A letter to a man I knew for an hour

Dear Dr. John whatever-your-last-name-is,

I knew just what I wanted to say to you as I stepped up to the intimidating COUNSELING ASSOCIATES building. I was planning to tell you everything that you needed to know to help me figure out how to make my life matter, so I wouldn't feel the need to do what I had tried the day before. I was going to tell you about the razor, the bulimia, the bottle of mystery pills my friend had given me to take the edge off. Anything it took to remind me what it was to be happy.

And then... you beckoned my mother to step into your office with us. I couldn't stand the small, windowless room with burgundy walls and generic office chairs lined with those little gold-colored balls. I sat down and didn't look at you. I was angry with you for letting my mother come into the room, because everyone knows that teenagers don't tell their parents anything. What did you expect me to do? I'd already broken my mother's heart; was I supposed to rip it out of her chest and pulverize it, slice it up with my own razor? No.

I looked at the chair and ran my fingers along the little balls, then experimented with twisting my fingers in different ways. I figured out early on that I could pop the knuckles in my pinky by pulling it to the side with my index finger. Then I focused on your shoes--ugly light brown boots with buckles. And a low heel. What kind of man wears heels? I wondered. Did you wonder what I was doing instead of looking at you? I was busying myself with everything I could. The only time I looked at your face, I was studying your ugly moustache and almost offensively unattractive goatee.

When you asked if the attempt had been an impulse, I immediately told you that it hadn't. When you asked why, I told you that I didn't know. What was I supposed to say? As you asked a few more cookie-cutter questions, I went on to tell you that I couldn't control these horrible feelings that wouldn't go away. This was the only information that I was willing to share with my mother, but it should've been enough. It should've been enough for you to realize that I wasn't happy. But it wasn't.

Then you opened your mouth and had to inform me what was wrong with me. "Not too long ago, I had a guy come in--he was maybe a couple years older than you. He had been best friends with this girl for years, but one day this girl decided that she wanted him to be her boyfriend. He didn't want that, and his friends kept bugging him about it. He came here and realized... he just didn't want to be bugged anymore."

I told you that while I had a similar situation once, no one bugged me about it and my friend and I didn't talk anymore--we didn't even go to the same school. This had been months ago, and I never thought about her anymore. You suggested to my mother that she block her phone number--what? I had just told you that we weren't in contact. You didn't listen to a word I said.

Instead, you listened to my mother when she told you that I had read the book 'Cut' by Patricia McCormick the day before the attempt. When I insisted that I hadn't been influenced by that stupid book, she didn't answer. I could've said that I had thought about this for years, and planned for months. Started to do it a dozen times just in the last two weeks. I finally looked up--at her, not at you. She went on to tell you, "I don't think she needs counseling or meds. I mean, last night just after we got back from the hospital, she burst into song with her sisters like always. She seems fine." I glared at her, but she wasn't looking at me. It apparently didn't occur to either of you that I had smiled and sung like always because I'm unable to let people know how I'm feeling--which is probably why I was in this situation anyway. I'd have told you that, too, if my mother wasn't there.

Then Mom suggested that maybe it was Harry Potter's fault--I loved the series, after all. Maybe I wanted to be reincarnated as a witch. Did you actually believe her? You should've noticed that she was placing the blame on anything that didn't involve my actually feeling pain. Everyone else who heard my mother go off realized it, and informed me of it later. But not you. You nodded interestedly and kept listening to my mother go on.

A while later, you announced that I was fine. I had acted on impulse (though I told you repeatedly that I hadn't). I was a perfectly normal teenager who had just gotten overwhelmed. I should go to the doctor for a checkup, and I'd be fine. As we stood and shook hands, I finally looked into your eyes. I tried to convey a silent message of HELP ME through the eye contact.

Did you not notice that I said no more than ten words during the whole thing, other than several sharp "Mom!"s? Didn't you see that you weren't getting the whole story by listening to someone who doesn't know me at all? Why couldn't you tell, during that one brief moment in which I looked pleadingly at you, that I wasn't as happy-go-lucky as the picture my mother painted?

You didn't listen to a word I said. Was it because I'm a teenager? That's why the nurses in the ER barely spoke to me, and the only thing the doctor said was that according to the blood test, I hadn't taken as many pills as I said I had--er, or thought I had--apparently, it didn't occur to him that there were no meds in my system because his nurses had pumped all of it out of my stomach.
You probably think that just because I'm a teenager, I'm an impulsive or attention-seeking whiner. Of course, being under the age of eighteen, I'm incapable of feeling anything other than the need to fit in.

Thanks for all your help.