I don’t know you, but I love you.

Last year a friend of mine suicided. Honestly, we were not that close but we shared this passion and this purpose that draws me close to so many people. I attended his funeral and grieved with my friends for the red-bearded giant who loved pumpkin spice lattes in the morning and Jamison to cap the day off. More than his favorite drinks he loved serving others and having a purpose. I didn’t know him well, but loved him nonetheless.

In the last 18 months I have in some way been connected to more individuals than I can count on my hands, who have taken that last resort, that last ditch option that it’s hard to back out of except on accident. When James’ suicide took my community by storm there was an outcry on social media from so many people who were struggling with thoughts and behaviors of suicide. I moved from post to post offering my support as a trained ASIST caregiver, my friendship, and most importantly my love. Some rejected my statements or thought me foolish, one girl challenged how I could love her without knowing her. Nonetheless , I love each of them. I want to tell you why I can love each of you, without ever having met you.

This is a hard time of year for me, because it is the anniversary of how in the darkest of days in my life I was able to love someone that I didn’t even know and in the end will never truly know. I lost my baby in my first trimester. It’s statistically probable and so relatively insignificant that it occurred, in the grand scheme of things. It wasn’t a cookie cutter planned pregnancy, but none the less I found myself with child. Something I wanted my whole life. I had no idea who this life was inside me. What a good man he could be. What glass ceilings she might shatter. I didn’t need to know a thing about my baby, who I called Sharkbait, after Nemo. Just like Nemo, my baby would start out with disadvantages, but I believed he was strong, that she could conquer all. I believed that just by being I could love Sharkbait so much that it would never end.

I remember my devastation, after two weeks of hearing a heartbeat while suffering complications, to birth my almost 10 week old fetus in the dark of my room and realized I’d never hear the sound of his heart again. Sharkbait was gone and I loved him no less and maybe even so much more for the wasted potential.

When someone suicides, or simply doesn’t try in life to succeed, I find that I love them nonetheless and also so much more. Knowing this, having experienced what I have, I try each day to love every person I encounter more and more. I’m not always perfect, but I damn sure try, and no one is less off for my love.

I recall very vaguely the few days following my miscarriage where my mum flew me to where she was in Vegas at a conference, so I could be near her. It was a blaze of booze, cigarettes, and a roulette table. It was late nights sitting on a pillow in the bathroom so she wouldn’t be awoken by my sobs.

I thought I would die. I wished for it. It was a shit year full of mental health crisis from my undiagnosed PTSD (at the time) that I couldn’t acknowledge because of stigma. The same stigma that makes people not talk about suicide or miscarriage. The things that make us appear so vulnerable in its’ honesty, so we bottle them up like they don’t exist… until they boil over in the dark of night… at bar closing when we’ve had too much to drink… in whispered circles with intimate friends… in the awkward pause when someone says that I don’t know the pain of childbirth without remembering they know my hidden shame.

When I lost him I told myself the sympathetic response that we’re now taught not to say… “At least you can have more kids one day”… “ At least you’re free now from being tied down”… and the list goes on. No one told me those things, they were mine to say. Mostly other people would stutter, at a loss for words, often they still do. The empathic response I’ve been told are the ones that helped me pick up the pieces and change my own mindset. “I understand.” “Me too.” “I love you.” “I’m here for you.” The most valued response was the love I was given.

Through my own ongoing struggles with suicide post-Iraq, my miscarriage almost broke the camels back. The next year around this time I became even worse than before with my thoughts and behaviors of suicide. In the interim I’d connected to an organization that provided me the opportunity to live and serve others, I did so as a promise to the lost potential from my miscarriage. I felt I had to take on and be the potential, make my life something of value.

It wasn’t enough. The one year anniversary came and I was a mess. There were people who didn’t know my full story, and still won’t unless they read this blog. It didn’t stop those people from loving me regardless of their knowledge of me. They saved me, helped me carry what felt like an impossible burden. I still could not speak of it. Nonetheless, I was loved beyond measure.

Through multiple programs, therapies, medications, struggles with binge drinking, and not always making good decisions I have been loved regardless of how well others know me. You don’t even know what you don’t know about another person. So you have to go on faith that you love things about them you couldn’t even imagine.

We all have secret pains. We all suffer shame and guilt. We all let society and it’s stigma hold us back from the edge of living our true lives and being our true selves.

If you’ve suffered a miscarriage, have a mental health diagnosis, struggle with suicide or addiction, or even feel as if your life is happy and easy, whatever you are, whatever you do… I love you, I really do, even though I likely don’t even know you. You can take faith knowing that you are loved. You are not alone. I look for you in the street, so we can share a smile and be connected a little more. even if only for a second… because nonetheless I will always love you, the same way as after 4 years I still love my Sharkbait that never got to live, but somehow helped me find a life worth living.

Original Post on Medium.