Today marks a year since I tried to die.

It’s sunny and hot, which I appreciate after all the rain. I saw a crow taking a bath in some of the water left from the rain on a roof. I had a nice cold decaf coffee after work. Did some studying, did some knitting, had some lentils for dinner. Life gradually became normal. Mundane, in a good way. Not perfect but close.

I’m happy to be alive. Lucky, really. Forever grateful to the friend who managed to get me help in time.

I’m ashamed that I did it, ashamed of what I put people through, and ashamed of what I sometimes can’t help but see as weakness.

I’m angry at the system. Had I not nearly died, I wouldn’t have had any help. I would’ve died, if not on that day, soon after. It took two suicide attempts and getting hospitalised to get a diagnosis I could have gotten in the community two years earlier if a psychiatrist had paid attention to what I was describing.

I’m angry at the “you’re just not trying hard enough”, the “have you tried splashing your face with cold water? if you don’t try those things of course you’ll end up in A&E again”, the “maybe go to the beach, have some fish and chips, to me it just sounds like you’re stressed”, the “what you have cannot be treated”, the “you still haven’t tried to kill yourself so you’re not that bad”, the “think how lucky you are, how can you want to die when so many people have it so much worse”, the “no, I don’t think you have bipolar disorder”, the “it just doesn’t seem like we can help you.”

I’m angry not just at the individual people who don’t seem to be competent enough to work in the mental health field, but also at an underfunded and short staffed system where even the best of people often lack the time and resources to provide the best care.

I’m grateful to the hospital. I had a good psychiatrist who saw I had bipolar disorder right away and started me on medication, supportive nurses and healthcare assistants who made me feel safe and cared for, occupational therapy staff who helped me find coping skills that actually worked for me and got me participating in activities, and a psychologist who allowed me to see my resilience and good qualities instead of only seeing the moments where I was weak. It was all that help that enabled me to do the work to turn things around.

I choose to focus on the gratefulness and the appreciation of being alive. Anger and resentment won’t change the past, but I’m still disappointed at the state of mental health care.

How many people live feeling miserable, how many people die, only because they don’t get the help they need no matter how much they try to access it? How many people are made to feel as if it’s their own fault they’re like that, as if they’d be all good if they just tried harder?

I could be dead, and I’d be just another body adding to the statistics, another “what a shame, but what could we have done to prevent it?”

Listen to patients and service users. Treat us like the unique individuals we are. We’re not perfect textbook cases. If you give me a list of coping skills and I tell you they don’t work and I still feel suicidal day in and day out, perhaps consider the failure is on your part and not mine.