For those of you who are newly joined to this story of my life. It’s been pretty insane. Like, literally. From 8 month rehabs to multiple suicide attempts. Since I was 18, my life has been, difficult to say the least. And no, I haven’t always been surrounded by friends and family. I’ve been completely alone in the world. I’ve hit rock bottom. I’ve lost everything. Everything...multiple times. And yet, I’m still alive. So although, this story starts out sad and doesn’t exactly have that perfect ending, where “they all lived happily ever after”. I mean, come on, life isn’t some fairy tale where everything’s all rosy once you find your one true love. Been there, tried that, didn’t work. But this is my story. This is my roller coaster ride in the year 2015. These are where my thoughts and emotions have been over these last few months. This doesn’t mean this is where they were last year or will be next year. But enough of you are constantly asking me where I am right now, where I’m going in life, or sometimes just what’s going on in my head, that I’ve decided to take some time and give you the cliff notes. Yeah, gotta love Spark Notes that are 8 pages long. Oh boo hoo. Suck it up Buttercup. You wanted to know, here ya go. And spoiler, enough of you will really enjoy the ending.
I’m not the best with timelines but somewhere in late Feb/early March of this year I was admitted to the hospital. I attempted suicide for the first time in 8 years. To this day, I don’t know what I was thinking when I was taking those pills, and nothing is so simple as to have only one answer, although if it was, I would say it boils down to pride every time. In this case the pride manifested itself in believing I had no purpose on this earth and God was wrong to put me in all your lives. That I was in no way helpful and only some kind of festering boil that needed to be lanced and drained of negativity. I felt that the only way my life had any meaning was simply to be as a warning to others. Haha, yes, I know many of you told me that as a joke and it truly is funny. And the problem wasn't in believing that that humorous demotivational poster was a purpose for my life, because it totally is in many ways, but there was definitely a problem in believing that was the only purpose for my life and then brazenly rejecting it as well. See, pride. So I decided to do what I honestly believed everyone deserved even if they didn’t actually want it, and take myself out of your lives. I knew death was the only way you could truly be done with me and be able to heal. Running away wouldn’t cut it. I remember that day vividly in some ways and it cuts my soul like a knife.
And although I tend to think very black and white, and I dislike grey, I’m learning that there are very few uncomplicated absolutes in this world, so I won’t say that day was this “big turning point in my life”. As an optimist, and a fan of memes, I realize that taking a step backward after taking a step forward is not a disaster, it’s a Cha-Cha. And that is the way I have danced through this ballroom called life. There is not one big light-bulb moment for me. There are too many questions in this world and even more answers.
But for this post on this day, as a starting point, that hospital visit works well enough. It was this particular stay I realized a significant “truth”. If you know me, I'm always looking for different kinds of "truths". And on that day I realized, I could try to take my life as many times as I wanted. God is simply not going to let me die that way. Some may think that I have survived, not because of God, but because I have only made half-hearted attempts to end my life. That I was some simpering white privileged girl who cried over spilt milk. These people are fools. You have no idea where I’ve been and what I’ve done. And yet, I am alive. This I believed for so long, was either some cruel cosmic joke, or a horrible mistake. But I had to face the fact that I was stuck here and no matter what I did, for now, I was invincible.
It really struck me how rude fate could be when I was discharged from the hospital and placed at Holly Hill, where I met a gentleman who had literally shot himself point-blank in the head with a gun and survived. He, like me, didn't want to be here and he had done something I had wanted to do and showed me the futility of it all. No, the bullet didn’t miss. The bullet went through one side of his head and out the other. This man is not a vegetable. He can walk and talk and function. Getting there however, took years of reconstructive surgeries and hard work. He showed us the scars and we tapped on his face to feel the metal plates. It was surreal. You probably see this story with some kind of moral, probably happy or hopeful. People like that man, me and all the others there that day, who were trapped in an abyss of hopelessness, saw it as our last chance taken away from us. It was exactly the opposite of what so many think. We already thought we had nothing. Hope was long gone, but now control over our fates was too. We couldn't even decide to leave this world full of anguish, pain and sorrow.
I came to the conclusion after meeting him, that I was stuck here. And although I wasn’t happy about it, I was going to make sure the people who deserved a life without me, had a good life despite me. Yes, I know, don’t worry, it gets better. The first thing I realized I needed to do, was take the strain off the terrifyingly few people I was relying on at this point. It might not be very fair to make a crapload of people deal with my emotional train-wreck of a being, but if I was going to have to live on this earth and if these people weren’t going to rid themselves of me like they ought to, than they needed more to share in this suffering or no one would survive('cept me, 'cause I'm invincible). So I began that very day. I stifled my pride and made several calls. In the beginning, my decision to change was not for me, but for others. I had long since given up on my own life, I was just resigned to it. However, God is “sneaky sneaky”(reference to "Mr. Deeds") and I had already given in to communicating with Him again a few weeks or months earlier(really, not good with timelines).
You see, we made a deal. He was obviously not leaving me alone and wanted me to talk to Him, and although I felt quite crazy that day, standing in the shower talking out loud, even to the point of saying, “I’m crazy. I’m f*&^ing crazy”...repeatedly. But we talked and I made a deal that night(disclaimer: this is not a sound theological principle to stand by and I don’t recommend it). I told Him I was willing to talk to Him, if He would let me be myself. You can laugh at that, “be yourself” part, but seriously though. God is this big deal, omniscient, omnipresent, lots of “omni” words, Holy Being who know’s all my innermost thoughts. I can’t just go and have an actual relationship with Him, while trying to hide all my imperfections and blasphemy(and there is a LOT of that). He wants me to talk to Him, then I will, but no formal crap. I can barely hold my life together much less try some of this cliche nonsense everyone seems to think is necessary. So we started talking pretty regularly, which was a very good thing for this round at Holly Hill.
For those of you who don’t know, at this hospital juncture, me and my doctors had decided, with my family’s permission, to try coming off meds for the first time in 10 years. To try to start over and see where I am now, so we could see where to go. At 18, I was placed on medication and although I have missed days, I have never been more than a week without any attal. But with the constant change of doctors, newer drugs being made, changes in weight and age, we wanted to see where my baseline was now, and work our way to something that could be more effective. Because at this point I was utterly exhausted at finding a “cocktail” that worked for more than a year. There was also the possibility that the bipolar was not as prevalent as it was when I was 18 and that therapy might be more effective than any meds would be at this point, also because the borderline has always been the continuous prevailing concern. All the doctors agreed that after a massive overdose and being in a safe environment, this was the optimal time to test that theory as well.
So, here I am, in a ward, no meds, nothing to do and no tranqs. Me and God had an overabundance of time to get to know each other. So we began. I read more of the Bible that week than probably my entire life up until that point. And it intrigued and enthralled me. There was so much good stuff in this thing, but it was quite overwhelming. Kind of like, trying to go to Goodwill and find all those clothes that suit you and fit, without any kind of organization, all by yourself. I mean, when I go to that place, I can only do it with someone who is willing to help me look for those pants, or that shirt, and occasionally point out other things that would fit quite nicely as well, that I wouldn’t have thought of. So, I decided that’s exactly what I needed to do and started asking people their favorite verses. And I might have been slightly shocked with their excitement in supplying me with exactly what I needed. There was one verse in particular...but I’ll get to that.
The next couple of months were a bit of a blur. Summer came and I was moved into my parents house with a new job: homemaker. I was absolutely terrified. Yes, I’ve lived on my own, I’ve been a wife in everything but name and yet, I still could not cook. The last time I tried to cook I literally had to put a fire out in the oven with a fire extinguisher. So while this was not an exciting development for me then, not much was being asked of me at that point, so I thought, what’s the worse that could happen? Now I know how to put a fire out and I seriously doubt I could kill someone with my cooking. Food poisoning, tops. Plus, the last time I gave people food poisoning with my cooking, we were only sick for one night. I was obviously improving. So, with much trepidation, I decided to dive into this new role. Yeah, y’all didn’t really know what you were getting into when you had dinner with me, huh?
Those next few months was a rush of information. It felt like I was having a growth spurt, with all the “growing pains” that can be associated. I wasn’t just learning how to thaw chicken and get stains out of microfiber, but I was learning what it meant to be a child of God. What it meant to live on this earth with these people, who I totally believed, didn’t deserve to share it with someone like me. And although I still didn’t believe there could ever be such an amazing thing as a “future” for me, I had hope that maybe life didn’t have to be a struggle every step of every day. I had hope that maybe I didn’t have to reject God’s purpose for my life, and after more time, that maybe I had even greater purpose than I could have ever imagined for myself. But hold on, I’m getting ahead of myself.
At the end of the summer I felt like life had meaning again and I was on the road to somewhere, even if I had no idea where. And God decided it was time, time to prove to me that He was trustworthy. One Friday night, I found myself in a position where I had no one to turn to. I hurt more than you can possible imagine and I was, literally, too scared to move. I immediately emailed my Bible Study for prayer from the dark confines of my closet and cried and shook and asked God, “Why?! Why are You doing this to me?!” I don’t hold my punches with God and I was at a loss. I knew there were several outcomes to what was happening and none of them, that I had actual experience with, were good. So I just sat and cried, cursed and prayed some more. And the world did not end - history did not repeat itself. I’m not saying it was this easy, carefree, I-prayed-and-everything-was-suddenly-all-hunky-dory moment. No, I felt like a battered piece of gum on the bottom of someone’s shoe. I was drained, tired and scared. I was confused as to what had just happened and how to proceed. I knew I hadn’t done anything stupid, but that didn’t mean it was over and it didn’t mean there was no longer a possibility of another hospital trip. I just needed till Thursday and my appointment with my therapist to discuss what had happened. He would fix it, he would make it better...I still didn’t get it.
If I had thought Friday night was bad, the following Sunday night was much, much worse. It was like a plane crashing right after you just survived a car crash. And although it’s possible to survive a bad car wreck(I know, I totaled my car in 2013), being in a plane headed for the ground, I mean, I don’t know the actual percentage of survivors, but I sincerely doubt it’s all that comforting. So there I was, back in the closet, folded in two and wracked with sobs, unable to breathe, unable to move and seriously contemplating suicide again. This time, I was even more reluctant to turn to God. How could He could do this again, so soon?! I wasn’t ready for this. I couldn’t handle this! So I called, person after person. Trying to find the answers I needed from humans and not giving the ultimate authority on life, the trust He alone deserves. I was in mid text when I realized just that, that people are human. Literally, a light-bulb moment for such a simple sentence. People are human. People, all people, are imperfect and fallible. I didn’t trust God wholly and completely at that point, but I had no one else and that was enough to get me through that night.
That was another bit of my life’s dance. Another, “turning point”. And no, things did not get easier after that. If anything, things got harder for a while. My stress was at the max - I wasn’t eating a lot, if anything at points; I stopped sleeping, pretty much at all; I was struggling hardcore with the fact that all my idols were being kicked of the pedestals I had put them on, one by one; and although, I didn’t trust God all that much, I trusted Him more than anyone else, including myself. And I did not, at that point, think that was a good thing. Because, frankly, I was pissed at Him. He was taking away all that I knew and understood. I didn’t understand that He was giving me something far better and I was definitely, definitely not going to be happy about it. I was willing to go along with Him on this path He had chosen, but that was pretty much because I was sick of being dragged and wanted to walk freely in the direction I was apparently going to end up anyways.
And I was learning a lot. It just didn’t always seem worth it, and sometimes, still doesn’t. But these days, more often than not, He shows me the good that comes, not only out of evil, but also out of conflict, exhaustion and overall messy situations. My most common request for a couple weeks there was, “God, please let me see the good that comes out of this.” And He was quite faithful to me with that prayer. I started seeing more than just the moment, I started seeing God’s plan unfolding all around me. I took the blinders off and started staring at the world in all it's glory. And the world is a complicated mess. A beautiful, complicated mess, full of all the colors of the rainbow. Not just black and white. And I started seeing more “truths” every day. It was completely overwhelming.
I remember the day I truly started to believe no one is “better” than me. You might not understand what a big deal that is, but for someone like me, who has been “comfortably miserable being the worst person in the room” and insisted on it to others. This was not only a revelation, but extremely difficult and uncomfortable to grasp. I also didn’t realize, exactly how important it was, this concept of equality, on my path to one day having a hope and a future. And this was how it went for a while. Me lying in bed, sitting on the stoop, taking walks in the park, or wading in a stream, and delving into the “truths” of the universe. And unfortunately, much of what was pointed out to me, was not typically “happy” or “comfortable”.
One day, when I still wasn’t sleeping most nights, I was lying on the trampoline and delving into the mysteries of the universe when God unfurled another scary "truth". He did it in an unusual way. Most people know I’ve desperately wanted to wear a red wedding dress, for years now. I’ve had many reasons for those people who question this. It’s sassy, rebellious, great color, unique, traditional in like, some other country, you name it, I’ve said it. On this evening, I had already gone without sleep for one too many nights, and I could practically heard God say, “You’re favorite color is white. It always has been. It's been your favorite since you did that prism experiment in elementary school and learned that, while black is the absence of color, white is ALL the colors. Yes, you've had other favorites, but white is 'most favorite'. Why wouldn’t you want to wear this color, that you love, that holds meaning for you, that is full of happiness and hope, that is the symbol of holiness and purity, on such a sacred day?”
I was also beyond exhausted enough, that I was straight up with Him. “You said it God, purity. I’m not pure. I’m like, the opposite of pure. If I wore white on my wedding day, most people’s reaction would be, ‘that’s inappropriate’. Whether they voiced it out loud or just thought it to themselves. Whether it was a conscious thought or one that was immediately reprimanded by the thinker, it would still be this big elephant in the room as I walked down the aisle. I can’t handle that God. I can’t be in a room full of people on such a special day and know every single person, even the groom and myself are thinking the same thing. It would be better just to be the butt of the ongoing joke that I’m too screwed up even to wear white on my wedding day. But, as tired as I was, I saw where He was going with this. I admit it. I was pathetic. I literally begged Him, “Don’t make me wear white, please.” And He did hear my plea, but He answered it quietly and gently. “I would never pick a guy for you who would think that, Katie.”
Of course, He would point out one of the roots of the problem. Although, I knew I was everyone’s equal, that I was just as undeserving of grace as those around me; I truly didn’t believe anybody else would ever be able to think that of me as well, much less that there was someone out there willing to spend the rest of their life at the side of someone with a past like mine. And although, that’s something I’m still struggling with, He’s been coaching me through it every step of the way. Psalm 139 has come up frequently in this process. From that day in the hospital, to the sermon last week. I find it to be one of my biggest comforts as well as the meanest, toughest combatant to my biggest fears and insecurities.
We talk a lot, me and God. More than I’d like sometimes. He no longer puts up with me ignoring Him. Little things, big things - He always wants to discuss what’s going on in my life. I don’t think I’m grateful for that as often as I should be. Many a day I find myself in the field down the street staring at the stars and feeling like I’m Simba in “The Lion King”, and God is my Mufasa. Sometimes I yell and cry, other times I laugh and spin in circles like a small child. My mood fluctuates frequently, but it doesn’t scare me quite like it used to. There’s always a reason, and even if there doesn’t seem to be one, I trust Him, that Big Dude Upstairs. He’s proven He’s got my back in the alley behind the bar as well as in the pew at church.
And then the big day came. September 5, 2015 I wrote:
Today/this morning @ 4am, I have taken suicide off the docket, permanently. It’s not a back-up or even a back-up of a back-up. It’s not a 100th in my list of back-ups. It’s not 1000th, millionth, etc. Done.
I see a truth & I don’t think you can ever unsee God-given truths. You can acknowledge them, read about them, discuss them, debate FOR them, but the moment you truly see & believe, it’s there for good.
I see the truth that Jesus died so I can go to Heaven. That He loved me, He & those other 2 Goobers of the trinity.
They’re trustworthy(the trinity). Humanity is not, but God 3-in-1, is. I asked Him never to let that happen again in the 100% I want to ask Him way & whether I heard the words or not. He made it clear that I am never going to want/need to attempt suicide again...because I love HIM.
I love you, God
...Can I go to sleep now?
Please?
930am :) Thanks
Haha, yes, that was my journal entry verbatim. It doesn't have the perfect words in it, but it's an important point. Suicide is no longer an option, not just because I think I'm invincible, but because I have some weird faith thing. I trust that God not only has my back now, in these good times, but in the hard times as well. And yes, I slept that night. Things still aren’t perfect and no, I don’t sleep every night. There are still days I don’t eat. There are days I get angry and yell. There are days I feel like I’m “just making this sh$# up as I go.” Life is never going to be a perfect fairy tale, but more often than not, I find myself saying to myself, God and others, “those moments are worth what I have now”. I don’t know if I can describe it yet. It’s not always joy or contentment. It’s not the fact that I finally believe a future could actually be possible. It’s not one single feeling, thought, epiphany, or anything like that. I think, in the end, it’s just enough for me to know it’s worth it. My life is worth something. I don’t know what yet, or why, but I know I am valuable.
That’s the first time I’ve acknowledged that. This is my story in the “Book of Katie”. Chapter Unknown. Verse Hope. Yeah, I never liked numbers. What can I say? I may be valuable, but I’m still a rebel!
Sincerely,
