Few peo­ple know that  not long ago I con­tem­plated tak­ing my own life. At the time I wasn’t me. I was drown­ing in a sea of depres­sion. I felt worth­less, hor­ri­ble, not-good-enough. I didn’t know it-but I’d been liv­ing with post post­par­tum depres­sion for over a year. I didn’t rec­og­nize the early signs because I thought I was feel­ing a lit­tle depressed because my hus­band was serv­ing in Iraq. The only thing  I’d ever heard about post­par­tum depres­sion were with regard to moth­ers feel­ing or actu­ally hurt­ing their babies. Because I never once con­tem­plated throw­ing my beau­ti­ful baby boy against a wall I didn’t think about it. I didn’t real­ize how seri­ous it could become.

While my hus­band was in Iraq my son and I lived with my in-laws in Miami. I was home. I got to see my fam­ily, my Mom, my sis­ters, my brother. I func­tioned. I was an awe­some mother. It was a bit harder for me to laugh but I laughed. Every day I felt as though a dark cloud hung over me. I thought it was just because the other half of me…the other half of my soul was fight­ing in a war. I didn’t real­ize that a war for my very being was tak­ing shape in my own head.

I had my first panic attack a few days after a very scary tele­phone con­ver­sa­tion with my husband-a con­ver­sa­tion that ended in him say­ing, “Baby I love you. I’ve got to go. We’re being attacked!” Two weeks went by with out a sin­gle word from him. I became anx­ious, paranoid…afraid. When I finally did get to hear his voice and was reas­sured that all was OK-my anx­i­ety dimin­ished and I chalked up that hor­ri­fy­ing panic attack as me sim­ply being on edge.

Things actu­ally got bet­ter from there on out. I actu­ally felt happier…sort of. I felt a bit pathetic for not being strong for my hus­band. I never told him the extent of my fear that some­thing hor­ri­ble had hap­pened to him. I didn’t tell him about the forty min­utes I spent sob­bing in my father in law’s car one after­noon when I’d got caught in a rain storm on my way to get my nails done. Nor did I tell him how the lit­tle things that would nor­mally make me so happy didn’t. The only per­son who really could make me smile-truly smile then was my son. He was my only real, pure joy. So you can see why post­par­tum depres­sion never crossed my mind.

When my hus­band got home I was pos­i­tively bliss­ful. I was happy. For the first time in months I felt like me again.

Then we moved to Vir­ginia. For a while I was fine. Until one day an inci­dent on a play­ground changed every­thing. One small thing caused me to begin to feel para­noid that some­one was going to steel my son from me. Those feel­ings led me to feel like a hor­ri­ble mother. A feel­ing of worth­less­ness seeped back into my psy­che. Months passed. I began to feel like my fam­ily would be bet­ter off with out me. While dri­ving alone I would think about ways to end my life.

ME. END MY LIFE??? Yes. When I think about that now-if I hadn’t expe­ri­enced it-I wouldn’t believe it pos­si­ble; because the very thought of killing myself is so far from the per­son I really am that it-even to me some­times seems unfath­omable. The crazy thing is-no one knew, no one could tell there was any­thing wrong with me. I was an excel­lent actress. Hid­ing behind a smile. My own hus­band knew noth­ing was wrong until one day in the shower I finally broke down and said, “You’d be bet­ter off if I were dead.” This-knowing that was such an un-Nicole thing to say paired by the fact that I sat-a crum­bled shadow of the per­son I was on the shower floor-freaked out-called my mom, who I spoke to in-depth about how I was feel­ing. She said I needed to call my doc­tor imme­di­ately. The next day I was sit­ting in a psychiatrist’s office-the next day I was on a year long road back to me.

I’ve been con­tem­plat­ing telling this story here for a while. But this morn­ing when I saw this announce­ment that the band I adore so much who-oddly enough I found dur­ing this crazy-unlike-me depressed state of my life-was par­tic­i­pat­ing in a sui­cide pre­ven­tion cam­paign I felt the time was right. I felt that maybe my story could help some­one. I felt that if some­one who knows me as my bright, cheer­ful, pos­i­tive sunny self, to know that even I felt like a cloud hung over me. Even the sun gets hid­den by clouds sometimes-the impor­tant thing to remem­ber is that the sun will shine another day, when the clouds have gone.

I was depressed here. Can’t you tell?

Sui­cide is not the answer. Your fam­ily and friends will never be the same. I had a friend who took her life last year. All that is left behind is pain and ques­tions. If you feel or know some­one who is con­tem­plat­ing tak­ing their own life. Please pick up the phone. My hus­band did-and it changed my life.

Pick Up The Phone PSA — Say It from rnmkr on Vimeo.

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