I woke early that morning. In time to leave a message for my shrink to call me back. Half of me was desperate to talk to him, desperate for help. The other half was resigned to continue on my destructive path to its final ending.

What did I do that day while I waited for his call? It’s difficult to remember events, as locked as I was in the torment of my thoughts. The call came around dinner time. I was not interested in food. Why should I want to feed this body of mine that I wanted so badly to leave behind.

I had no plan of what I was going to say to him. When he asked me how I was feeling, I answered truthfully, out of habit. I wanted to die. I was sick of fighting this illness, I couldn’t do it anymore. I wanted to take a handful of sleeping tablets and jump in the river. He told me to go to the hospital, and out of habit, I did what I was told.

Admissions was a blur. I remember the nurse at the psych ward searching my bags and me handing over my razor blade. She saw my forearms slashed my more than 50 razor-cuts each. ‘Why would you want to do that to yourself, love?’ she asked. It had been helping at the time. I felt so empty that it was the only thing that made me feel alive. The pain. The blood. It had chased away the thoughts of death that were haunting me. But I didn’t need the razor anymore. Cutting wasn’t helping anymore. I had nothing left that was.

‘We’ll help you, love,’ she said kindly, but I couldn’t believe her. I knew that they could cure this bout of depression, but I have Bipolar Disorder. The depression will return, that is inevitable. I was just so sick of fighting it.

She helped me into bed. I felt exhausted. As I closed my eyes, I knew, in spite of it all, that for now I had chosen to live.