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Once I Got Sober, I Stopped Wanting to Die
For 20 years, I was passively aggressively trying to kill myself.
May 24, 2013
I hyperventilated quickly into a bright red balloon as many times as my lungs would allow. I could taste the cool, sweet, nostalgic hint of whipped cream but I wasn’t eating whipped cream. Instead, I was inhaling nitrous oxide from a whipped cream charger that’s normally used to create an airy thickness to certain sauces and creams.
When you inhale nitrous, you feel light-headed and even start to giggle, hence the nickname, laughing gas. It’s also known as doing whippets.
The way I abused whippets went beyond just slight, light-headedness. I hyperventilated until I passed out and felt like I was crossing over to the other side for a few seconds.
As soon as my lungs felt icy cold — and I could no longer inhale and exhale like I was having a panic attack — I took one more deep inhale and let go of the balloon. It whizzed across my living room, making my cats, Mark and Varla, jump up to catch it.
The familiar wa wa wa warping sound of nitrous slammed against my brain. My eyes rolled back and I began to see stars, which then formed into what looked like a halo of light right above me that reminded me of an operating…