Hey you,

I know you’re hurting. And I know you’ve been hurting for a while. You’ve taken it day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute for a long time now. And you’re tired. So tired. Tired of feeling this awful, tired of fighting so hard and tired of feeling like it’s never going to get better.

I know you’re frustrated. You struggle to get out of bed, change your clothes, take a shower, clean your room, do the dishes, go to work and be productive. All the things that are so easy for everyone else have suddenly become some of your biggest struggles. And it’s not fair. You didn’t ask for this.

I know you’ve hit rock bottom, and you’ve been there for some time now. I’m not going to tell you “the only place you can go from here is up,” because I know you don’t believe that. But what I will tell you is that it’s not always going to be this way. You won’t sit at rock bottom forever even if you can’t see it just yet.

I know you don’t want to die. You want so desperately to live, but you also want the pain to stop. You need the pain to stop. It physically hurts to live through this much pain. And you feel like dying is the only way to make it all go away.

I know you feel trapped inside your own mind and suffocated by the pain. Your brain is supposed to keep you alive. It’s supposed to remind you to eat, to breathe, to move. But you feel like your brain is slowly killing you, and it’s frustrating.

I also know your brain is feeding you lies. It tells you that you don’t matter. That you’re a burden. That you can’t be saved. That the whole world would be a better place if you weren’t in it. That if you died today, everyone would be better off tomorrow. No one would miss you, no one would care. That there’s no hope for you.

And that voice in your head…it’s annoying. It sounds just like you. Feels just like you. It has a way of replaying every mistake you’ve ever made and reminding you of all your worst qualities. It makes you think that all you do is mess things up and ruin the lives of everyone around you.

But here’s the thing: It’s. Not. You. It’s your mental illness. This disease has taken over your brain, and it has a way of making you feel awful. It knows how to replay every mistake, every bad memory and every word you wish you didn’t say. It knows how to replay those things over and over in your head until you believe that it’s the truth and you feel like you can’t keep living.

But I’m going to say this again: That voice inside your head isn’t you. It’s your mental illness.

I know you feel lost, overwhelmed and hopeless. But I also know you want to get better. Just remember that you don’t need to figure out everything today or even tomorrow. You don’t need to fix all your problems or find the right combination of medications or feel 100% better right now. All you need to do is keep putting one foot in front of the other and remind yourself that the voice inside your head isn’t you.

I know you feel like you’ve made too many mistakes. Mistakes that are unforgivable, and you feel like you can’t move forward because of it. But you want to know something? We’ve all made mistakes. That’s part of what makes us human. Those mistakes don’t mean you’re not worth saving.

Because you are – you are worth saving.

If you’re struggling right now, I want you to stick around. I’m not going to promise you that it’ll get better tomorrow, next week or even next month. I can’t promise you that you won’t spend nights crying on the bathroom floor, wanting so desperately for a friend to reach out and ask if you’re ok. I can’t promise you that you won’t hit rock bottom again. But I can promise you that one day, you won’t feel like this.

I know all you see is darkness. But just because you can’t see the stars doesn’t mean they’re not there. One day, the light will come back. One day, you will see the stars and realize they were never gone. Just hidden.

When all feels hopeless, just remember you’ve survived 100% of your worst days – even when you thought you couldn’t.

You deserve to get help, and you deserve to get better. You are not a burden for reaching out for help. You are not getting in the way or making someone’s life worse by sticking around.

So yeah, I know you’re hurting. And even though you feel like you’re fighting a losing battle, I promise you, you’re going to come out on top. Because you’re a fighter and a survivor. And you refuse to quit.

You matter. You are important. You are loved. You are brave. You are enough.

You don’t have to go through this battle alone. I’m right here with you. I promise.