BELLA
PHOTO BY RANDY BACON
BELLA
“But Life is So Much More”
I remember it really started when my sister, Aria, came home in third grade with a broken arm and bruises all over her. I just remember I was so angry because it was a fifth grade boy who was doing it to her. That’s when the bullying first started.
We used to call her Tsunami, because Aria would just explode everywhere within seconds. She’d always been the crazier one out of us. But I don’t know what it was about that school or the bullies. There were even kids that would dare her to cut herself with scissors in class…and she would do it.
We took her to therapy multiple times, and she had two 72 hour watches at the hospital. But it never did anything, because there were never any resources for somebody her age. They would tell us, “She just needs the support and love of her family to get through it.”
The last time before Aria's successful attempt, we took her to the hospital because she had cuts across her chest. We took her and they told us that they wouldn’t keep her for the 72 hours. They told us she just needed a mother’s love and they had us take her home. And then that very next week it happened.
Our family went out. Aria stayed home to work on homework. When we got back home with the Starbucks we had brought her, I heard my mom scream. I ran there but there was a big office chair in the way. Adrenaline was so real – I threw it across the room like I’ve never thrown anything. She was laying there, and I was the one giving her CPR as we waited for the ambulance to come. And when they came, I remember staring at this picture of her with a butterfly painted on her cheek… I just stared at it until my mom said we had to go to the hospital.
I already knew Aria was gone even before they told me she was gone. At the house, the paramedics got her heartbeat back, but once we got to the hospital, her leg was completely blue. And then she didn’t have any brain waves—her brain activity was gone. So, we called it the next day.
She was only 11 years old. She was just about to be an eighth grader.
I think it was ultimately the bullying.
To anyone considering doing what she did, I just think you always need to look at the bigger picture. You can’t just look at the snapshot of what you’re feeling right at that moment. I think it’s more personal for me because I was always the one with the depression and anxiety before Ari - it was something I had to deal with since I was 12 too. And days get hard, but you have to realize there’s something bigger. And you can’t be selfish, because you’re hurting more than just yourself.
To other families going through this, I think people shouldn’t be so scared to talk about suicide. Yes, it is an awful thing that doesn’t need to happen, but for you to understand why the person did it, you have to see how badly they were hurting. I think if you can notice the signs before it gets to that point, if you can understand that they’re hurting...you might save them.
I’ve learned that I can deal with a lot of traumatic things. I’ve always been the rock. Everybody else cries, everybody else feels. But I’m the one that has to stay stable. I keep rolling with the punches. It’s tiring but it’s okay. I can do it. Gotta keep rolling forward. It’s hard to juggle all of life. Emotions is one thing, but life is so much more.
I don’t want Aria to ever be forgotten.