I killed my friend.

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Okay, I was being melodramatic yesterday. It was the first thing I though when I found out. I know better now; it ws jsut a knee-jerk reaction What I really meant was, "I helped kill him, because I was too busy and shy and couldn't be bothered to tell him!" I was going to talk to my shrink about it too and never got around to it! I had all these problems of my own, but I culd still have told him about Terrance!

I wouldn't even have known if my mother hadn't been in the computer room with me, talking to this black guy who was also on Terrance's floor. He said a guy on the fifth floor died and that was why the ambulance was outside, adn they had come up with a stretcher and were taking the body out of the room. "He was in there for four days. hen Cam went up and knocked on his door, because he was worried or something, he was gone. Well, not gone. Just, you know." He said it was a redhead.I thought it was John, an acquaintance of mine who is also sort of a rehead, who had been taken away by the police about a month before because he was abusing his bipolar meds and causing some trouble. My mother went thru the people she knew in her mind, after we both said we didn't know anyone with red hair. Then she said, "Terrance. Oh my God, it wasn't Terrance, was it?" And I knew right away that it was. "Yes, Terrance, that was him," the black guy said.

Terrance and David the two epople I felt closest to at the Y, and now I don't have either of them. They were the only friends I had before coming on here. If I hadn't found WrongPlanet and made tons of friends here, I'd have been devastated and seeing black holes again. But now I'm antidepressed-- they had called in my prescription just that morning or something-- and a few hours later it was starting to work a little, perhaps the giddiness effect, and then I heard about Terrance. David borrowed money from people and never gave it back, and left and never came back, and when he did come back avoided all the people he had borrowed off of. He sort of used me to get to my mother, to borrow $10 off her. Mind you, other gave him more than she did, maybe he just wanted to borrow less off us because he liked us, I dunno. He was strange. He asked people out to dinner, women and sometimes women with their daughters. He bragged about the free bed he got from Welfare, the free disability money he was getting, the crappy but cheap apartment they had given him. But he and Terrance were the only two who talked to me when they saw me sitting on the front steps crying (albeit trying to hide it). They cared enough to take a second look to see if I was alright, and then they stopped and started talking, asking what was wrong. The three of us talked about depression and supported me-- I told them how much it meant to me that they were the diagnosed depressives but the only two people who stopped to help me. I joked that they were happy. They joked about how they were the happiest because they were medicated.

Terrance was going to take me out once and we would get a little tipsy and open up to each other, but it never ahppened. We just forgot about it, or were too embarrassed to bring it up again. Both of us had social anxiety. But we were mostly 100% open with each other. He always let others use the computers, he one ordered thsi expensive, delicious pizza and told everyone that came into the comptuer room to have a piece. He got a lovesat and a TV for his room and said that when he left he would just leave the, there for the next person. He tried to convince this foster mtoher of a mentally ret*d girl to go easy on her, loosen up, the kid was a nice, simple, easy-to-please girl who just wanted something simple and why not let her do it? He was curious about my life; he went stright to look up AS when he heard I had it, it was from him that I heard first about Heather Kuzmich, he looked upthe antidepressant I was on because he was curious. "Oh, why don't you take Lexapro?" he said. "I hink I should go on Lexapro, actually. Oh, no. There are some side effects here I don't like. Like sexual dysfuntion."

Terrance was always happy and smiling and diplomatic. He was so empathetic. He said he'd been through too much to be judgemental.

He had so much to look forward to. He was getting a big settlement from a company for wrongful dismissal. He was going to get paid fairly well for something he wrote as well. He said that he would be a millionaire in a few years. He was a pasable singer and hios singing went very well with his guitar playing, which he ws ery talented at. He single-handedly organized a concert for homelessness awareness, got them to tell their stories and made up songs about their stories, was going to have a PowerPoint presentation, a huge audience, and a few of the people with the worst stories speaking, and this would raise a lot for homeless people.

He ahd all these plans. He wanted to be famous, he was so creative, but he was understimulated, and his shrink didn't help him enough, and now he is dead.

He used alcohol and partying and sex for stimulation. There's not much else to do in Edmonton. He tried. He really did. He went on shopping sprees, was a big spender, wrote for Canadian Living and a newspaper and was writing for something even bigger now, he has an internet presence (Terrance Armstrong is his name), he helped people at the Y write incident reports and that, he went to a support group at the University of Alberta Hospital, he ttok his Paxil, he emailed his many friends and family members. And his need for stimulation was his downfall, and that's why my need for stimulation is killing me. I don't want to have to end up like him.

I am not sure how appropriate this is or not I may or may not get slammed. I am sorry if this seems out of line in this thread.

Ana54 you were not responsible either directly or indirectly for Terrance's death.

It is a warning by the FDA(In the USA)about the increased risk of suicidal tendencies on people taking antidepressants. I am not sure if this was mentioned up in Canada or not. Please accept my condolences about your friend Terrance.

http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2007/NEW01624.html

Ok...sad, yes. But - a touch melodramatic? This seems to be a theme. Why is that? Maybe think about why.