Living Testament

The issue of teen suicide has always been extremely real for me because I was there myself less than four years ago.

When I was growing up, I had a very standard upper-middle-class life, a good house in the city, good friends and I was getting a good education. So no one could see what was going to come next.

At the beginning of my sophomore year in high school, I began to doubt my sexuality.

Which then led me to question everything in my life. I thought that no one in my life would support me or accept me for who I believed I was. As the year began to move on, I became more and more depressed and I withdrew from social situations and my commitments to athletics and school. Around the middle of the fall semester, I began planning my own death, what I would do and when. It didn’t seem like anyone had my back or even cared what happened to me.

Suddenly though, that all changed. Just two days after I attempted suicide, one of my friends on my team talked to me about how I was feeling and convinced me to see one of the school counselors. When I went and talked with her, it was one of the greatest blessings of my entire life. She showed me that there were people who still cared and that whatever happened to me would affect other people.

That friend who took me to my counselor was my literal lifesaver and without them, I would not be here today. There is hope in the darkest of places and a life can be saved. I am a living testament to that and I hope to show other people that they can be a lifesaver to someone else by just reaching out.

– Jackson

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