It’s been 15 years.

Yesterday marked 15 years since I died by suicide. Yes, I mean literally died. (If you don’t already know that story, you can hear more from my TEDx talk.)

It may sound surprising, and it probably seems well overdue… 

But for some reason, yesterday, 15 years, finally feels like that’s in the past. I mean if anyone else told me they did something 15 years ago I’d think, “That's a long time ago.”

But for many years before that apex moment, and ever since then despite continual growth and healing, part of me has been deeply, unconsciously identified with that part of my life. Part of me has still been identified with “crazy”, as mentally ill, unstable, and inherently broken. 

Through Internal Family Systems (IFS) theory, I know this makes sense. IFS posits that our psyches aren’t monolithic entities, rather they are made up of “parts” that fulfill various roles. Further, it states that when we have traumatizing life experiences that were too difficult to make sense of or properly metabolize, parts of our psyche get splintered off and “stuck in time” to manage potential reoccurrence.

Well, I reckon it's all the work I’ve done and continue to do… but something about yesterday and 15 fucking years feels like I am finally ready to put that girl playing that role to bed. 

That era was surely a potent part of my experience. It’s something I lived through, aside for those few minutes, and it's something that’s long been over.

Neuroscience and behavioral psychology tells us that we move through our lives not based on what we think or what we know, but who we believe ourselves to be.

And 15 years seems like it’s about time to be somebody new. 

Cause that’s not who I am, and it really never was.