevere. From Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel, I learned “to begin something new is a wonderous thing. But to lose everything and be able to begin over again is nothing less than a miracle.” For the first time in my life, I now fully appreciate the blessing of being alive.
It is only in hindsight, that I can see how transformational these losses have been. I’ve looked to the spiritual traditions, not just social psychology, to guide me on my journey. If I was to thrive and not merely survive, I had to walk down what Native Americans call the Red Road, a metaphoric symbol of healing and transformation. It took many months for me to see my losses as harbingers of new beginnings. Converting memories of loss to memories of meaning has been my ongoing existential task. While I’m a fairly stationary person, I’ve traveled many miles in my imagination.
My healing imagination resists the idea that I should not feel the pain of the past. From the beginning, others wanted me to “be over” the pain without understanding that grieving is an ongoing and life-affirming process. Grief is not a pathological process to be cured. My quest has been to experience grief, not classify it. In the process, I have a profound sense of gratitude for my continued life. I don’t need to bring the nebulous concept of “closure” to my old life to feel fully alive today.
Imposing a semblance of meaning to what had once been so traumatizing, allows me to feel better, think more clearly, and function with more confidence. Reducing the chatter in my brain has allowed me to be more discerning. I have created a calming distance between my thoughts now, and what happened then. Being mindful in the present does not mean I’m not affected by the past. I still have anxiety but I no longer have the agitation that once overwhelmed me. I no longer fear dying alone and unloved, because I am no longer alone and unloved.
Of this, I am sure. If it was up to me, I would plead for eternal life in this world. I don’t want to die but when I do, I want my life to be well-lived. I need to feel that my life has mattered, that in my small way, I have contributed something of value to the human experience. I want my writing to be an important part of my spiritual legacy.
Much of the value of writing about trauma is in how words are received. I have found power, a sense of personal efficacy when my words influence and inspire others. The most common response to my writing has been, “Wow Michael, this is going to help a lot of people when it is published.” Writing has helped me understand my experience by using transformative language that helps reshape my sense of self and relationships with others.
As I pass through the seasons of my life, I appreciate the wisdom of singer Joni Mitchell who wrote, “Something’s lost, but something’s gained, in living every day.” It’s been said that you cannot have a testimony without a test. I had to go through a cleansing fire to rise from the ashes. For the first time in my life, I am truly happy to be alive. Living a life of meaning has been the guiding light that illuminates my path forward, allowing me to see beyond myself. My highest aspiration is when I die, my friends and loved one’s will say a hearty and eternal “Amen.”
Read part two: On Living with Parkinson’s Disease
Michael Robin is a clinical social worker with more than forty years of experience.