(tw: suicidal ideation) so, my cousin B is a year older than I am. we've always been pretty similar in most of our interests and outlook. i've always felt like he understood me, more than my actual siblings. B failed out of college last semester and ended up working for his older brother as a salesman in california. as i've slowly spiralled downward this semester - and as my grades have spiralled downward - i've had the recurring thought that i'm going to fail out of college just like he did. "second verse, same as the first," only even worse on my end because anxiety and depression. except... well. today, i learned from my mom that apparently 1) B fucked up in his job and 2) had a falling out with his older brother and 3) got fired and 4) is suicidal. so. fuck. i'm completely blindsided. and also my previous thoughts about how similar we are are way more horrifying now. because i've felt depressed for a while now, and i never really mentioned it to him, i guess, and maybe i should have. only, i have thoughts of self-harm but don't actually consider suicide very much, but apparently he has. a vague plan and everything. and even scarier, it's some form of suicide by cop. which. jesus christ. i don't know if i understand that at all. is that a traditional-masculinity thing? not killing yourself but trying to force someone else into killing you? fuck. this definitely isn't going to make bringing up the idea that i may have depression to my parents any easier. he was going to stay with us for a week at christmas. don't know if that's happening now. i reached out to him on skype, which is where he contacted me the last few times we spoke. i don't know what else to do.
Maybe it's a masculinity thing, maybe it's part of a bigger construct of reducing guilt (if someone else does it for me, someone whose job it is to do and witness things like this, I don't have to lay it on a train driver/car driver/whatever poor sod finds me, etc). And if you want to, then yes, I think you absolutely should reach out to him. I know it's scary to think of yourself going the same way. Maybe you do have a lot in common, but that doesn't mean you have to follow in his footsteps, or that you will.
Huh. Hadn't thought of it in a reducing guilt way. I've reached out to him both over Skype and via text. My phone claims that he read the text some hours ago. No response. Not sure whether I should try to call him or not. It's a lot easier to type than to talk. ...I know it's taken me an entire day to compose relatively short replies to emails, and that's just this week. Maybe I should allow more time for him to reply before trying to decide if I should try to call him. Thank you.
for what it's worth, maybe it will make bringing up the possibility of depression easier to your parents? like, you could phrase it as "i've noticed myself doing things similar to cousin and i don't want to get that bad, so i'm seeking help." (also, in my experience, it's much easier to tell your parents after you've gone and done it.) your school should be able to help, too. even if they don't have a psych on campus, they should have a form of accessibility services to help you - extensions based on medical need, exemptions from (for example) grades based on attending class, counselling, that sort of thing. where i am (ontario), if you have a diagnosis filed with your campus, you can still count as a full-time student even with a reduced courseload, which allows you to keep school benefits/loans while taking care of yourself. also, ime, when people texted me it helped, even if i didn't reply. knowing someone actually wanted to talk to me was a lifeline.
He did respond and I have since responded, so that's a bit of a relief. @budgie ...Yeah. I think my not having brought up the subject of my possible depression so far has been a combination of my age-old difficulty asking for help and my not wanting to hurt my parents even more (I failed half of my classes this semester). This whole thing with B has only compounded the latter issue. I believe my school does have some sort of services, yes (possibly psych?) I'll have to see if I can take advantage of that. I will try not to be discouraged by slow replies / lack of replies, then. Thank you.
Have you considered that telling your parents might actually lessen whatever worry or pain they had about you failing classes, since it offers an explanation?
