Since its release, the wildly popular Netflix show 13 Reasons Why has been polarizing. Some people believe the show is a realistic depiction of bullying, sexual harassment, and assault that shows how these actions can truly affect someone. Others find the show too graphic in its depiction of suicide, and say that it romanticizes suicide as a means to get revenge on the people who hurt you.
Popular YouTube vlogger Alexa Losey is solidly in the second camp in this debate, and released a new video Wednesday talking about how losing a friend to suicide affected her life — in an effort to show how suicide really affects the friends and family left behind.
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"This is was the most difficult thing I've ever had to film and the scariest thing I have ever had to edit," she writes in the description for the video. "We see so many people talking about suicide in the media almost glorifying suicide, like in the netflix show 13 reasons why, and it's important to address how serious of an issue this is and encourage people to get help."
She doesn't go into details of her friend's suicide, and nor should she have to. As she says, "it don't think it's fair to her, I don't think it's fair to me, and I don't think it's fair to you guys."
She does share that a close personal friend took her own life five years ago, and what that felt like for her.
"I just kinda want to sit for a little bit and talk about what it's like after," Losey says. "What it's like leaving the people that love you behind even when you feel like nobody loves you. 'Cause it sucks."
After her friend's suicide, Losey says, was like losing a little piece of her heart that she will never get back. It's confusing, and it doesn't make sense. She says she understands what her friend was feeling due to her own experience with suicidal thoughts — and in those moments she felt like no one loved her and that suicide would fix all of her problems.
"It doesn't," she says. "It leaves everybody that you care about with so many more."
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Watch the full video below:
If you are thinking about suicide, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or the Suicide Crisis Line at 1-800-784-2433.
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