I don't think time helps

It took me seven years to get over a relationship where my love wasn't reciprocated.

That person was a major part of my life for almost two years, so you can see how it may get stuck in one's mind. For weeks I just couldn't stop thinking about it. Then it started fading, only to recur every once in a while, reminding of me what I can no longer have.

Time away, by itself, did not do anything. All it does is allow you some room to breathe: it gives you the opportunity to set things straight in your head.

What helped ultimately was experience. Talking to people. Making (and failing at) relationships. Taking up (and failing in) new things. It is an emotional reshuffle, and things like that tend to shake some stubborn things loose. At a certain point, the affects of your experience detach you from the solidified notions enough that you can't help but ask yourself what your new self is.

Identity is malleable: it is made of ideas that you took to heart, for one reason or another. Call it "internalization" if you want. What you consider yourself to be shapes you further into who you are. The sooner you can put some space between yourself and routines that solidify those ideas, the sooner you can start to set yourself free from them.

For what it's worth, I have an inkling of a clue of what you'd gone through. That sort of an experience can shape people all sorts of misladen ways. The fact that you're out in the open being able to talk about it speaks of your resilience and your desire to remain in spite of the cruel things.

I'm glad you're here with us today. Keep giving 'em a good fight.

I get the feeling that when people say "give it time", they don't mean "only give it time". That's dumb. Time gives perspective, that's it. But you may also need new friends, new relationships, traveling alone, a dog, a few seasons of Doctor Who, learning how to cook, drinking a lot, quit drinking, a typewriter, a moustache for a while, medication, and maybe psychotherapy. Among other things. And you need time for all of those things to happen.

A long time ago I tried ending my life as well. Did time help? Yes. But only because I filled it with all the right things (and some delightful wrong ones).

When I was in my twenties, I was depressed and suicidal. I thought I had ruined my life, that there was no way forward. I had a therapist who was frustrated with me. I was trying so hard to get better. My therapist gave me an ultimatum and I broke it. Then, the week before the final appointment, I was sexually assaulted. I didn't tell her. My partner at the time was very callous and selfish in response to my reaction to the trauma. So I was pretty well hanging by a thread.

Two seemingly small things, I think, saved me.

First, I had the same thought as you--what if this is the rest of my life, what if I never get better? I believed I never would. I started trying to accept myself where I was.
I started being a little nicer to myself, gentler. I tried to to what I could and let that be ok.

Second, one day a little neighborhood girl appeared at my door, sobbing, She had a tiny kitten she found on the ditch bank. Her parents said she couldn't keep it and she should put it back where she found it. I promised her I would find it a good home. Of course I fell in love with it and I promised that kitten I would take care of it. At the moment I said it I didn't really think about the consequences, butI have a thing about honesty and keeping my word. As time went on I realized I couldn't kill myself and also care for that cat. I started making little changes in my life for her, making sure I had the resources to keep her well fed, in a safe home, a little savings for her medical care, etc. The promise to that cat gave me a window of time to start reclaiming myself and building a life I wanted to stay in.

Between the changes in how I engaged with myself and the changes I made for the cat, the depression faded, Not entirely, but bad stretches lasted days or weeks instead of months and years. On the worst o days over the next 19 years when I thought I wanted to die I knew I couldn't. For her. By the time she died, I had built a much better life and I knew how to get myself through the rough patches.

I'm not saying get a cat. I just really feel like as bad as things can be, having someone or something that you can help, nurture, protect, even a plant, or some kind of art, can be an anchor to remind you that you are not just here for yourself when yourself doesn't feel like enough.

It has been 30 years or so now. I wouldn't say I am cured but I would say I am much much better at living and not letting a bad day overtake me. I believe I am stronger, kinder, humbler and much happier because of depression being part of my life's experience. I know bipolar is different but I believe you may find yourself in a similar place in 30 years. It may not seem like it now, but to me it looks like you are headed it the right direction.

I don't know if any of what I wrote is helpful, but please know I am rooting for you.

There's a lot of overlap in our stories.

For me, depression was the way I first learned to see the world. It was a distorted filter on my vision, but I didn't know any different, so I thought that's the way things genuinely were.

It was truly eye-opening to begin to see the world, for the first time, as it actually is. I had no idea. I'd only ever known depression's dishonest shifts in color and perspective. Over time I learned to distinguish between the two states -- what depression had me seeing, and what I saw without it.

Currently, after years and years and years, I don't live absent of depression, though it does go away for periods of time -- sometimes even long ones. Of course, it also comes back sometimes. Time, however, has given me the ability to recognize its distortions and acknowledge when they start to resurface. Instead of mistaking them for the world as it actually is, I'm better able to realize what they are and what they're doing -- the lies and falsehoods they are trying to sell me on.

This doesn't mean I'm not low or down or sad sometimes. I'm often profoundly so, for extended periods -- such is depression. Also, it doesn't mean the distortions magically go away, but these periods are a lot easier to weather when I'm able to gauge how far away I am from my non-depressed norm, and I know that there's a norm to return to and how it feels. I have a better framework in which to understand everything, and that helps everything remain structured.

I share this not as advice or to be didactic at all -- just to give what it's been like for me, in case there's some overlap to be identified there as well.

I'm happy you're here -- both "here" as in alive and "here" as in with us, on this site.

Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote about this. "Time does not bring relief; you all have lied/
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!" I think time helps but it's more of an acceptance than a healing. Pain circles around and finds us again later, but we learn that we can survive it and be happy in spite of it.

Look at what you yourself wrote though.

I have since spent a lot of time creating and nurturing safety nets to make sure this never happens again.

No, time isn't a cure or magic salve, and that's often not what we want to hear when we're in pain. But it is (potentially) experience, perspective, growth, maturity, wisdom, and opportunity. It sounds like you've gained a measure of all of those, so give yourself some credit.

“Fix” might be a hard word to live up to. But it sounds like you’ve worked hard so that bad times don’t prevent good times in the future. It’s clear we’ve lived very different experiences, but when things have been at their worst for me it’s as though nothing good has ever happened to me and I’ve never known happiness. There must have been a number of good things in the last 12 years to allow you to have these safety nets in place. You can have yourself more good things in the future. Maybe you’ll get more than safety nets. Someone walking a tight rope has a safety net, but that’s their last resort. They also have a balancing stick and experience. When you’re back in the position where you can build out safety nets again maybe there are opportunities to build more intermediary safe guards.

I relate to this so much. It does indeed feel like this battle with mental health going to be a lifelong struggle - I'm 28 and have started to cut myself again despite thinking it was something I was done with, having been ok for 3-ish years