(the story behind the song)

_{TW: suicidal ideation; substance use}

When I was 18 I was an undiagnosed autistic girl-child with depression, obsessive tendencies, and unresolved trauma. I never wanted children. I had been a born-again evangelical Christian since I was 13. I was living in Oxford and studying Business and Psychology and had been in a new relationship for 2 months. I was using recreational drugs as much as I could afford, chain-smoking and listening to Longpigs and Babybird on a loop. I lived in student halls and my room was a concrete block. We shared a kitchen. I only ate toast and I weighed 7 stone. I was pregnant.

“I was an island under the sun. Nobody saw me coming undone.”

When I was 22 I was an undiagnosed autistic almost-woman with depression, obsessive tendencies, and unresolved trauma. I was pretending to be a parent to a 3-year-old boy who already knew I wasn’t up to the task and poured his hurt into rage to try and make me feel something. I was married and it was complicated. I was a worship leader at a charismatic church who got drunk when nobody was watching. I was listening to Lighthouse Family and even I knew that this was a Bad Sign. I was in the second year of a jazz degree even though I hated jazz. I was pregnant.

“I made you in the confidence of reckless youth. Now it’s too late to do it all again.”

I don’t regret the decisions I made at 18 or at 22, though I would stress that I am now firmly in support of a person’s right to choose. And I love my children so much; they are two of the best adults I know. But what followed was a life that I was in no way prepared for and couldn’t control.

“How can you teach them what you don’t know?”

I went through the motions in my mother-mask, blurred the boundaries of obsession and had very little maturity or emotional regulation. I self-medicated with anything I could get my hands on, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that I don’t remember ever being okay. And the worst thing is that I didn’t know it was affecting my children.

“And all the light I thought I had but never did. I was only lying to myself.”

Yes, I was present and they were always physically safe. I fed them, I clothed them, I bought them toys and sweets, I hugged them and looked after them when they were sick. I told them they could tell me anything and they did. They still do. But I was a half-person, with pieces of me trapped behind a wall of resentment. I was transfixed by the illusion of a soulmate, and that often prevented me from putting my children first.

“Running in circles, on broken bones. Too far removed to carry you home.”

My son told me a few years ago that it was okay, and he understood, but that he used to think I didn’t really want him around and that maybe that was why he felt worthless sometimes. My daughter used to push notes under the door saying, ‘Mummy, I know you’re busy but if you would like to play with me, I’ll be in my room.’ And that breaks what is left of my heart.

“And all the light I thought I had but never did. I was only lying to myself.”

Whatever it was that I needed to give, I just didn’t have it. I was too young, too lost, too broken, too unwell. I talked to a hundred therapists, to friends and to myself, about dying. How I just needed it to stop. I thought about driving my car off cliffs or into other cars. I thought about how sharp a Stanley knife was and how I could do it so it wouldn’t hurt. I looked up exact doses of medications that would kill me rather than leave me alive but physically damaged. I once stood on the edge of a cliff in Devon for a full hour – testing myself, moving a foot forward to look down at the rocks, a tear testing the force of the fall like a canary in a coal mine.

“I’m tired, I’m tired, I’m tired, I’m tired, I’m tired… of never seeing anything beneath.”

I lined up the reasons why I wanted to die, like a battalion of soldiers. And on the opposing army there were just two kids. Kids with an inner strength they didn’t get from me but who were also lost and scared and needed to be loved. And for all the things I couldn’t give them I realised that one thing I could do to prevent them from being hurt any further was to Not Die.

“…pieces of me (pieces I found) – give me a reason to stick around.”

My children read this and gave permission for me to share it. It isn’t easy for them to hear how I felt during their childhood but they say they always knew I loved them. They have happy memories and we are closer than we’ve ever been.

“But you were stronger, stronger by far. You set an example… you outgrew my heart. And in between my fractured dreams I wonder why, and where you got the dignity to try to forgive me for ruining the good days.”

There is some hope in this story. To see my children surpass me in confidence, courage and moral conviction means that not everything was ruined. They have forgiven me. I’m still working on forgiving myself.

*I Saw Love As Not Dying

_{Full of Chemicals, my debut album, will be released on 12/07/2024}