Bria DiCenzo

Involved drama student and senior Bria DiCenzo anxiously awaits her future at Sacramento State where she will major in Communicative Disorders. Beneath her smiling appearance, however, is a girl who has suffered through traumatizing experiences and held a lot of internal pain inside.

Bria’s depression stemmed from bullying that she encountered in middle school. Many of her classmates would bully for her sexuality as well as her weight, among other things.

“In 8th grade I saw a kid spreading rumors and making rude comments about me, and I remember him calling me a lesbian. I made the mistake of taking a pair of scissors and scratching myself on the arm with them. From that point on, the other students refused to sit next to me,” Bria said. “If the seating chart was rearranged, they would make sure that they weren’t sitting next to me, and if they did have to, some of them would physically move their desks.”

That year her depression only intensified as the insults and bullying continued to escalate. Bria recounted specific memories from those years, choosing her experiences at science camp as an example of the bullying she encountered on a daily basis.

During that trip, Bria went on a hike with a group of other students and didn’t have her glasses or contact lenses with her. After returning from a bathroom break, Bria found that her group had intentionally abandoned her; she was alone without a way back for two hours before anyone noticed she was missing. More painful, Bria explained, was having the girls that she was placed in a cabin with refuse to sleep across the room from her because she was a lesbian.

“They moved out, and so I was alone in my cabin. I knew the girls were talking bad about me behind my back. It made me feel like I was worth nothing. Those girls would tell me at school how weird I was or look at me like I had a disease and that was pretty much what triggered the core of my depression,” Bria responded.

Already deeply hurting from her experiences in middle school, Bria was fearful of entering high school and remained closed off. Freshman year she began to regularly self-harm, unaware of the addiction had gotten herself into.

Bria explained, “It is a misconception that people who cut, or people who are depressed, do it because they want attention. That was what my mom initially thought I was doing it for. Some of the reasons for why I would cut would be small. Like, I never felt good enough. I take something or someone or some situation and let it get to me more than it should. When I first got addicted to cutting, it felt impossible to stop.”

As she progressed through high school, things got worse. Sophomore through junior year it was hard for her to even go a week without hurting herself. “I genuinely was never happy, at that point,” Bria said. She continued to explain that she was going through a lot during that time, so several different things would cause her to cut.

“My dad, for example, he takes his anger out on the people around him. It’s not happening anymore, but he used to grab my arms, my hair, hit me, and push me against a wall and yell at me for little things like if I left a spoon out with peanut butter on it. He’d tell me I was worthless which would make me feel like I wasn’t important and then I would self-harm.”

She continued to face growing difficulties, and she knew that the people around her didn’t understand how much their words could hurt her.

“There have been so many times at school where someone has said something and I went straight to the bathroom and I’d cry and bang my head on the ground until it I couldn’t anymore. That person wouldn’t know how much their words hurt me.”

Those words were especially harsh one night, when Bria was texting a boy she had met. “He had said rude things to me [in the past], but I kept texting him because I liked having someone to talk to and I had pretended to have a crush on him to make people think I was straight,” said Bria.

“One night he texted me, and he told me I should kill myself. He didn’t understand how serious I took that. I don’t know if he meant it, but if I could have done that at the time I would have. People don’t understand how serious those simple words can be taken.”

For a week or two during her junior year, things had gotten so bad that Bria could not stop thinking about ending her life. During finals week of her junior year on a Thursday night, Bria attempted to overdose on a mix of medications.

“I felt like there was no other option, and the longer I waited the less of a way out I felt there [was]. I went to bed immediately after I took the pills and passed out. I remember waking up the next morning and I felt like I was going to have a seizure or something. In the car on the way to school that Friday morning, I told my mom what had happened, and she got mad. She didn’t believe me actually and she told me just to go straight to school.”

When she arrived at school, still crying from her car ride discussion, Bria’s friends asked her what had happened. She confessed to them, and one of her friends who was worried for her safety told a teacher, Ms. Beilstein, what was going on. Bria was terrified because the only other time an authority figure had known about her self-harming and depression, it did not go well.

“I honestly thought I would be sent to a mental hospital and that Mr. Jindra would expel me. Instead, my mom came and had a meeting with me, Mr. Jindra, and the school psychologist. I couldn’t believe that they were actually worried for my health,” said Bria.

From that point on, Bria moved towards recovery and tried to channel all her pain towards forgiveness and hope. Earlier this year, however, she went through a difficult break up with her first serious girlfriend that dropped her back to the low place she had been in. Contemplating another suicide attempt, Bria sought help to prevent herself from making a permanent choice for a temporary feeling. After receiving encouragement from her therapist, family, and friends, Bria is in a better place and ready to help others with the experiences she’s been through and inform people about the reality of what depression is.

“People don’t understand that depression and suicide isn’t a joke. It’s not an excuse or just a thing that happens to everyone. It’s important for people to be aware of what a serious topic this is. Understanding suicide and depression is understanding how much damage and hopelessness someone can have under a smile, a laugh or a joke.”

Reflecting back on her experiences, Bria explained, “the things I went through were the lowest points of my life and I don’t want to go back there. I don’t want to say that I’m perfect or strong, and I’m not proud of my cutting, the scars on my body, and my past. Those things though, they’re things that I can say that I’ve conquered. There are still times when I’d rather not live or be around people, but every day when I come home and my family talks about the best part of their day, mine is always that I woke up that morning and that I’m going to bed that night. I try to smile every day despite what’s going on around me.”