Boulevard of Broken Dreams

It’s towards the end of 2004 and I am 19 years old. I have been diagnosed with moderate depression and I am currently trialling my second lot of antidepressants. The first ones, Escitalopram made me shaky all the time. I couldn’t keep still and the nausea was something else. The second ones, Venlafaxine seem to be a bit better, but they haven’t started working properly yet.

I am working full time as a trainee accountant and I go to college one day per week. I earn well below minimum wage as I’m an apprentice. Despite this, because I live at home with my Dad and Step Mother I can afford to go out drinking. ALOT. It’s not just drinks that I can afford. I also buy a lot of Cocaine. I can’t imagine having a night out and only drinking alcohol. I need to either put shit up my nose or take pills. I go out on Thursdays for Rock and Metal night, Fridays for cheesey pop music and Saturdays for Indie night. Not to mention the local live bands that I go and watch throughout the week. 

My Psychiatrist “Dr M” knows all about the drinking and the drugs. I explained to him that I feel like shit all the time anyway, so having a few hours coming up from a pill or sniffing lines of Coke was a break from all of that. Even the come downs don’t bother me. Like I said, I am going to feel like shit either way. 

During these nights I most likely won’t go home. I will text a lie to my parents about where I am and I will go home with a stranger and have meaningless sex. I will leave early in the morning and make my way back home, not even giving the guy a second thought whilst I wait at the bus station. 

It is the 3rd December 2004. It is a Friday and I am doing my usual Friday routine of getting smashed in a nightclub. It’s a guy from college’s birthday so there are a few of us out. At one point I lose everyone. I am walking around in a drunken daze and I bump into A. A is a childhood sweetheart. I’ve known him and had feelings for him since I was 14. We spent the summer of  2000 together and we kissed a few times but it never went any further. A couple of years later I end up going out with his friend, to make him jealous but it backfired and I was with an abusive boyfriend for 2 years.

 I haven’t seen A in a long time and as soon as we see each other we end up kissing. We share a taxi home as we live down the road from each other. He invites me in for a cup of tea. The cup he gives me has a dolphin for a handle. We inevitably end up in his bed and we have sex all night long. This one is different. I actually like A. So much that I stay there all afternoon. He walks me back home late afternoon on the Saturday. 

This time I imagined us having an amazing long distance relationship. He works away in a different country so it would be tough. But I think I can do it. I would have done anything for A to have been mine four years ago and I dream that this is finally happening. 

I didn’t know then that that would be the last time I ever saw A. 

I didn’t know then that I would be greeted with a horrendous argument from my Step Mother the minute I walked through the door. 

I didn’t know then that I would take a bottle of water and all of my old Escitalapram pills and catch the bus to town.

I didn’t know then that I would sit on a bench in the middle of the city centre and take all those pills. 

I didn’t know then that this act would be the start of a four month stay as an inpatient in hospital. 

I didn’t know then that I would try to kill myself.