Recovery Diaries In Depth

From Suicidal to Thriving with Tree Franklyn | RDID Ep. 102

• Recovery Diaries • Season 1 • Episode 2

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Discover the transformative journey of Tree Franklyn, a best-selling author and founder of the Empathic Awakening Academy, as she candidly recounts her battle with mental health and the inspiration behind her poignant letter, "Mom, I Want to Kill Myself." Tree's story is one of resilience and humor, often finding solace in nature despite her amusing struggle with allergies. Together, we challenge the harmful "suck it up" mentality and reflect on how societal attitudes can impact personal well-being.

Tree opens up about the silent shadows that shaped her upbringing, with her father's PTSD from the Vietnam War and her mother's experiences as an orphan in Vietnam coloring their family dynamics. Despite growing up in an environment where mental health was a taboo topic, Tree's determination to advocate for mental health blossomed through her personal blog. Her message is clear: even in the darkest moments, there is a path to healing and a future filled with light.

Through insights inspired by psychologist Carl Rogers and her own experiences, Tree emphasizes the incredible power of empathy and active listening. Her heartfelt essay on the Recovery Diaries site continues to be a beacon of hope for those grappling with suicidal thoughts. As we explore Tree's journey from despair to happiness, we extend an invitation to stay engaged with our content and join us in supporting mental health awareness.

https://treefranklyn.com/

Conversations like the ones on this podcast can sometimes be hard, but they're always necessary. If you or someone you know is struggling, please consider visiting www.wannatalkaboutit.com. If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please call, text, or chat 988.

https://oc87recoverydiaries.org/

Gabriel Nathan:

Hello, this is Recovery Diaries In-Depth. I'm your host, abe Nathan. Thanks so much for joining us. We are happy to have you here on today's show. We're going to be speaking to Tree Franklyn. She's a best-selling author, a coach and a founder of the Empathic Awakening Academy. She's going to be talking about her heartfelt letter to her mother. "Mom, I want to kill myself.

Gabriel Nathan:

Each week we'll bring you a Recovery Diaries contributor folks who have shared their mental health journey with us through essay or video format. We want to see where they are in their mental health journey since initially being published on our website. Our goal is to continue supporting our diverse community by having conversations here on our podcast to follow up and see what has shifted, what has changed and what new things have emerged. We're so happy to have you along for this journey. We want to remind you to follow our show for new and back episodes at recoverydiariesorg.

Gabriel Nathan:

There, like the podcast, you'll find stories of mental health, empowerment and change. You can also sign up for our mailing list there so you never miss a new podcast health, empowerment and change. You can also sign up for our mailing list there so you never miss a new podcast episode, essay or film and you can find this podcast pretty much anywhere. You get your podcasts. We appreciate your comments and feedback about our show. It helps us improve, make changes and grow and, of course, make sure to like, share and subscribe. Course, make sure to like, share and subscribe.

Gabriel Nathan:

Tree Franklyn, welcome to Recovery Diaries in Depth. It is so delightful to have you on the show. Thank you so much for being here.

Tree Franklyn:

Thank you, Gabe. I'm so honored to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah, it's a pleasure and this is a new podcast and it's so exciting to have you on as one of our very first guests and I don't know I just I view this as such an exciting opportunity to A: talk to people I like about a subject that really interests me, which is mental health, so this is like the greatest thing in the world for me. I hope it's good for you too and enjoyable.

Tree Franklyn:

It is. I love talking about mental health, even though sometimes it's pretty depressing.

Gabriel Nathan:

But you're laughing. Yes, we're off to a good start already.

Tree Franklyn:

Yes, absolutely.

Gabriel Nathan:

You know, I think it was Charlie Chaplin who said that we laugh so that we may not weep.

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah, I love that.

Gabriel Nathan:

I mean, and it's true, because it is hard to talk about and it is depressing at times, but it doesn't have to be. And I think that you know we lose so much when we forget that we are not just our mental illness, right, we are whole complex individuals with senses of humor and silly things that happen to us during the day, and you know, we're all of these things. All of these things, and I guess my first question for you is, as an advocate and as someone who talks very openly about her mental health, do you, I guess? What do you do to fill your tank and to make sure that you're not losing all those other bits and pieces of you that may not be getting as much attention day to day?

Tree Franklyn:

I'm really spiritual so I have to do things that feed my spirit. So whether it's just being in nature, being around trees, doing silly things like talking to the trees and hugging trees, and talking to bees and flies and birds and having conversations with them, it makes me feel very connected to this bigger world, to this bigger something. There's something bigger than just our humanity and our emotions and our struggle. So those things I really make time for for, whether it's just even five minutes sitting outside and looking into the sky.

Gabriel Nathan:

What is your favorite tree to hug? Do you have a favorite?

Tree Franklyn:

You know, surprisingly, I did an allergy test uh four years ago and I'm pretty much allergic to all of nature and trees and grass and...

Gabriel Nathan:

Do you have to pop an allergy pill before?

Tree Franklyn:

No, I just suck it up, I just hug them anyway. Every once in a while I pop a Zyrtec.

Gabriel Nathan:

There you go.

Tree Franklyn:

Just because I get too rashy, but I try not to do that all the time and every day. But yeah, I'm pretty much. For some reason my body is allergic to a lot of grass and trees and shrubs and I just love them. Anyway, I love cottonwood trees just because where we go fishing my favorite spots to fish they have a lot of cottonwood trees out there. But I don't care that I'm allergic to them. They're my most highly allergic tree.

Gabriel Nathan:

Oh my God, and where are you? Geographically roughly in the world?

Tree Franklyn:

Right now I'm in Southern California.

Gabriel Nathan:

Southern California, OK. You said something about allergies. I said do you pop a pill? And you said, no, I just suck it up. I was driving behind a van yesterday that had a bumper sticker that said "suck it up buttercup was thinking about mental health and I was thinking about suicide and about what we know now that we didn't know before or that we knew about but didn't care. You know that when someone would be struggling with mental health or they would sometimes get that refrain, suck it up, suck it up buttercup. And I was thinking about why someone would put that on the back of their van and how it's just the total antithesis of what we want to be teaching kids. And I wanted to know if you had any experience like that, growing up with that kind of like suck it up attitude, maybe when you were in your earlier days of struggling, or is it something that you maybe told yourself in your ea rly days ?

Tree Franklyn:

All the time I told myself that. I told myself why can't you just let it go? Why do you have to take everything so deeply and why do you have to feel so intensely where everybody else just sort of brushes things off and they seem okay? And so I think a huge part of depression that actually makes it worse is our attitude towards ourselves and saying that we shouldn't be this way Life is.

Tree Franklyn:

You know, there are so many good things happening for us and why are we so depressed and we can't really pinpoint the reason, and so we sort of blame ourselves for it, where everybody else seems to be able to suck it up and be okay with things and brush things off, and for us we feel really deeply if we're struggling with mental health challenges and I think that that shame and that feeling of I'm not doing well, I'm not doing good enough, I'm not able, I'm not strong enough to make myself feel better, that sort of thing, and I think it's pretty dangerous that suck it up, buttercup. In some ways it can be pretty dangerous in the context of when someone is really depressed. You can't just say suck it up and they're like okay, great, I'm fine now.

Gabriel Nathan:

Well, it's like telling a person with anxiety don't worry so much. It's like, oh wow, why didn't I think of that?

Tree Franklyn:

Very smart, right? Yeah, there are times like I was in Vietnam, gosh, like 20 years ago, and we all rented scooters me and two of my friends. We rented scooters and we went into town, we hired this person, took us real deep into this third-world town and we got stuck in a huge heavy rainstorm and we had to ride our scooters back. It took about an hour in heavy rain and torrential downpour and we were not prepared for it.

Tree Franklyn:

We didn't have rain jackets or anything, because earlier on the day it was nice and warm and sunny and I was so scared and I was so freezing and I was so scared and I was so freezing and I was so cold and we all just had to keep moving because our scooters were running out of gas. We just had to get back to the hotel and I told myself suck it up, suck it up, suck it up, just go, because I really wanted to stop and cry. I really just wanted to like, stop what's happening, it's just too intense, but you can't, you have to get back before you run out of gas or before it gets really dark, and so that advice really helped me at that time in certain times where you just have to keep moving. You have to keep going, but for the most part, yeah, suck it up or don't worry so much. It doesn't really help on a day-to-day basis.

Gabriel Nathan:

And I think the other thing, too, that you said earlier also, that like, well, everyone else can do it, everyone else is. But that's bullshit too, because they're not. Like we have this idea that we're not okay but everyone else is, and the reality is that no one's okay, but everyone else is, and the reality is that no one's okay. Everyone is struggling, everyone is faking it, Everyone, you know, doesn't know whether to shit or go blind, for lack of a better term. Right, but we have this idea that it's just us. And where does that come from, do you think?

Tree Franklyn:

I think it comes from us not being open to talking about it. Like, you and I are talking about it and there are a lot of websites and podcasts and social media and things now and it's becoming more and more open and okay for people to talk about it. Back in the day, when I was in my 20s, obviously there was no internet. Nobody was talking about it. Everybody was faking it. So you look at everybody faking it and you think everybody else is doing well, but you're right, Everybody else was just pretty much suffering as much as I was, but nobody talked about it because it was a stigma it was back then.

Tree Franklyn:

We thought it was a weakness an inherent weakness in ourselves, and now I think there's so much education about it and information about it that we're realizing that it's not necessarily a weakness. It's. Sometimes it's our biology, it's our chemistry, sometimes it's just a certain adaptation skills that we need to learn. It's just a whole combination of things and we are realizing that it's not a flaw in us. We were not born flawed and now we're stuck like this for the rest of our lives, whereas we used to think it was.

Gabriel Nathan:

Can you talk to me about those earlier days for you, when you were first struggling with mental health and with suicidality? How did that come Like? How did that come about and how did that manifest within you and what was it like in your family, you know? Did you talk about it with your family? How did all of that really kind of begin for you?

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah, I think part of it is genetic and there's a lot of studies now that's testing genetics and where depression comes from. And I think we do get some of that from our DNA, from our ancestors and our parents and our grandparents, and I think it does get passed down to us. It doesn't mean that we're stuck with that because oh, it's in our parents and our grandparents and I think it does get passed down to us. It doesn't mean that we're stuck with that because oh, it's in our DNA and that's it forever. We're screwed. But it just means that we can at least sort of forgive ourselves for having taken on someone else's emotions and pain.

Tree Franklyn:

My father, I think he never talked about emotions at all, so mental health wasn't even a thing in you know. It wasn't even a phrase in his mouth that ever came out in his emotions, where he just sort of shoved them down with alcohol. And he suffered from very severe PTSD from the Vietnam War, which is where I sprang from. My dad was in the military, american white in the military, went and met my mom, who's Vietnamese, in the Vietnam War and then had some babies and brought us back to the US and he never got help for his PTSD from the things that he saw. He never talked about the war with us.

Tree Franklyn:

We knew, everybody knew that he drowned his sorrows in alcohol. Nobody ever talked about it. It was the big elephant in the room growing up, and my mom growing up she was an orphan and her parents had died when she was young, as a kid, as a teenager, and so she sort of was raised by her teenage sister also, and I believe that she suffered a lot of mental health problems as well, and nobody, neither of them, got help for it, Neither of them acknowledged it for themselves, and so, raising a child, they were not able to have those conversations with me, and so I sort of had to flounder around and figure it out on my own, and they of course never showed their sadness or their depression or their anxiety. So I just thought I was crazy.

Gabriel Nathan:

And that's a heavy burden to carry around, to think that and then to not be able to express it to the people closest to you.

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah.

Gabriel Nathan:

Did your siblings struggle with mental health too?

Tree Franklyn:

I think so in their own way not specifically in the same way that I did and I think that they all had their own way of handling it. It was very different. My middle sister's very extroverted and so she got a lot of help not by talking about it but just by being very social and having a lot of friends and doing a lot of things and keeping very busy. And I'm very introverted and I take things in internally a lot, and so I didn't talk to a lot of people, I just sort of internally had conversations with myself, and then my other sister had conversations with myself, and then my other sister. I feel that we all struggle with it in our own ways and I feel that we all somewhat still do struggle with it in our own ways. Everybody not just me or my sisters and my parents, but I think everybody struggles with mental health. They find their own way to deal with it.

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah, either healthy or not.

Tree Franklyn:

Absolutely yeah.

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah, Can you talk a little bit about how and why you first really dipped your toe into putting yourself out there in terms of mental health advocacy? Why and what was your first foray into kind of being a little bit more public-like? And then I have a follow-up. But I think I've asked you too much, so I'll just hold back for a minute.

Tree Franklyn:

It's all good. I started a side blog like a side hustle. I started a side blog like a side hustle. I started a blog online and I was just writing about things in general. You know, when you start a blog, you don't really know what the heck your niche is or narrow down or all of that stuff. You just write for the sake of writing.

Tree Franklyn:

And I wrote, dear Mom, on my own blog and it was just very cathartic for me to write that. It was really more for me than anybody else and I was feeling real happy at that certain time in my life and I wanted people to know that just because you are in this way, it doesn't mean that you have to be in that way forever and that there is light at the end of the tunnel. And my blog, somehow all of my writings, tend to go towards emotions and emotional things and healing, and so I got a lot of people who signed on my subscribers and they always asked me you know, how can you be so happy and what did you do? And so I was like you know what I think people really need to hear this that when I was really down and depressed, I thought that was it. Like there's no, that's it. There's no more future for me, this is the way it's going to be forever, and there's no light at the end of the tunnel. I'm just cursed for this and I probably deserve it, and blah, blah, blah.

Tree Franklyn:

And so I didn't want anyone else to feel that way, and it took me a long time to climb out of it, and I think a lot of people nowadays are looking for that magic pill, whether it's a physical pill that they take or an article that they read or a new book that they read, and they think it's going to be. Everything's going to be hunky-dory and wonderful from then on. But I want people to know that sometimes it's a process, sometimes it's a long journey, but regardless of whether it's a long journey or a short journey, for them it's still a journey and there is light at the end of the tunnel. That's why I started writing about it. That's why I love talking about it now.

Gabriel Nathan:

I can't believe that was your first. That was really your first public piece, "ear Mom.

Tree Franklyn:

Yes, yes. To that level and that depth.

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah, and I think you know what you were saying about feeling that way, that this is what I'm cursed to be forever. This is just how it's going to be. This is my story that I'm depressed, I'm feeling suicidal, and that's just what it's going to be. You know, that's suicide right there. It's helpless and hopeless, and we combine that and lock that in and that's a really, really dangerous place to be, and so I think it's so lovely that once you were out of that, that, y ou felt confident enough and, like, stable enough and well enough to be able to communicate to people, stable enough and well enough to be able to communicate to people. No, you know, that's not, that's not your story. You're not doomed, you can climb out of that. Um, because I think it's one thing to tell people you got this, or you're not alone, or you can do this, but you're actually showing them, um, you know, you're providing this personal story that really shows people you actually can get better. It's a really beautiful thing.

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah, and it's also because I heard when I was depressed you know, people saying exactly what you just said, like you'll get over it, you'll get through this and all of those things. But they're very flippant remarks. When you have someone who's actually been through it and they sit with you and they actually say, yes, you will get through it, and you know that they know what you're talking about, they've been through it rather than just a friend or a partner saying, oh, you'll get through it, it's just a difficult time, you'll get through it. It makes you feel like you're being dismissed when people say that, right, but when people actually really do understand what you're going through and can actually sit there in that pain with you and allow you to be in that pain and not try to fix it and not try to help you, but just sort of be there with you, then it does give you that sense of hope and it gives you that feeling that you're not alone.

Gabriel Nathan:

Well, let's share that sense of hope with our listeners. If you would be so gracious to please read your essay, we would love to hear it in your voice. It is called "Dear Mom, I Want to Kill Myself.

Tree Franklyn:

Okay. In my early 20s I was diagnosed with manic depression, now commonly known as bipolar disorder. I had suicidal thoughts every day for nearly a decade, starting from my late teens. I wanted to die. Every night I would fall asleep to a tear-soaked pillow, begging a cruel, invisible God to have the mercy to let the bed swallow me up so I could disappear. Cruel, invisible God to have the mercy to let the bed swallow me up so I could disappear. And every morning I would wake up with strands of clumped, tear-dried hair, furious that I was still alive.

Tree Franklyn:

On multiple occasions I've held a knife to my wrist and neck and a gun to my mouth and temple, and on every occasion I was too scared to follow through. Leak loser. Can't even kill yourself. Can't go on living and you can't go on dying. You're pitiful, useless. One quick little push through the flesh, one tiny little squeeze of the trigger that's all it takes, and yet you can't even get that right. The world would be a better place without you in it taking up so much worthless space. You're a disgrace.

Tree Franklyn:

These are the thoughts that went through my head every day, and that was my reality. I was living in a black hole, its powerful gravity sucking me in pulling me down. I desperately tried to claw my way out of it, but it was a constant struggle to hold on, to stay alive. Just one more day. And the worst part no one understood. In a world of six billion people, I was alone. Everyone else seemed happy and unaffected, light and carefree, and I was the opposite. I felt everything, especially the darker, heavier emotions. Little things made me so sad and I cried all the time. Somehow I missed the memo on how to be happy, or maybe I just wasn't good enough to deserve what everyone else seemed to have. The ones who were close to me tried to help, but their attempts at care always made me feel worse.

Tree Franklyn:

I remember the utterly helpless look in my mom's eyes one day when I was visiting her in St Louis. We were in her kitchen and she was cooking bacon over the stove, flipping each wavy piece with a fork as they sizzled in the oil. She stopped between pieces, turned and asked me for the hundredth time why I was so sad. I was sitting at the table alone and I looked up at her, wanting desperately to have an answer for her, but I didn't. There was no reason. I couldn't point my finger to anything and say this is it. This is the reason I'm depressed. It was just a general all-around feeling of hopelessness and worthlessness, of not belonging. And sad was such an insulting understatement to how I really felt.

Tree Franklyn:

When I tried to explain all that to her, her eyes died and I saw the dark clouds that surrounded me starting to envelop her. I felt her helplessness in addition to mine. It's one thing to be depressed. It's another to see my suffering spread to someone I love dearly. That was when I learned to put on a fake smile to pretend that things were okay, when deep down I wanted nothing more than to die. I never wanted to see that look in my mom's eyes again, and I never did. But years later I discovered that she had learned how to put on a fake smile too. When I pretended that everything was okay, she pretended to believe me because she didn't know what else to do.

Tree Franklyn:

And the worst thing for a parent is to see their child in pain and not be able to help them. So I wrote this letter to my mom and all the moms and dads and loved ones who know someone battling depression. If you really want to help them, study letter closely, take it into your heart, commit yourself to the steps involved. It may not seem like much and it may even be impossible at times, but let me take your hand and guide you into the mind of your daughter, your son, your husband, wife, friend, sister. Allow me to show you how you can help them through their darkness so they can emerge on the other side lighter, happier, free from that despair that keeps them shackled and living the joyous life they truly want and are fully capable of having. I live on that other side now the dark days of the heavy clouds no longer control overwhelm, trap and suck me into their pits of despair. Now it's not about how I can die, it's about how I can live.

Tree Franklyn:

I wake up every morning with a playful, lighthearted enthusiasm bursting out of me, and I can't wait to face the day when I go to sleep at night. I want to hurry and fall asleep so I can wake up and do it all over again. I roll over and I see my boyfriend sleeping. Now my husband and I feel an overwhelming sensation of belonging and appreciation. We live in harmony him, me and his 17-year-old daughter and we sometimes laugh until our bellies hurt and our jaws ache. Our two dogs licking and pawing, jumping all over us, wanting to be a part of the fun. I have more than enough energy to go rock climbing, skydiving and hiking all in one day.

Tree Franklyn:

I don't snap at people, I'm not annoyed easily and I have mental clarity, awareness and presence to spend quality time with my family and loved ones. I'm not an outsider anymore and I'm no longer living in my head or inside my dark tunnel of self-pity. In fact, I look in the mirror and absolutely adore the woman staring back at me. My mom and I have what we call laugh attacks, where we laugh so hard we cry and we don't even know why. One of us might have said something mildly funny and that's enough to set us off into crazy, contagious laughter that spreads to my sisters and anyone within an earshot radius. I feel bold and courageous and I welcome challenges. Knowing if I can get through an entire decade of wanting to kill myself that's 3,650 days. I can get through anything. What doesn't kill me only makes me stronger and damn, am I strong. If you look up strong in Wikipedia, you'll see my picture and I'll have a real, genuine smile, not a fake upside down frown.

Tree Franklyn:

If you want to help your loved one get to this other side, this letter's for you. I know that everyone's different and depression is not the same for every person and what works for one may not work for another, but hopefully this can serve as a general guide to help you into the mind of your loved one. I went back in time and wrote it from the point of view of where I was in my darkest days. I wish my mom had this letter back then, if not for me then at least for her own sanity, and I wish I had this letter too, so I could soothe myself when I was inconsolable. If you're depressed, maybe this letter can console you too, to soften even 1% of your pain, because sometimes that's all it takes to get through to the next moment.

Tree Franklyn:

Dear mom, I hate seeing that. Look in your eyes the one that tells me your heart is broken and, worse, that I've broken it. It churns my stomach and, frankly, disgusts me to know I am the reason you feel so helpless. I know you feel like a failure, like a bad mother. Please let me assure you that's the furthest thing from the truth. I know you want to help me and, believe me, there's nothing more I want than to be helped, except the times. I'd rather just die. There's nothing more.

Tree Franklyn:

I want to feel good again, or maybe even for the first time. I don't even remember what good feels like. Did I ever feel good? All I know now is darkness, heaviness and suffocation. I can't breathe, mom. It's like there's not enough air, like someone turned down the oxygen level on earth. Except everyone else seems to be breathing just fine. I'm gasping for air, but there's not enough to take in. I'm dying slowly, painfully, withering away. I want to get it over with and die.

Tree Franklyn:

Already I'm tired of suffering, of feeling so bad all the time, and I'm tired of watching everyone around me try to make things better, only to make things worse. And then I feel me even more at fault for making everyone feel so bad, and that makes me feel like an even bigger piece of shit than I already am. It's just a never-ending cycle of shitdom. Remember when dad used to rip off my band-aids? I wanted him to go slow because I was scared and it hurt, but he yanked them off in one quick pull. I never liked it. It always hurt, but it was over in two seconds, and that's why I want to die. It will hurt, but at least it will be over quickly at least. Then it will be done. End of story. No more pain. I'm already hurting anyway. Let's just get it over with.

Tree Franklyn:

But you know what, mom, despite how incredibly freeing that sound, there's a small but loud part of me that inherently knows it really won't be over, maybe for me who knows? But certainly not for you, dad or my sisters. You will all have to live with my choice for the rest of your life, and I think that's what keeps me going. I cause enough pain in life. I don't want to cause any more in death. You see, mom, you don't realize how much you are helping me simply by being alive. Your life is the reason I am not dead. So how could that possibly make you a failure In my book? That makes you a savior. When I hold the sharp steel blade to my wrist, summoning up the courage to slice through the skin, you're in the background of my mind. Knowing how devastated you would be if I took my own pitiful life makes me put away the knife and pretend just for one more day to be happy.

Tree Franklyn:

You try all these things. You tell me to look on the bright side, smile more, fake it till I make it, do this and do that and while none of it helps. I know your intentions are pure, you really are trying to help but it's not working. And I see sometimes when you get frustrated and angry, you're not so much angry at me, you're angry at your own inability to help, your own helplessness. But you lash out at me because I'm the one standing there reflecting your own helplessness back at you. I'm the one in front of you, still in my own suffering, as proof of how helpless you truly are, how futile your attempts, despite everything you've tried, and I know you have tried and tried and tried. It must be tiring for you, mom. You must be exhausted. So let me tell you what would help, and I'm sorry if this hurts you to hear, but I have to be blunt and honest or else you won't hear it and I won't be saved One enough with the fake it till you make it crap. I don't want to turn my frown upside down. Do you honestly think a simple direction change of the curvature of my lips will solve this deep critical problem? If I had a knife stuck in my chest and a gaping six inch hole pouring out blood a gallon a minute, would you suggest putting one of those tiny round band-aids on it. To make everything all better. That's exactly how it feels to be told to look on the bright side and think positive thoughts. I have a knife in my chest. I'm bleeding to death. There is no bright side and no amount of positive thinking will close this wound.

Tree Franklyn:

Two sad is different than depressed. Sad is when we lost Aunt Margie to cancer. Depressed is when I've lost myself. Sad is wishing she was still alive. Depressed is wishing I was dead. Like her too, I feel dead inside. There's no one home. Only someone must be home, because that someone is exhausted, numb and aching all at the same time.

Tree Franklyn:

Three being depressed is like having a constant dense fog follow you around 24-7. Only it's not just surrounding you, it's inside you, in your brain. I can't think clearly. It's foggy in here. I feel like I'm stuck in someone else's eternal nightmare. And it's not just a mental thing. I feel it in my bones and if I had a soul I'd say it's permeated my soul too.

Tree Franklyn:

But somewhere underneath, over around, in or through the fog, there's something else in me, mom. I don't know who or what it is, but there's something. There's someone screams at the top of her lungs, begging, shouting to be heard, to be freed. She wants out of the fog, but it's too thick. I can't see her. I only have a sense she's there, but sometimes I don't hear her at all and I think she's died or moved on or decided. Maybe I'm just not worth fighting for. But she's in there, always fighting and kicking and yelling. Sometimes I hate her. I wish she would just shut up. I think she's the one keeping me from pulling the trigger, because if I go, she goes and she doesn't want to die. Her will to live is tenacious and annoying.

Tree Franklyn:

Four, stop trying to fix me. I am what I am. I might be broken and shattered into a million different pieces on the cold hard floor, but don't try to sweep me up and glue me back together. Just let me be broken and messy. Right now, your full acceptance of my brokenness, of my pain, may be the difference between a healthy wrist and one that's been plunged into with a knife. Just let me be. I feel everything deeply. I'm too sensitive.

Tree Franklyn:

I don't know that I will ever come out of this. From where I sit, the world looks bleak and the future dimmer. But you know otherwise. You have hope, you feel joy, you see light, you actually laugh, a real deep from your belly kind of laugh. I cannot convince you to come to my side to know what I know, just as you can't convince me To come to your side and know what you know. So if you can hold on to what you know, and let me hold on to what I know eventually your knowing might permeate mine. Eventually your light will seep into the cracks of my knowing and one day it might eradicate all the darkness and fog. But not now. I'm not ready. If I was, that one day would be today and I wouldn't be writing this letter.

Tree Franklyn:

So, instead of trying to fix me or force a change, trust in the power of acceptance, accepting me as I am, especially at a time when I don't accept myself, is the most powerful gift you can give me. Just think about it. All day, every day, I tell myself what a failure I am, how wrong and weak and stupid I am. I feel broken, defective, left behind. I feel unworthy, inadequate and a burden. It doesn't help me to have you validate those feelings in me by trying to change and fix them. You're basically saying you're right, you are defective, you are a burden. If I wasn't, you wouldn't try so hard to fix me and I wouldn't see that helplessness in your eyes.

Tree Franklyn:

I know it's really hard for you to watch your little girl in so much pain and your motherly instincts are going haywire trying to make it all better. But I am telling you now if you could resist your temptation to quote unquote make it better, put aside your urgency to fix things and just be here with me in my presence, in full acceptance of where I am right now, I will get better, faster than any other tools, tactics and tricks you use to try to fix me. I know your mind is freaking out right now. That can't be enough. You're thinking there must be something more you can do. Just sit back and accept that your baby's on the verge of suicide every day? Hell, no, I get it, mom, and you're right. There is more you can do. If you don't heed any of the above and just do this one thing I'm about to show you, you will still help me tremendously and I guarantee you, if you do this consistently, exactly the way I show you, in time I will rise out of this depression. In time I will get better. In time your baby will rediscover her worth, learn new ways to think and behave and she will be happy again. It is possible and here's how.

Tree Franklyn:

Five, two words, listen, repeat, that's it. If I say to you, mom, nothing's going right in my life, my boyfriend dumped me, I don't have any money for rent and I feel like a failure, I want you to say back to me you're saying nothing's going right in your life, your boyfriend dumped you, you don't have any money for rent and you feel like a failure. Am I hearing you right? Or you can paraphrase it by saying you feel like a failure because everything's going wrong, you don't have any rent money and your boyfriend left right. I want you to keep doing this until I stop talking. Keep listening to what I say and keep repeating it back to me. Eventually, I will run out of things to say. It might take five minutes, 15, or 30, but I will stop and I will feel exponentially better.

Tree Franklyn:

How does this work? This kind of active, reflective listening was developed by a brilliant psychologist and founder of the humanistic approach to psychology, carl Rogers. The idea is that everyone longs to be listened to, acknowledged and understood. We all want to be heard and validated, even if what we have to say is not true. Our need to be understood is more important than what we say.

Tree Franklyn:

Depressed people need understanding the most because no one wants to listen to them or talk about it, and eventually people fall away or distance themselves, understandably. So If I tell you I'm a useless failure and you spend the next 20 minutes trying to convince me otherwise while my eyes gloss over, both of us will end up frustrated and banging our heads against the wall. It will not be as effective as if you spent five seconds repeating my feelings back to me. In doing this, you validated that my feelings are important and showed me that you care enough to listen and truly hear me, even if you vehemently disagree. People always make sense in their view of the world. Instead of dismissing what they think is crazy or untrue, try to understand their view, even if it's ridiculous. When you start listening and repeating what I say, I feel as though you aren't dismissing me and that you're actually trying to understand me.

Tree Franklyn:

Sometimes, just being acknowledged and understood is enough to catapult me into a softer feeling place, so I can think more clearly and cope better.

Tree Franklyn:

This seems too simple to work and you're surely having doubts, but all I can say is try it. My world is very dark, mom. I'm here all alone and no one wants any part of it. The only ones I can talk to who understand are other depressed people, and we both know you can't lift someone out of quicksand if you're stuck in it yourself. Will you please be the hand I reach for to help me keep my head above the surface? I have no one else, not even myself. Thank you, mom, for everything you do, and I'm sorry I'm such a lousy killjoy of a daughter. One day I will make it up to you. One day, with your help, maybe we can go for ice cream on the beach, lay down a blanket in sand and watch the sun set into the ocean together, and maybe I'll turn to you happy tears in my eyes and thank you for not just giving me life but for saving it. I love you forever, your depressed daughter.

Gabriel Nathan:

If you or someone you know may be in crisis or considering suicide, please call, text or chat the suicide in crisis lifeline at 988 Um, Tree, it's such a beautiful piece and what I love about it? I love a lot about it. But it resonates so deeply with me because when I read it, and when I hear you read it, I'm thinking about my father, who just wants to fix everything, everything. And that's the way he shows love and that's the way he feels powerful If he's fixing something and if there's a problem, he's on it.

Gabriel Nathan:

And even when there's like a simple, tangible thing that he can do like can you pick up the mail while I'm gone, he is so excited to do it because it's so. My son has a problem and he's coming to me and I can, I can do this. But when I was a kid and I was, um, severely anxious and depressed, they didn't know what to do and they couldn't fix it. And, um, I I have a lot of empathy for him, especially A coming from a different country and a different era where mental health was just not a thing and we didn't have the same language for it and there was just no way to fix it and there was just no way to fix it. And your counsel to your mom, particularly the last item of just listen, listen to me and that will be enough. It seems crazy that that will do anything, but really it does everything.

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah, I agree, and I think when we can just be there for anyone, whether they're going through a mental health challenge or just having a moment, if we can just be there and not try to change their mind or fix anything, then we do validate their existence, basically, right, we validate them for just being who they are. And I also get from your father's perspective. You know as much as we who are struggling with mental health feel like failures. A parent, any parent, as you know, being a parent, any parent, just sort of feels like wow, what did I do?

Gabriel Nathan:

And what can I do? How the hell do I deal with this?

Tree Franklyn:

Yes, yeah, and so they feel somewhat of a failure as well. When parents see their children suffering, they're like did I do something wrong? What can I do better? You know that sort of thing and there are no answers. So there's a struggle all around.

Gabriel Nathan:

Did you share this with your mom? When you wrote it?

Tree Franklyn:

I did.

Gabriel Nathan:

Like, right when you wrote it?

Tree Franklyn:

I shared it, not immediately. I wasn't sure how she was going to be able to handle it, because I don't think that I ever told her that I held the gun or a knife, that I was that suicidal. She knew I was depressed and we talked about being depressed. I never told her about all the times that I tried to or wanted to die. I didn't tell her how bad it was because I just saw her eyes die when I would try to even talk about being depressed. And so when I finally did share it with her, she said wow, I had no idea. Why didn't you tell me when you were going through it and I thought you couldn't even handle the fact that I was depressed, let alone suicidal, and why would you put that on? I didn't want to put that on to her back then, so I knew there was nothing that she could do.

Gabriel Nathan:

What kind of conversations did it, or did it open up conversations with her? Did it generate more understanding from her and a deeper connection between the two of you?

Tree Franklyn:

It did, and she actually took that letter and she sent it to some of her family members because she said they need to hear it right. She said they not only from the depressed point of view, but from the person who's trying to help the person who's their loved one, who's depressed. She sent it to a few people and I was surprised at who she sent it to in my family, because I was like, wow, I had no idea they were even struggling with that, and so it did open up a lot of conversation and the person that she's one of the people she sent it to I was very close to, and so it opened up a conversation between that person and me and allowed us to have much deeper conversations and more meaningful conversations than we have ever had in our lives.

Gabriel Nathan:

That's wonderful.

Gabriel Nathan:

And that's like that really drives home the point, too, about the power of first person storytelling that, like, you put something out into the world and you have no idea what it's going to do, you have no idea what kind of doors it's going to open in your personal life and your family life and for other people as well. And I I want to tell you, like you know, running the Recovery Diaries site, I get these stats every month about essays and how essays are performing and who's looking at what and how many clicks, and all of that, all that internet jazz. And this piece is consistently a top performingperforming essay on the site. And the way most people are getting to it is they are Googling the phrase I want to kill myself. And the first stat that I got about it was they were typing in I want to KMS and I was like I want to KMS, what the hell does that mean? And I was like, oh geez, that's what it means.

Gabriel Nathan:

And at first it scared me, yeah, but then I was like this is actually really great that people are feeling. That's not great that people are feeling that way, but it's great that people are feeling that way and that they're expressing that into a search engine and they're coming to this because this is such a hopeful, helpful piece. And I know that and I have felt suicidal. But if I were feeling suicidal and I were on the internet, this is what I would want. This is kind of like the life raft that I would want to receive, so I just want to thank you for putting it out there and for sharing it with us and with our community.

Tree Franklyn:

Oh, and I want to thank you for having it. I had it on my blog for a while and you can see on your own blog what are keywords that are people coming to your site and it was exactly that. They were like suicide letter to my or I want to kill myself and I don't have the resources to help. I'm just a single person blogging. I don't have the resources to help and having that be on your website Recovery Diaries because you guys do fantastic work and you have so many resources for people to reach out to and find help, and I am so thrilled and honored and blessed that you have this article on your site because you are the ones who are doing really the work every day, all day, every day, and advocating for mental health, and I'm so appreciative of that and I'm so grateful that it's on your website and not mine.

Gabriel Nathan:

Thank you.

Tree Franklyn:

I can't help as much as you guys do.

Gabriel Nathan:

Well, thank you for gifting it to us. It's a really precious part of our community. So thank you. And I guess the last question that I have for you is what has changed in your life since writing this piece originally? I mean, I know you, obviously your boyfriend became your husband and his daughter became a few years older, but like what else has cha nged in your life.

Tree Franklyn:

Since writing the piece?

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah.

Tree Franklyn:

I'm more open, definitely more open. I remember first publishing it and hitting that send or whatever it was and posting it and I was scared. I remember I felt like the world just sort of like crumbled down a little bit and I was so scared because it was the first time I ever really talked about it in that depth. And now I'm very open to talk about it and I don't have any fear about talking about any of those experiences and some people, some of my coaching clients I go much deeper into the actual experience of trying to kill myself and it doesn't affect me in a negative way anymore. It feels very open and free and it feels I feel like other people need to hear it, and so that's really. What's changed in me is that I can be a little more authentic about those experiences and not have to hide it and not have to worry about what other people might think of me.

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah, I guess sometimes it's that first dip of the toe in the pool that can feel very trepidatious and then after that we can kind of just soak in it, coming from a non-swimmer see, I'm so full of shit, I fucking hate the water so much. But I mean it is like that right, like you have to take that first dip and then it gets easier.

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah.

Gabriel Nathan:

I'm so glad that you dipped your toe in that way. It's a pretty brave way to dip your toe in the pool, Tree, with that piece.

Tree Franklyn:

Oh, thank you. It's all or nothing sometimes with me.

Gabriel Nathan:

Yeah well, we'll take all for sure. I just want to thank you so much for being here and for spending some time with me, and please let people know where they can find you online.

Tree Franklyn:

Yeah, they just go to my website, treefranklyncom. It's Franklyn, is spelled with a Y, f-r-a-n-k-l-y-n, and you can find anything about me. You can contact me through my website.

Gabriel Nathan:

Awesome, and please do that. And Tree also has another piece on our website that you can read as well and it's really about kind of being born into the trauma of war. You know Tree alluded to her parents and that experience. It's another beautiful piece and maybe there'll be a third someday on our site, so keep that door open.

Tree Franklyn:

Yes, would love that.

Gabriel Nathan:

Thanks so much for joining us and take good care.

Tree Franklyn:

Thank you, Gabe, appreciate you.

Gabriel Nathan:

And you. Bye. Thank

Gabriel Nathan:

you again for joining us in conversation today. It's beautiful to see the progression of our contributors. Very special thank you to Tree Franklyn for joining us here today on Recovery Diaries in Depth. Tree Franklin Franklyn is a bestselling author, coach and founder of the Empathic Awakening Academy, which helps sensitive, empathic people master their energy so they can heal their past and create a new and empowered future. Before we leave you, we want to remind you to check out our website, recoverydiariesorg. There, like this podcast, you'll find additional stories, videos and content about mental health, empowerment and change. We look forward to continuing to grow our community. Thank you so much for being a part of it. We wouldn't be here without you. Be sure to join our mailing list so you never miss a podcast episode, essay or film. I'm Gabe Nathan. Until next time, take good care.

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Gabriel Nathan

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Gabriel Nathan

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Tree Franklyn

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