I Was Hanging by a Thread, Then I Knitted a Sweater
By: Ashley Broadwater
Tags: Life Lessons, Relationships, Self, This Happened To Me, Mental Health

Photo by Giulia Bertelli on Unsplash

In high school, I felt terribly suicidal. I found myself in relationships that felt strained. I felt unloved and unimportant, always stuck in a fight with words both yelled and unsaid.

I was tired. I stayed up too late. I idealized and devalued my body, never feeling like I was at home inside of it.

I worried about the future. I tried to run from the past. I sought out validation in the wrong places, telling myself I was in control when I was not.

I was hanging by a thread. I didn’t know how much longer I could stand it. I reached senior year and yearned for college, counting down the months. I cried by the side of the road, using sticks to draw in the dirt and poke holes.

I listened to a lot of Bon Iver and The Fray, crying in my bed, crying in the shower, crying outside. I lived on the depressed side of Tumblr and forums in which I found others who struggled in similar ways. I told myself it was validation, when it was all really just triggering.

I looked for hope and grabbed it anywhere I could find it. I talked to friends. I talked to family.

I found quotes that encouraged me. Painted the quotes. Hung the paintings up on my wall. Looked at the paintings before I went to sleep.

I listened to new music. Taylor Swift, One Direction, even Fetty Wap. Watched YouTubers into the hours of the night, cuddled under blankets, trying to not let myself go hungry so I could sleep.

“It’s time,” I heard God say. “It’s time to recover.”

I worked on loving myself better. I worked on fighting for myself, for what I wanted, for what I deserved, for what was rightfully mine.

I was still hanging by a thread, but I was also beginning to knit a sweater.

As the sweater got bigger, I became more warm. I went to college, made friends, asked for help when I needed it, accepted it when it was offered. I went to therapy, letting a volcano flood out of my mouth. I didn’t want to be afraid anymore.

It’s not always easy finding a home in a dorm bed, especially when a boy stole a part of me in it.

But I would not let him unravel the sweater I had been knitting. I would not let him watch me collapse. I would show him who was in power now.

I wondered if that was okay for me to do. I questioned the validity in my experience and my emotions. Was I resilient or scared? Was I resilient or safe from the start?

I went back to therapy. Let the volcano rush out again. Said the words that tasted like gasoline. Played with the hair tie on my wrist. Listened when she said what happened to me was what I thought it was.

Several more boys would tear me down. Several more fights and traumas would occur. My experience with suicidality was far from over.

But even though my sweater stretched, the threads didn’t break. My progress was not undone, even when it felt like the seams were close to ripping.

I tried to love myself again and again. I found worth not in how others treated me, but in who I was, who I knew myself to be in my heart.

I helped others, finding my identity in advocacy. I tried to hear myself when I told others they were beautiful and worth it.

I kept knitting the sweater, and now it’s complete. Stretched sometimes, worn sometimes, faded sometimes, but certainly whole.