An upcoming memoir details former Miss USA Cheslie Kryst's struggles before her tragic death in January 2022.
Kryst, who had earned a law degree and MBA, the title of Miss USA, and a correspondent role for Extra by the age of 30, writes in her upcoming memoir that she carried an "unshakable feeling that I did not belong" and battled a "constant inner voice repeating 'never enough" before dying by suicide on January 30, 2022.
Before her death, Kryst left her mom, April Simpkins, a note asking her to help get the memoir she had been writing published. Simpkins fulfilled her daughter's final request as the book, "By the Time You Read This: The Space Between Cheslie's Smile and Mental Illness," is set to be released on Tuesday (April 23).
Kryst detailed how the backlash she received after being crowned Miss USA in 2019 affected her "long-standing insecurities" and contributed to her feelings of "imposter syndrome."
"Just hours after my win, I had to delete vomit-face emojis that a few accounts had plastered all over the comments on my Instagram page. More than one person messaged me telling me to kill myself," Kryst wrote, according to book excerpts obtained by PEOPLE. "All of this only added to my long-standing insecurities — the feeling that everyone around me knew more than I did, that everyone else was better at my job, and that I didn’t deserve this title. People would soon find out I was a fraud. I felt like an imposter, but not just in pageants."
"Over the next few weeks, the media coverage continued. I almost always suppressed my panicky thoughts and feelings of inadequacy during my interviews. I only felt like a failure afterward, as I meticulously picked apart each of my responses and kicked myself for not using a better word or saying a profound phrase or interjecting humor or throwing out a useful stat," she continued.
"Winning Miss USA hadn’t made my imposter syndrome go away. Instead, I was waiting for people to realize I didn’t have a clue about what I was doing," Kryst added. "I’d perfected how to deal with that feeling in competition or in small doses— I could compartmentalize anything in short bursts. I’d immediately focus my thoughts on positive statements of power, but that only lasted for so long."
Kryst wrote she felt pressure "to be perfect because I had to represent for all youth, women, and Black people who also wanted to be in the room but had been denied access."
Simpkins added her own excerpts to the book, detailing the moment she received a devastating text from her daughter on the day of her death.
“First, I’m sorry. By the time you get this, I won’t be alive anymore, and it makes me even more sad to write this because I know it will hurt you the most . . .” the text read, per Simpkins.
"My brain couldn’t register the words on the screen," the mother wrote in the memoir, per PEOPLE. "I read them again and screamed from a place in my soul that I didn’t know existed."
"[My] daughter was a fighter and yet she was gone. Every day she’d fought persistent depression, until she couldn’t fight anymore. Despite the many ways depression tried to rob her of joy, with near-constant headaches, loneliness, hopelessness, sadness, and a feeling of unworthiness, she still found a way to smile, love, and give. Everyday I’d had with her was a true gift from God. Every day she was here was a victory," she said.
"Cheslie didn’t 'do this to me' or anyone else," Simpkins added. "She felt unimaginable pain and needed that pain to stop . . . It was clear to me that her passing was not an emotion-fueled, spontaneous decision. She’d sent me that final text message to comfort me and to explain the depth of the pain she had carried."
"I knew it was important to share this," Simpkins told PEOPLE. "I knew there are other people who felt what I was feeling and could relate."
If you or someone you know need mental health help, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor.
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