Committed

I didn't realize how much I disliked the word until I heard her say it.

"Our best friend committed suicide." She said. 

I was at my friend's home helping her set up for a party. She was grieving the loss of her friend and in no state of mind to plan an event. But there it was, that word, "Committed." My stomach turned a bit as I heard it hit the air, and I realized I never use that phrase when I reference the death of my mother. "My mother took her own life," is my blanket statement. She wasn't committed to the idea of dying. 

Or was she?

When I think of the verb, to commit, I always defer to the positive definition, "to pledge or engage oneself." Growing up I was the committed daughter, committed athlete, committed student. Later I life I was the committed employee, committed wife. My entire life I've strived to commit to all of my endeavors.

When do  your commitments stop being what you live for and start becoming the things you run away from? (Tweet that.)

There is the other definition of the verb that I became familiar with at an early age too. "To place in a mental institution or hospital by or as if by legal authority." I've begged for my mother behind several glass doors and looking back now I can feel when the seeds of disdain for "committed" were planted in my memory. 

Back to my friend who just lost her friend, the one that took his own life. I watched her cry and listened to her offer up the question that we can never answer, begging to know the information to which she would never be privy. 

"WHY?"

I knew I would not be able to give her any resolution to that question. My only offering at that time was my empathy. But days later the idea of committing yourself to something is still lingering with me. So I thought I would look the word up in the dictionary once more to find clarity. And there it was, the one definition I never really considered. 

Commit: [kuh-mit] verb- To entrust, especially for safekeeping

I have spent many an angry night cursing my mother for her commitment to leave this world. But what if way the ones we loved and lost to suicide weren't really committed to leaving us? What if they were just so broken that they saw no other way but to give up and entrust their soul to God, asking him to hold tight for safekeeping?

Please don't confuse my musings on this verb as me condoning or romanticizing suicidal behavior. I can assure you that's not the case. I'm only saying that researching it a little bit more has softened my un-easiness with the phrase.

2 Timothy 4:7 says, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith."  

Who can say how long someone can fight the good fight? We all are on different tracks in this race in life, some longer than others. I prefer now to think that those who commit left this world with faith in God for safekeeping. (Tweet that.)