Jesus Loves You.

Yes.  You.  Even when you've been less than a stellar individual.  Even when you feel like you can't be loved.  He does.  He will always take you back.  I promise.

Home + Rehab.

I am sitting in my bed after sleeping for 11 hours.  I landed here in sunny California at noon yesterday.  At 3 I was on my way to Saturday night Church.  God was my first priority when I came back.  I love that.  At about 4 I ran into Amber.  She's my best girlfriend.  Like, legit.  I love this girl like a sister.  A few minutes later I ran into my discipler and we hugged and she said I am so excited to meet with you this week so we can get a plan.  We're meeting with Pastor Phil on Wednesday and then I am meeting with her on Thursday at Islands (this restaurant) because it's where we met the first time.   I ran into Pastor Phil after service, which was about Ruth, and marrying Godly people and how Christ saves us even though we are outsiders and what you might consider damaged goods.  It was such a powerful sermon and exactly what I needed to hear.

I feel like damaged goods.  I don't feel worthy of love, especially love by Jesus.  I feel like one of the reasons I dated so many people that aren't good for me, ahem, my ex, yes?  was because I felt like I didn't deserve anyone better.  I figured that I'm not worth it.  I'm not good enough.  I'm not smart enough or talented enough.  But you know, that's ridiculous.  The thing is that you will never be good enough for Jesus.  That's the entire reason you need Him!!  And boys cannot fill that place in your life.  Boys don't fill the void that only God can.  Drinking can't fill it.  An eating disorder can't fill it.  Drugs can't.  But even if you are struggling with those things, God can still heal you.  He won't leave you regardless of how many times you pull a Jonah and flee.  Looking back, the week before I left for college, we were talking about Jonah in church.  There isn't a single pair of Nike's in the world that are fast enough so that you can outrun God. 

You might be "damaged goods."  I am.  We all have scars.  We all have things we wish we could do differently.  But we are viewed as amazing because God chose to redeem us despite our garbage.  I know I need Rehab.  I need to let God deal with all the stuff in my heart and I need strength and security and love and to really grow my roots deep into Jesus.  I need Rehab.  What about you?

Hotel Blues.

I don't like the person I've been.  I don't like the way I've been living the last few months.  I fly out in 6 hours to California.  I'm up sitting alone in my hotel room thinking about this semester.  I'm thinking about the mistakes I've made.  I wonder how much I have changed.  I wonder how long my Mom's excitement to see me will last.  Because she knows I'm not fine.  I have to fill out a form when I get home to medically withdraw from my math class because I didn't go to the final because I had a panic attack so I went to the bar with friends and drank my pain away.  I had gone to the student health services that day to get a refill on my pills before I left for 3 weeks and she told me I qualified.

I've spent this semester digging holes.  Running.  I don't like the person I have become.  I don't like who I've been.  I fell.  I still feel pain.  Drinking with friends is fun, but when you wake up, the pain is still there.  I've gotten sick of people walking out of my life, so I've been walking away from mine.  I've been irresponsible.  I've been silly and childish and I don't hardly recognize the person I am anymore.  When I look in the mirror my eyes seem cold.  Everything about me screams fragile.

I'm not okay.  I don't want to go see family.    I want to curl up in my dorm room and hide.  I don't like the person I've been.  I don't like the life I've been living.  So I need to change.

I'll Help You Survive.

I don't know what it is you are going through.  I don't know how hard the fight is.  I don't know if you feel like you've been abandoned.  I can tell you that I have felt like that a time or two.  You might feel like you're a mistake.  You might feel like there is no point in walking anymore.  You feel like you want to die, but I want to tell you that you're here for a reason and you aren't a mistake.  You were made with a purpose that only you can fill.   You were made with such love and care and even though you won't ever do anything to deserve it, you don't have to spend your life trying to.

I can't tell you that it's going to be easy.  I won't lie to you.  Because they aren't easy.  It's hard to keep living when everything is falling apart, but when you are crumbling, there's a God out there who is holding you together.  He is strong in our weaknesses and He wants to tell you that you can survive this.  He'll help you every step of the way.  Reach out and take His hand.

Death is Easy.

Death is easy.  Peaceful even.  There's this quiet haze that falls all over your body and for the first time in your life you can't feel a thing.  You are truly numb and if you could smile, you would.  But you can't move your face.  You can't move at all.  It's not that scary kind of paralyzed either.  It's like when zonked out on tranquilizers, but more.  So much more.  Sleeping like the dead takes on a whole new meaning for you.  Your breathing slows.  You feel this letting go of everything.  Warm and tingly like your drunk.  But you're not. 

Usually when dreaming, you are still aware of the outside world.  This isn't like that.  All you have is yourself.  You feel like you're floating.  You can't hear anything else.  You can't feel the sheets on the bed or the IV pumping fluid into you.  You can't feel the pain after drinking the charcoal to stop the pills from doing irreversable damage to your liver.  Did anyone tell you before you took all that Tylenol that it is one of the slowest ways to die because it takes about 3 days for your system to fail, and you have to down the entire bottle on an empty stomach?  No, no one did.  It didn't occur to you that there was a right way to overdose.  You just felt like your mind was a freight train and you were just trying to get the train to slow down.  You can't feel the nurses hand on yours.  You can't hear your parents fighting and crying.

Floating feels nice.  Death is easy.  Life is hard.  Life is messy.  Life is complicated.  Life hurts.  Death is peaceful.  It doesn't hurt.  But living takes courage and strength you don't think you have.  When you finally wake up, they force you to drink some apple juice.  You want to go back to the floating.  You want to go back to the quiet but all you hear is your parents yelling.  Your father screams obscenities and then leaves the room in tears.  The first few days living after knowing what being so close to peace are hell.  But if you surrender to the quiet, you miss so much.  And even though death is easy and life is hard, life is worth it.  Checking out before your sixteenth birthday, before things get a lot better, is a crime.

Hold on.  Life is hard, but it is worth it.

Slow your breath down.

This chest is full of memories

Of gold and silver tears

I’ll give you more to own than

All of this

And I’ll give you more than years

For you were once a child of innocence

And I see you just the same

Your burdens couldn’t win or

Lose a thing

Oh, I’d tell you once again

But you’re always on the run

 

Slow your breath down

Just take it slow

Find your heart now, oh

You can trust and love again

Slow your breath down, just take it slow

Find your smile now, oh

You can trust and love again

 

If you leave I’ll still be close to you

When all your fears rain down

I’ll take you back a thousand times again

I’ll take you as my own

I would sing you songs of innocence

‘Til the light of morning comes

‘Til the rays of gold and honey cover you

In the sweetness of the dawn

But you’re always on the run

 

You’re not alone

You’re now a part of me

You feel the cure

I’ll feel the toil it brought you

 

 

What can I say?  I love that song.  I've been at a stage in my life where things are very chaotic.  In about 3 months my Mom is moving to North Carolina and I'm sure that the 5 of us will live in separate states.  I don't know where I'm going.  I've made a mess of me.  I've spent a year and a half crying.  I'm not going to hold myself back anymore.  I just want to slow my breath down and find my heart beat.  Thank God for starting to put me back together, because I've been a wreck for so long.

Chasing Pavements.

I've made up my mind,
Don't need to think it over
If I'm wrong, I am right
Don't need to look no further,
This ain't lust
I know this is love
But, if I tell the world
I'll never say enough
'cause it was not said to you
And that's exactly what I need to do
If I end up with you

[Chorus]
Should I give up,
Or should I just keep chasin' pavements?
Even if it leads nowhere
Or would it be a waste
Even if I knew my place
Should I leave it there
Should I give up,
Or should I just keep chasin' pavements
Even if it leads nowhere

I build myself up
And fly around in circles
Waitin' as my heart drops
And my back begins to tingle
Finally, could this be it

Or should I give up
Or should I just keep chasin' pavements
Even if it leads nowhere
Or would it be a waste
Even if I knew my place
Should I leave it there

Should I give up
Or should I just keep chasin' pavements
Even if it leads nowhere
Or would it be a waste
Even if I knew my place should I leave it there
Should I give up
Or should I just keep on chasin' pavements
Should I just keep on chasin' pavements
Ohh oh

Or should I give up
Or should I just keep chasin' pavements
Even if it leads nowhere
Or would it be a waste
Even if I knew my place
Should I leave it there






I don't know what the future holds for me.  I don't know where I stand with a lot of things.  A week from today I will be getting on a plane and heading back to California for three weeks.  A week from today I am putting this semester behind me.  I am letting go of the drama and the anger.  I randomly started sobbing at one this morning.  I am sure I am going to fail at least one class but I know that with everything that has happened, it's understandable.  I'm not making excuses or trying to be lazy.  But with where I have been at, I know I will fail my first class.   I'm not going to let it destroy me.  I'm not letting him destroy me anymore.


I'm not going to give up.  Life is for living, for forgiving, and for leaving town alive.

Going away for a while.

I've had a really really rough time dealing with all the things in my life.  I won't go into details, but each day has been really really hard.  I'm trying.  But I don't want to get up.  I don't want to get out of bed.  So it is best for everyone that I go away for a while and withdraw from writing this out and just focus on trying to keep going right now.  I hope that all of you take care of yourself.  Please pray for me to have the courage to keep living because death is easy.

Alright.

Is it alright to say that I can't see the hope from here?
Is it alright to say that I'm not content?
Is it alright to say that I'm not feeling anything?
Is it alright to say that I don't know where you went?

Would it be alright if we talked awhile?
'Cause its been so long and I can feel the night
Would you walk this road with a lonely soul?
'Cause I need you to make everything alright

Is it alright to say that I am struggling everyday?
Is it alright to say I'm not hearing you?
Is it alright to say that I don't want to go your way?
Is it alright to say that I don't know what to do?

Would it be alright if we talked awhile?
'Cause its been so long and I can feel the night
Would you walk this road with a lonely soul?
'Cause I need you to make everything alright

We All Fall.

We all fall
Sometimes
We all let ourselves down
Sometimes there's nothing left but to live with what's been done
And know you're not the only one
Who falls
We all fail
Sometimes
We all let someone down
Sometimes there's nothing left but to promise to ourselves
That next time we won't be the one
To fail
I want to tell you you can go on
That beginnings come from ends
I still believe in you
And so does God
He's the one who still believes in those who fail
He's the one who still believes in us who fall...

I matter so much. And so do you.

My discipler asked me if I had listened to this week's sermon.  I just started it and I'm only 2 minutes in and I already know that God needed me to hear this.   It's theme is how much God loves you and how you can't keep going down the road you are on.
I haven't listened to the sermons in about 2 months.  I haven't done anything.  I hardly read.  And yet God loves me so much.  I haven't done anything to deserve it.  I have spent the last 4 months going down the wrong road.  I relapsed with my eating disorder after I moved away.  I've been purging.  I am nervous that I won't pass a few classes because I can't hardly go to classes because I have had such little energy.  I hardly sleep at night.  I'm depressed.  I'm empty.
There's a huge part of me that cannot see that I'm loved by an amazing God who promised me almost 5 years ago that he'd never let me go.  But I let go of Him 4 months ago.  And I'm empty and hopeless because I'm not walking the narrow road.  I'm sobbing right now as I'm writing this because I honestly hate myself and I hate the way I look.  I hate the things that I do because I know that I have an ugly heart right now.  I've been drinking and smoking and I've fallen apart so bad.  I have been angry at God and angry at myself.  There's this one line in a song that I love: She hates you hate's life hate's the way she looks naked.  Now she's feeling lousy and drousy and how could she love something that's barely alive?
Those are strong words, but that's how I feel right now.  I can't keep going down the road I'm on.  There has been a few times since I was 11, when I first started purging, I have had major chest pains to where I wonder if I'm going to redo serious damage to my physical heart. Never mind the fact that it kills my emotional and spiritual heart every time I pray to the porcelain god who makes me die and breaks God's heart.  When I was born, I had a hole in my heart and it was repaired when I was almost one years old.  It was the first time I made my Dad cry.  The second time was when I woke up after my first of several overdoses.  I was given a new chance at physical life at 1.  By the time I was 9 I wanted it to end.  And I tried so many times and couldn't understand why God wouldn't let me succeed at taking my life away.

I've spent 21 years wondering why God has had me alive.  I've spent 21 years hating myself.  I have spent 10 years in the hell of bulimia.  And even though my ED isn't as bad as it has been, I still have had the desire to change everything about myself.  Because God made me wrong.  How prideful is that?  How the heck do I have the right to look my Creator in the eyes and dare to say You made me wrong.  You didn't make me pretty.  You didn't make me thin.  You made it hard.  You gave me love and then took it away.  You put people in my life only to take them away.  You have broken my heart.  Literally.  You have made it so hard on my parents.  You made it hard on me.  You gave me a family that doesn't know You and doesn't get why when I'm home I live at church.  They don't understand why I would read my Bible and only listen to worship music.  You love me, beyond measure, despite how I have talked to You.  Despite how I feel about myself.  Despite the fact that I rejected You for so long and rejected the gift of life You gave me.  Despite my doubts and my fears and my anger.
Since when is it all about me anyway?  Why can't I just accept that God loves me?  God is literally looking at the life I have been living for the last 4 months and sobbing.  Jesus is standing at my door and knocking.  I'm hiding behind pot, drinking, and hating myself.  I'm hiding thinking He can't see me.  I'm hiding thinking no one knows.  I'm hiding thinking I'm garbage and that's what I deserve.  What a waste of life He has given me.  I left California so filled with the Spirit.  And I had joy.  It was not always like this.  I was bought with a price and I cannot ever pay it.  And yet I think I'm a waste.  I think God doesn't want me.  But He's been showing me nothing but love since the day I was brought in this world and I have done nothing but try to take myself out.
I want to just stand before God now and cry too.  I am so sorry God.  I am so sorry that I have filled myself up with garbage and now I am so sick.  I am sorry I have rejected You.  I am sorry I have been hiding.  For not listening.  For being stubborn.  For living in darkness.  For not understanding that You still love me and You value me. You want me.  You want me even if a man doesn't.  Or even if my body isn't the way the world demands it to be.  You want me even though I have made a huge mess.  Even though I haven't been dying to myself so I can live for You.  Oh Lord, I've messed up.  Help me lay down my garbage so You can heal me.  Help me to see how much You love me.  Help me to remind me that this race isn't supposed to be a cake walk.  But Lord, please walk with me every step of the way because I have been trying to do it on my own for so long.  And I can't walk on my own anymore.  Carry me through this.  Lord, please give me the strength to walk towards You when the drinking and the smoking and the eating disorder pull me back towards the wrong road.  When the garbage I put into my life through the music and the TV and the movies I watch pull me back.  When I willingly walk away.  Help me to want to seek Your face and Your love and Your kindness.  Help me to re-date You and re-commit my life to You.  Because I matter to You.  Because You love me and You want to take me back. 

A Dustland Fairytale

The Dustland Fairytale beginning
With just another white trash county kiss in '61.
Long brown hair, and foolish eyes.
He'd look just like you'd want him to
Some kind of slick chrome American prince.

Blue Jean serenade
Moon River what'd you do to me
I don't believe you.

Saw Cinderella in a party dress, she was looking for a nightgown.
I saw the devil wrapping up his hands, he's getting ready for the showdown.
I saw the minute that I turned away, I got my money on a pawn tonight.

Change came in disguise of revelation, set his soul on fire.
She said she always knew he'd come around.
And the decades disappear
Like sinking ships but we persevere.
God gives us hope but we still fear what we don't know.

Your mind is poisoned.
Castles in the sky sit stranded, vandalized.
The drawbridge is closing.

Saw Cinderella in a party dress, she was looking for a nightgown.
I saw the devil wrapping up his hands, he's getting ready for the showdown.
I saw the ending when they turned the page, I threw my money and I ran away.
Sent to the valley of the great divide
Out where the dreams all hide.
Out where the wind don't blow,
Out here the good girls die.
And the sky won't snow
Out here the bird don't sing
Out here the field don't blow
Out here the bell don't ring
Out hear the bell don't ring
Out here the good girls die
Now Cinderella don't you go to sleep, it's such a bitter form of refuge.
Why don't you know the kingdoms under siege and everybody needs you.
Is there still magic in the midnight sun, or did you leave it back in '61?
In the cadence of a young man's eyes.
Out where the dreams all hide



Laying down and dying isn't an option.   Sitting in your room all day doing nothing is not an option.  You have to get up and fight.  Fight for a better day.  Because it doesn't always have to be this way.  I can promise you that if you just get up and go it'll all be better.  It will still be hard sometimes, but I can promise that it won't always be horrible. 

Heart Surgery.

I think it's ironic that I was born with a hole in my heart.  I had it repaired physically in 1991.  One of my favorite songs is Tiny Heart by Flyleaf.  There's another song that means a lot to me that deals with the heart.  Total Eclipse of the Heart has shown up several times.  After one of my overdoses, it was the song playing on the radio when I woke up.  A few years later, itwas in a skit for TreeHouse and that was the song that played.   This woman had these really bad "boyfriends", drinking and drugs, and suicide and everything and then Jesus broke down all the people and everything.  It was really cool and it made me cry.  Especially because I have done every single one of those.  I've used drugs and I've drank.  I've attempted suicide, I've cut.  I've done so many horrible things.  But He still chose to save me.

I need you now tonight.  I need you more than ever.  And if you'd only hold me tight, we'll be holding on forever.  Turn around, bright eyes.  My favorite Bible verse is about the heart.  God has been hitting me hard with Ezekiel 16:8 and Ezekiel 36 this week.  I need to let Him clean out my heart because it's still bleeding.  It still has holes.  I have holes I cannot fill. 

It's like, Jesus is standing outside the door and knocking and I'm running away.  I'm sitting bleeding and all He wants is for me to turn around.  Sometimes I feel like I'm not even home. 

It's ironic how cheesy love songs can be so profound.  I would have probably originally hated that song, but it's had such an impact on me.  I don't know what to do and I'm in the dark, but I need You to fix me.

Foundation.

"I write about hope and light and love and happiness.  I want that so much for all of you.  I write about recovery.  I want that for all of you so badly.  I was in a state of recovery.  But I have been really losing that sense that everything is going to be okay.  I've been feeling lost and I need to find my ground again.  I've lost my way and I've lost my footing.  I need to rebuild my foundation."

I'd like to point out that I don't have the slightest idea where I'm going with this, I'm just pouring out my heart.

It's amazing how I wrote that today.  I found myself spending hours worshiping and listening to Flyleaf.  Flyleaf is one of my favorite bands.  Their song Supernatural was playing a year ago tomorrow when I woke up in my car after being knocked out for 10 minutes.  I woke up to smoke swirling around me, my head pounding, smoke pouring out of my mouth.  My ribs ached.  I was shaking violently and at that moment someone pulled me out from the wreckage that was my car.  I should have died that day.  But, I didn't.  And it was this that was playing when I first woke up.


Her headaches
Constant
Increasing in pain with each passing day
She can't even manage to stand on her own
It's gotten so bad

Now you think of saying
There's no use in praying
Still she bows her head so she can say,
"Thank you for just one more day."

Supernatural patience
Graces her face
And her voice never raises
All because of a love
Never let go of
Never let go of

I'd like to point out that I had over 2000 songs on my iPod, and it was on shuffle.  So, the odds of that happening, not very likely.  It's amazing that tomorrow marks a year since that accident.  It's strange for me to think about where I have been since that year.  At that time last year, I wasn't in school.  I was working at target.  I had just had major surgery.  I went to church twice a week, and I did life group with about 10 women.  We met on Wednesday nights.  We would worship together, pray together, laugh and cry together, and of course, build our foundation.

I worked the graveyard shift at target.  I would usually get off work at either 8am, or noon.  Since my younger sister was in high school, my Mom was working, my Dad was in Antarctica, and my older sister worked the later shift, I would come home to an empty house.  I'd immediately run to my Bible and read.   I'd even read at least a chapter before work, and I'd pray throughout my shift.  I'd sit for hours in the quiet of my house reading and spending time with my Dad.  My sisters used to get annoyed with me because they'd walk in the house and would hear me blaring worship music in my room, singing at the top of my lungs.

After my ex got arrested that summer, God was all I had.  God was all I wanted, because everything else left me empty and broken and all I had was hurt.  I felt like I had to walk up to my Dad (God my Dad, not my actual Dad...) and hand Him my shattered heart.  I told Him to keep it, that it was all His.

I didn't want it.  I never wanted to feel as low as I felt the day he was arrested.  I never wanted to feel how I felt when everyone for the most part that I cared about had told me once that I should kill myself.  I didn't want to feel like garbage anymore.

I didn't want to feel like things would never be okay again.  I didn't want to feel like I had nothing left.  I didn't want to admit that for 2 years, my ex-fiance had been in place of God, but I know that he was.  I know that I made him so important, because the 2 years together, and especially the last 10 months of it that was long distance, I didn't open my Bible up once.  I didn't talk to God at all.  I didn't find a church.  I didn't do anything at all.  

3 weeks before we broke up, I was heading home from my college.  It was a 10 minute drive.  I couldn't make it home.  I had to pull over to the side of the road because I began shaking and crying and I had to get out of my car to puke.  When I finally got back into the car, I sat crying.  I prayed for the first time since I left Minnesota.  I told God I was so sorry.  I was so sorry that I hadn't prayed.  I hadn't done anything.  I had completely forgotten Him and I was so sorry and I knew that there was something blocking me from Him.  I asked Him to take whatever it was away, no matter how badly it would hurt.   After that, I was able to drive home.  I found my Bible hidden in the closet and read it, feeling immediately better.

Last February, I went on a weekend retreat up to the mountains of California with my church.  They had a breakout session on Saturday mornings where guys and girls were split up.  The woman speaker was the woman who preached my first night at the church and was the one who prayed with me when I got baptized that night.  I had known she would be speaking and was so excited to hear her talk.  There was about 60 women in the room and she talked about abuse and hurt and betrayal and feeling so depressed she didn't know how she would make it through the day.  She then told us to make a list of every person who we were angry with.  She asked us to think of every single person who we felt had betrayed us.  Then she had us rip it up.  She told us not to let it poison us anymore.   The first person on my list was myself.

Then she told us we had to ask for the strength to forgive them.  I went home feeling so light and free.   I started discipleship a week later. 

When my ex wrote me the 40ish letters, that's when I fell apart.  I began drinking to cover up.  I walked right into my bloody field, shook hands with my old demons, and made a pact to self-destruct. I began slipping into my depression and my eating disorder.  It's what I fall back on.  I pushed God away.  I didn't read.  I didn't talk.  I just sat bleeding.

Tonight, I felt like going back to the beginning to when I first let Jesus into my life.  I went back to the first passage I ever read, which is so marked up, and I have read it so many times, but I found myself back to the beginning.  I had to go back so I can go forward.

On the day you were born your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to make you clean, nor were you rubbed with salt or wrapped in cloths. ⁵ No one looked on you with pity or had compassion enough to do any of these things for you. Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, for on the day you were born you were despised.
 ⁶ “‘Then I passed by and saw you kicking about in your blood, and as you lay there in your blood I said to you, “Live!” ⁷ I made you grow like a plant of the field. You grew and developed and entered puberty. Your breasts had formed and your hair had grown, yet you were stark naked.
 ⁸ “‘Later I passed by, and when I looked at you and saw that you were old enough for love, I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your naked body. I gave you my solemn oath and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Sovereign LORD, and you became mine.
 ⁹ “‘I bathed you with water and washed the blood from you and put ointments on you. ¹⁰ I clothed you with an embroidered dress and put sandals of fine leather on you. I dressed you in fine linen and covered you with costly garments. ¹¹ I adorned you with jewelry: I put bracelets on your arms and a necklace around your neck, ¹² and I put a ring on your nose, earrings on your ears and a beautiful crown on your head.

Okay, I'm almost done, I promise.   My point is this:  Life is messy.  Recovery is a bloody process.  You have to work so hard for it.  Every day.   You have to remember what it is that you are fighting for.  You have to remember that you are loved so much by an amazing God who just wants to hold your hand every step of the way.  You have to remember that you can't keep going down the road you went down.  You can't turn to drugs and you can't turn to alcohol.  You can't turn to your eating disorder.  You can't turn to your depression.  You can't turn to your old addictions.  You can't turn to whatever it is that made you fall into the darkness.  Whatever your bloody field is, you can't keep staying there.  You have to let go of it.  You have to let go of the people that let you down.  You have to let go of the feeling that you were betrayed.

Just listen to this song.  Because you are so loved and you will never comprehend how much you are loved, but you are loved and you are treasured and you are adored, and God just wants to hold you and meet you in your field and help you leave it behind.  Let Him embrace you.  Let Him carry you.  Let Him heal you.

Comfort.

My discipler told me to get the book Jesus Calling.  It's a devotional for every day of the year.  It takes Bible verses and tells you things that God wants you to know.  It's like God is speaking directly to you, which is really cool.  She told me to look at the day I was born first.  Before even buying it, since I was at WalMart killing time, I turned to my birthday to see why she wanted me to read it so badly.

It's not a secret, I have low-self worth. I used to ask God all the time why I was created.  I felt like He made a mistake the day I was born.  In the first few months after my O.D, I would sit at night crying wondering why God had saved me, because I wanted no part in living, because I felt like I wasn't worthy of life.  I'm 21.  And while my self-esteem has become a lot better than it used to be, it's something I will always struggle with.   This is what God had to say to me about the day I was born:

Bask in the luxury of being fully understood and unconditionally loved.  Dare to see yourself as I see you: radiant in My righteousness, cleansed by My blood.  I view you as the one I created you to be, the one you will be in actuality when  heaven becomes your home.  It is My Life within you that is changing you from glory to glory.  Rejoice in this mysterious miracle!  Thank Me continually for the amazing gift of My Spirit within you.

Try to depend on the help of the Spirit as you go through this day of life.  Pause briefly from time to time so you can consult with this Holy One inside you.  He will not force you to do His bidding, but He will guide you as you give Him space in your life.   Walk along this wondrous way of collaboration with My Spirit.  

I was seriously about to sob in the store as I read that.  A few days before that, my Granddad sent me my birthday card.  I was nervous about opening the card because my Grandma was the one to send them every year.  I still have the last one she sent me.  Inside it said the world became a more beautiful place the day you were born.   I got a call from him on my birthday.  He told me how wonderful of a person I am and how I am doing so well and I'm 21.  He said how I have such an amazing gift to offer the world and he was hoping that I could finally see it.  He told me how proud of me my Grandma was and how he knew she would have wanted to eat ice cream with me (our way of celebrating).  She wanted me to know that I was special and how God has His hand on me.   She wanted me to know that God didn't make a mistake by creating me, since she knew that's how I felt every minute of every day for the longest time.

How comforting is it that?  None of you are a mistake.  None of you ever deserve to feel as low as I have felt.  Because you are worthy of life.  You are worthy of love and happiness and I know it's cheesy, but sunshine.  I want all of you to feel so much light and warmth.  Because I have been to some incredibly dark and cold places, and I never want you to feel like that.

You're not a mistake.  You were created with a purpose and I love you so much.

You Gave Me A Promise.

I've been sitting in my living room reading all of 1 John.  Wow.  It seriously just blew me away.  I was listening to the song You Gave Me A Promise by Fireflight and going over what I had written February 1, 2007, the day I prayed Jesus into my life. 


LIQUOR leaves you breathless.
DRUGS leave you senseless.
JESUS wont leave you regardless.
  
At my lowest, Jesus is my Hope.
At my darkest, Jesus is my Light. 
At my weakest, Jesus is my Strength. 
At my saddest, Jesus is my Comforter.

The waves might be crashing on you.  You might be wondering how you'll ever make it through.  But I can tell you that Jesus is holding onto you.  He will never let you go.  He doesn't care where you've fallen or where you have been.   Don't give up.  He gave you a promise and He loves you so much.

I haven't been doing well with my walk.   I've been tired and hurting and angry and losing my relationship, but I've realized that Jesus isn't the one walking away, it's me.  Hold onto the hope that He gives you.  When you feel like you can't go on, hold on.  Reach out.  But don't give up because He isn't giving up on you.

I Want You To Live, Not Just Survive.

"It hurts my heart, To see you cry, I know it’s dark, This part of life, Oh, it finds us all, But we’re too small, To stop the rain, Oh, but when it rains, I will stand by you, I will help you through, When you’ve done all you can do, And you can’t cope, I will dry your eyes, I will fight your fight, I will hold you tight, And I won't let you fall."

One of my friends sent me those lyrics tonight.  I haven't seen Christian since August of 2009 after my last mission trip.  Christian is studying Youth and Family Ministries at a college about 20 minutes away from my home town.  We met the summer before after I had been filming where I had been before TreeHouse.  He and I had been filming.  I came to TreeHouse after several suicide attempts.  He was there for the same reason.  

Christian has one of the biggest hearts I know.  He would do anything for a friend.  He knows I've been having a hard time.  I've been recently put on twice the normal dose of my anti-depressant.  It keeps the suicide thoughts away, not that I had been having any, but because I still struggle with low self-worth.  He told me I know you've been through a lot, and I know that after what your ex did to you, and after losing your Grandma over the summer, you've gone through a lot, and I can't imagine what you feel like, but I just imagined God hugging you as I was listening to this song.  So if you ever need anything, you know where to find me.  Hang on, girl.

Sometimes, life brings us so much pain.  We wonder why we should get up when it seems like something else will make us fall again.  Sometimes, we feel like we have nowhere else to turn, so dying, ending our lives, seems to be the best option.  But I want to tell you that I believe you are strong and I believe that life is worth living.  Even for me.  Even for you.  Even if you've done some unspeakable things.  I want you to know that ending your life would be a tragedy.

I want you to live, not just survive.  Please, hold on.  It gets better.  I promise.

My first descent into hell.

6 years ago today, I have just turned 15.  At around noon that Friday, I am called out of my class and told to go to the school's information desk.  Since they call you on an intercom system, they usually tell you to just go to the information desk and from there will tell you where to go.  I have never been called out of class, I feel like my entire world is caving in, and I am trying not to cry.  I have been feeling like this for months. 

4 days ago was my birthday.  My Mom hands me a journal.  I began chronicling my descent into hell and wrote about the blackness of it all.  I wrote about the black wave of terror that swallowed me whole.   I had been writing when my name had been called.   Walking to the information desk, I have no idea how I get there.  Everything seems to be moving extremely fast and my anxiety is getting the best of me.  I feel like I'm about to have a heart attack.  This isn't my first panic attack, and it won't be the last.  I tell the woman my name and she tells me my guidance counselor wants to speak with me.  When she notices how scared I look, she reassures me that it's probably just about classes and not a big deal.

I walk into the guidance office and tell the woman my name.  She immediately puts me into my counselor's room.  He and I had never met and he rushes in with a set of writings I had written in my 3rd hour English class.  Since I had been cutting, I was wearing a baggy sweatshirt and ripped jeans.  I have dyed my hair pink and it is long enough to hide most of my face.  I have on heavy eyeliner and my fingernails are painted black with a sharpie.  My ears are bleeding because in my English class I got the wonderful idea to pierce my ears with paperclips.   Here comes another question several people ask:  Was I Gothic because I was depressed, or was I depressed because I was Gothic?   I don't think it's either, for the record.   The counselor stares at me for a moment, doing what most people who saw me that year did.  He was taking an inventory of what I was wearing, and I felt like he was judging me.  He was looking to see where I had hidden my cuts, but I didn't know that.

He begins telling me how worried he and others are for me.  He asks me to lift up my sleeves and I don't know why he is telling me this because I can feel myself shaking from the weight of the world on my shoulders.  I can feel the ground spinning and I begin sobbing and taking quick breaths.   Since he knew I was having a panic attack, he asked if I wanted someone with me.   Ben was called out of class and I immediately apologized.  He held my hand as they called my Mom.  When she walked in, she took one look at me, and said what the hell is going on?  When they told her I had been cutting and I needed to be tested for major depression, my Mom turned to me and said what the hell is so wrong with you that you have to cut yourself?  I tell you over and over again how wonderful you are and you just don't get it.  What the hell is wrong with you?  I tell her in a whisper:  I cut because I'm dead inside.  I bleed just to know I'm alive.

My Mom takes me to the doctor and we stop for McDonald's on the way.  It is 6 years ago today and I can remember exactly what I ordered.  I can remember chewing my entire meal counting each bite I took.  20 chews for each bite.  120 bites for my burger and 120 for my fries.  Does this seem odd that I can remember in detail what I ate?  I can remember sitting in the doctors office waiting for them to do my inventory and I would shake my leg in a nervous twitch so that I would be burning calories.  I remember wondering how I could get away from my Mom long enough to purge, but since she had just found out I was a cutter and suicidal, she wouldn't let me out of her sight.

The woman who sees me was anything but professional.  She wouldn't even talk to me and I hated her for it.  I began to yell at her and used every profane word I knew.  The woman said to my Mom not to worry, cutting, being suicidal, and being bulimic was an adolescent phase, I was fine.  I left the office screaming at her.  I just wanted one person to understand how low I felt.  How every inch of me had been bruised.  How I had no energy to do anything.  How I tried so hard to just get through my days and as soon as I would get home from school I would collapse into bed and sleep.  Forget about homework.  Forget about anything else.  I would sit in bed half dead waiting for the courage to end my life.  My Mom drives me home and I am ignoring her.  I won't say a word.  I blare my headphones and listen to the CD Ben made me for my birthday.

When I get home, I collapse into my covers in my Green Bay Packers sweatshirt my parents gave me for my birthday.  A few hours later I tell my Mom the shit in my head won't stop and I just want to die.  She had been on the phone pleading with insurance companies, pleading with my old therapist, pleading with doctors, pleading to let someone see me.   She says get dressed you're going to the ER.

In the ER, I run into my old babysitter and she asks me why I'm here.  My Mom makes up some excuse I can't remember and silences me before I open my mouth to say I'm f'ed up and it doesn't matter.   When I am finally seen by a very pregnant doctor, she admits me into GeneRose1 West at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester.  That's a 2 hour drive from my house.  I arrive at Rochester and fight with everyone there until finally at 4am they let me go to bed.

In the hospital, I get some of the best sleep I have ever gotten.  Everything is peaceful and quiet and I feel safe. Looking back as I write this, I see just how far I have come in 6 years.  Who was this little girl so bent on dying?  I don't recognize her.  Even though I still have my slip ups, I feel so far removed from her.  I have strength and love and light in my life.  The girl going into the hospital, going into hell for the first of many times, did not have any of that.

For A Pessimist, I'm Pretty Optimistic.

I admit it, I'm a pessimist.  I look at things darker than most would. When I like someone, I think things like, well they would never like me back.  Or I think we'd never work out anyway so why even bother?  When people tell me I'm being pessimistic, I tell them, no I'm not, I'm just being realistic.

But that's the thing, it's not realistic.  It's not realistic to be alone forever, or for things to always be bad, or to never work out in anything.  I'm not just talking about what I do when I like someone.  I do that when I have a test.  I do it when I have a job interview.  I do it so many times it's not even funny.

So what do you do when you find yourself being so negative?  2 weeks ago in therapy, my therapist asked me what I thought about myself.  I immediately went into a huge negative spiral and he said, stop for a minute.  Do you notice how you deflate when you talk about yourself, or when you talk about things that are pessimistic?  I hadn't even noticed!  Then he said, okay, deep breath.  What do you like about yourself?  I sat there for a few minutes, not saying anything.  When I finally said something, he said, do you see how you light up again?  Stop.  Take a break.  When you go into your negative spirals, you have to stop and retrain your brain to not think that way.  You actually have life in you when you talk about the good things.  You have to retrain your brain after years and years of low self esteem to actually like yourself.

I know, it's incredibly hard work, but stop and take a deep breath and write down all the things you love about yourself.  Retrain your brain after all those years of damaging things it thinks.

Baby, I'm a Firework.

I went out to lunch with my best friend for my birthday, and I turned 21.  I'm honestly so glad to have made it this far.  Instead of focusing on the fact that I almost didn't, I just want to tell you all that life is worth living and that you're an amazing person. 

During lunch, the song Firework by Katy Perry came on the radio and I was thinking, this is the year I realize just how amazing I am.  And so now here is a list of songs that make me feel better about myself.

Firework by Katy Perry.   I love it because it's all about how amazing you are and don't let anyone bring you down.  You might feel like wasted space, but you can't ever be replaced is probably one of my favorite lines.  You're a firework, light up the sky.

Who Says by Selena Gomez and The Scene.   I'll admit, I'm not the biggest fan of her music, but I love this song because it's all about not caring what other people think.  I'm not a beauty queen but I'm still amazing.  I am who I am and if you don't like it, there's the door.  But I am worth it and I deserve happiness.

Beautiful-Eminem.  I can't find the edited version, so ignore all the F bombs, but I also love this song because you might feel like a joke.  You might feel like a huge mistake and super ugly and worthless and not good enough, but that's not true.  Sometimes, life can be so hard, but if you just hold on, you'll see that you are beautiful..  And you will see that life is so worth living.

I have math homework that I need to start but I just want to say that you all are amazing and worthwhile.  Keep holding on, beautiful, you're amazing. :)

Words to Live By.

Anyone who knows me or has seen my room knows I love quotes.  I have an entire notebook at home devoted to quotes I have collected since I started treatment in 2005 for major depression.  I love finding motivational things to get me through the day and here are some I have collected.

I hope they can help you the way they have helped me.

"When you feel like giving up, remember why you held on for so long in the first place." – Unknown
"Remember, there are no mistakes, only lessons. Love yourself, trust your choices, and everything is possible." - Cherie Carter-Scott
"Life's greatest happiness is to be convinced we are loved." – Victor Hugo
 "Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." – Plato
 "Little by little, one walks far." - Peruvian Proverb
 "Let's believe that if we all stand together we’re a force that can shake the whole world." - A Day to Remember
 "Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless." - Mother Teresa
 “Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.” - Lucius Annaeus Seneca
 "Only eyes washed by tears can see clearly." - Louis L. Mann
 "Hope sees the invisible, feels the intangible and achieves the impossible." - Charles Caleb Colton
 “Forgiveness is the act of admitting we are like other people.” – Christina Baldwin
 "You just have to keep on breathing because tomorrow the sun will rise and who knows what the tide will bring." - Cast Away
"You are stronger than the darkness in this world."-Unknown
"Believe that there's light at the end of the tunnel. Believe that you might be that light for someone else." - Kobi Yamada
 "Gradually the healing took place, seeming as it always does that it wasn't taking place." - Ursula K. Le Guin
 "Ah yes, the past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it or learn from it." - The Lion King

Take Care of Yourself.

So, my suite mates have gotten me into Glee recently, and I have been obsessed with Damian McGinty from there.  He is just so lovable.  Last week he sang this song and I haven't been able to get it out of my head.  I keep listening to it non-stop.

I think it's something everyone should know.   There are people out there who love you and want you to take care of yourself, even if they can't always be near you.  Even though sometimes life forces us to say goodbye.  There are people out there who want you to stay alive.  They want you to do your best to keep yourself alive and to keep going when everything is going so wrong and all you want to do is quit.

It's time for us to part
Yeah It's best for us to part
Oh but I love you, I love you
Take care of yourself, I'll miss you

The nights are long alone, I sit alone and moan
Oh cause I love you, I love you
Take care of yourself I'll miss you

And no more tears to cry I'm out of goodbyes
It's time for us to part although it breaks my heart
oh cause I love you, I love you
Take care of yourself

Take care of yourself

Take care of yourself
I love you

Take care of yourself.  Keep living.  Endure.  Keep breathing.

There is someone out there who loves you and wants you.

Your life matters.  You matter.  You matter so much.  To me.  I love you so much. 

It's an Elvis Night.

I know I've talked about Kevin a lot.  But he was a huge part of my life.  And I've spent the last 18 months attempting to get over him.  I've been doing pretty good with it, too.  But anyway, I have realized that there will always be a part of me that will love him and care about him.  Yes, what he did was inexcusable, but I also remember the person he was when I was around him.  It doesn't matter though, because we cannot be together ever again and I don't want that.   I know that the scars will always be there, but I have noticed them fading, not hurting as bad.  That being said, it does come back at night.  I am a night and day person.  At night is when my demons come out to play.  At night is when I wonder why I wasn't enough for him to stay.  I wonder what I did wrong to make him cheat on me.

Tonight I sat on my bed sobbing, missing my Grandma like crazy.  I remember June 4th of 2010, waking up in the morning and my Dad had made me breakfast.  He told me he had spent some time on the phone with my Grandma and to pack my bags because he was driving me to see her.  I was going to spend the week with her and that he knew I needed to see her and have her wisdom and comfort and love.  I had just lost my fiance and my Dad was wondering if I had cut myself in the night or anything like that.   I vaguely remember him having my Mom check me in the bathroom for cuts because when I had cut it was in areas easy to hide.  She found none.   I remember Paul from TreeHouse calling me and me sobbing and him telling me that I was strong and I would be okay.  I remember him asking me what my plan was and I told him my Dad and I were about to drive to Colorado to see my Grandma and he told me that my contract was still valid (the day I first went to TreeHouse he had me sign a contract saying if I was suicidal that I would call one of the staff, Paul was Kevin's mentor, so he knew what he did, and how close we were.)   I remember sobbing most of the way to my grandparents house and my Grandparents rushing outside to meet me.

I spent a week with my Grandma while my Granddad and Dad drove to Minnesota to get my sister from college since she graduated in May but took a summer class to finish.  She and I sat at the kitchen table early in the mornings since she said laying down and dying wasn't an option.  She would make me breakfast and I would cry, hardly eating.  So she would bring out the Elvis.  She and I would listen to him and she asked me what had happened.  I told her what I knew, that he had gone to jail, that it was for a sexual assault charge but I didn't want to know more.  Then I begged her not to tell anyone, especially my Dad.  She and I would spend the day fishing.  We would sit on the porch and talk.  She would smoke her camels and I would open up to her.

She told me she didn't have experience in breakups because the only man she ever dated or loved had been her husband for 56 years, but she told me how she knew how to keep living when everything seemed to be going wrong.  She and I spent the week listening to music and watching old school movies.

I feel so much better just remembering how much my family has been there for me, and remembering how much love and wisdom my Grandma poured into me.  If I ever have a family, I hope I can do that for someone else, and when I am a therapist, I hope I can do that for the people I am trying to help.  I have been given so much love and support and God has given me so many second chances it's not even funny.

I am so glad I have been able to feel this sad, because it means I'm alive.  And I am so glad I was able to cry and listen to Elvis tonight.

Ben. And Russian music.

It's funny how music can take you back to places where you've used to be.  I've been listening to tA.T.u all night long.  They're a Russian band.  My first boyfriend, Ben, got me into them.  I listened to them all of freshman year.  I hadn't listened to them in such a long time, but I found myself back to listening to them tonight as I'm studying for a huge history test.

I never really talk about Ben.  But I thought I would tonight because I'm feeling nestalgic and my therapist recommends me going back and dealing with all my issues, so I guess I need to talk about him. 

We met when I was in the 6th grade.  I was eleven, cutting secretly, and occasionally binging and purging.  But no one knew that.  This was one of the last years I was on adderal and adjusting to middle school had been really hard for me.  I was bullied almost every day.  I would eat lunch alone in the bathroom stall.  This was two years before I met my best friend, Jeff.

I was a swimmer, and had been since I was in Kindergarten.  My Dad, and both of my sisters swam, too.  I would spend every free moment in the water, but at this point I was developing physically faster than everyone around me and as I became more depressed, I despised the girl in the mirror.  Swimming became something I dreaded.   That's how I met him.  His Dad and my Dad were friends and swam together as well, so I went to his house for a party.  We began talking at practices and the first time I saw him in school I blurted out, wow, you have a shirt on.  Because I always saw him at the pool, I have ADD, had a crush on him, and was an awkward 13 year old at this point.

He laughed and said wow you're dressed, too.  We began talking more and hanging out the 4 nights a week we would swim for two hours.  We began hanging out at school as well.  He was the first to sit and eat lunch with me, so I wouldn't sit in the bathroom anymore.  He would tell me how he was happy we were friends, and how he liked it when I would smile, because he knew I didn't really like myself, and that sometimes I would cry.  He was the first one to see my scars.  He told me he didn't like it when I hurt myself.  He told me that I was an amazing person and he wished I could see it.

In 8th grade, I began going over to his house after school since he lived right behind the school.  We would hang out and watch Invader Zim and Futurama.  We would listen to Nirvana and all kinds of music.  When his Dad would come home from work, he would sit and talk to us and he would make me dinner sometimes.   He would tell me how he liked that we were friends and things like that.  I was happy to be there because Ben was really nice to me and would make me feel like he wanted me around.  He would come over and for my birthday he would make me CDs with our favorite songs on them and movies and things like that.

When I started high school, I still liked him.  High school was even harder for me to adjust to.  The bullying hadn't stopped and I was extremely depressed.  I began skipping classes and purging.  I had changed and wore all black.  My Mom says if you've ever seen an ad for anti-depressants, that was me, except the punk edition.  I wore eyeliner like Cleopatra, I would dye my hair punk colors and listen to metal.  Ben told me to start listening to t.A.T.u because he thought they would help me start to express myself. 

He would walk me to every class and hug me and tell me I was going to be okay and make it through my day.  When I first was hospitalized, he made me a card and called me to see how I was doing.  He was supportive and soon after we started dating.

As I got sicker and more depressed, began taking medicine, began cutting more often, began telling him how much I wanted to die, he told me I would make it through, how he didn't want me to die.  He told me how he loved me and how he hoped I wouldn't kill myself.   After three more hospitalizations, he started cheating on me and he became cold.

He wouldn't hold me anymore.  He wouldn't walk me to classes.  He wouldn't call.  He told me I was dead inside and worthless and that the world would be better off without me.  He convinced all of my friends except for Jeff to leave me, and completely stabbed me in the back.  That night, I was lying in the hospital, waiting for the doctors to see if my liver had damage because I had overdosed and tried to end my life.

I know this is the readers digest version.  But I am not angry with Ben.  I haven't talked to him in over three years.  I know he only dated me so I wouldn't kill myself, and I know that I was very sick and shouldn't have been dating.  I'm not angry.  It's not his fault.  Do I blame myself?  Sometimes.  But I know that I'm not fifteen anymore.  I know that at fifteen and suicidal, you can't really make the best choices, but I also know that I am a better person because of him.  I have learned to take more care of myself and how not to let anyone's words destroy me, to not let anyone be my entire world.  Dating a huge jerk ended up being a really good learning experience for me.

You Arx A Kxy Pxrson.

Xvxn though my typxwritxr is an old modxl, it works vxry wxll-xcxpt for onx kxy.  You would think that will all thx othxr kxys functioning propxrly, onx kxy not working would hardly bx noticxd; but just onx kxy out of whack sxxms to ruin thx wholx xffort.

You may say to yoursxlf-Wxll I'm only onx pxrson.  No onx will noticx if I don't do my bxst. But it doxs makx a diffxrxncx bxcausx to bx xffxctivx an organization nxxds activx participation by xvxry onx to thx bxst of his or hxr ability.

So the nxxt timx you think you arx not important, rxmxmbxr my old typxwritxr.  You arx a kxy pxrson.

Here's My Heart.

There's this one quote from Grey's Anatomy I absolutely love:

"At some point, you have to make a decision. Boundaries don't keep other people out. They fence you in. Life is messy. That's how we're made. So, you can waste your lives drawing lines. Or you can live your life crossing them."  And there's another one that I also think fits me right now: "Intimacy is a four syllable word for, 'Here's my heart and soul, please grind them into hamburger, and enjoy.' It's both desired, and feared. Difficult to live with, and impossible to live without."

Since my ex, I haven't really let people in.  And I basically told myself to just be alone for the rest of my life because I'm scared of getting hurt.  But I've realized now that being an island and being okay with being alone and pushing others away isn't what's good for me, either.  I've realized that life is so freaking messy and people do things to hurt you and there is darkness.  But I've also seen some people do incredible things and I know that God is real in my life.  But I've realized that by pushing people off my island, I've been doing that to God, too.  And because I have been pushing God away and not letting Him be close to me, I've missed out on good things.  I've missed out on things like going out with people because I'm scared they'll all leave.  I've missed out on spending quality time with God because I'm convinced that I deserved to have what happened with my ex happen.

My point is this:  I know I need to let people in.  I know that God has to be number one in my life, but I can't keep pushing others away because I end up doing that to God, too.  And I've realized that I'm not meant to go through life alone.

Here's my heart.  Please don't break it.

Drinking to Oblivion.

I'm 15 years old and downing Vodka like it's water with some of my best friends.  This is the first time I've drank, and I like the way I begin to loosen up.  I don't care about my sorrows.  I don't care that my boyfriend is a jerk who is cheating on me while I'm in and out of treatment.  I don't care about being on anti-depressants.  I don't care, because I'm not drinking to forget, I'm drinking to erase myself.

I'm drinking to get the courage to die.  When I'm drinking, everything feels amazing.  There's this warm sensation in my stomach, like I could curl inward and hug myself.  I throw my head back and say how amazing life is.  One of my guy friends looks at me with a puzzled look on his face, because he knows I'm suicidal on a daily basis.  He takes the bottle away and tells me to slow down.  But I don't want to.

I tell him how amazing it would be if you could feel like this 24/7.  I tell him I enjoy being smashed.  As my vision starts to blur, I keep drinking.  I can't remember to this day how many I have had.  I know that I fell down the stairs, began swearing like a sailor, and then threw up violently in the sink.  I remember the same boy who took my bottle away telling me how he was tired of my sh*t and that I needed to get myself together.  He didn't want to be my babysitter anymore.  I thought it was odd, coming from a meth head.

I tried to drink to oblivion, and I got alcohol poisoning.  At 15 years old.  I oddly enough woke up in the morning and made everyone breakfast, and I didn't even feel hungover.  I didn't care about anything.  I remember priding myself on that. I could get smashed and not feel a thing.  I was happy that my body was so good at being thrown around.  I thought it would never catch up to me.  But it did.

When you're drinking to erase yourself, to forget everything, to erase your sorrows, when you do stop having that buzz, you feel worse.  You feel like nothing matters when you drink, but when you finally sober up, you feel lower than you did.  Everything hits you harder than you thought possible.

On Monday it will be 2 weeks until my 21st birthday.  I will be legal, but I don't have the desire to erase myself.  I know that drinking to oblivion, or drinking to forget, to erase, to numb, to cope, is not the answer.  I'm not 15 anymore, and it's crazy to see how far I've come from all that damage I have done to myself.

I'm Awesome (And So Are You)

At breakfast today, I told Jeff this:  You know what, I'm awesome.  And if people can't see that, that's their problem.  Kevin was an idiot for throwing me away like garbage and I'm not going to lay down and die for that freaking jerk.  Or anyone else.

I'm awesome.  And so are you.  You have so much worth and if people can't see that, then they're dumb.  Because who you are is pretty amazing.  So don't ever change who you are for someone to like you more, because there are people out there who love you the way you are.

4 Lessons I've Learned This Week...

If you've read my earlier posts, you would know that I have officially relapsed.  Last Friday I started a low dose of lexapro, an anti-depressant that they only put you on when you've had a long history of depression, or very major depression, when no other anti-depressant works.   In my case, it's both.  I started taking lexapro in March of 2006, after my 3rd hospitalization for a suicide attempt.  I was on them for the rest of high school, but right before graduation, I was considered recovered, and I was taken off them, which was one of my main goals.

I spent a good 3.5 years on a 40mg dose.  That's a really high dose of serotonin, but in my case, it was needed.  I'm being tapered on, and I'm spending a week at 10mg a day, then I will increase to 20mg until my doctors appointment in about 2 weeks, when she will do another major depression inventory and most likely put me back on the 40mg.

This week has been a challenge for me, but I've learned 4 lessons and I'd like to share them.

1.  Do not let anyone push you around when it comes to your recovery.   I love my Mom, but she has never been diagnosed with a mental illness.  She can't possibly understand what I've gone through or know exactly what is right for me.  She can be supportive, but when it comes down to it, I've had this illness on and off, but mostly on, since 2003.  I will have it on and off for the rest of my life.  I know what I need to do to make sure I keep myself alive, because I have a moral obligation to keep my heart beating.  It started with a phone call a little over a month ago, telling my Mom that I was back in therapy, dealing with some issues.  Which was true.   She said, okay, if that's what you want.  But don't waste a lot of money or time on it if you don't need it.  When I told her it was a free service at school, she said, okay, if you need it.  Then last Thursday night I told my Mom that I had relapsed but I had a doctors appointment in the morning to put me back on anti-depressants.  She said, okay, but see if you can stay on a low dose.  You don't want to be on them for the rest of your life.  I told her that my main goal was just making sure I make it through winter and the spring because I also have to be really careful, because the winter is when I really dip low in serotonin, which is the main neurotransmitter that, when low, causes depression.   My point is this:  You know your own body.  You know what is right for you.  And if you want recovery, you have to fight like hell for that to happen.  Do not let anyone take advantage of you, or tell you what you need, because you know better than anyone else what is right for you.

2.  You matter.   Yesterday, I grabbed a fortune cookie after lunch, and this is what it said:

Your contribution is significant.   You matter.  One of the lovely things about depression is that it tells you horrible things, all day long.  It tells you things like, you deserve to be miserable.  You are a horrible person.  The world would be a better place without you in it.  I felt like that, yesterday.  I felt like so many people would benefit had I never been born, and I couldn't help but feel that God had a little note to tell me otherwise, that I matter, that what I bring to the world and to those in my life, has a meaning and a purpose.  I couldn't help but feel that he was telling me Jeremiah 29:11.  He has a plan for me, and I have something to offer to the world.  The same thing is true for you.  You bring so much to the world.  My best friend reminded me yesterday about how last May I talked one of my childhood friends out of suicide, from 2000 miles away, over the phone.  Depression had not allowed me to remember that, but had I never been born, one of my closest friends would have offed himself!  The world would be a colder and darker place without you in it.  Your contribution is significant, you matter.

3.  As hard as it is, get out of bed.  Depression likes to tell you to stay in bed all day long.  It likes to tell you that it doesn't matter, there is no point to even getting dressed.  Even if you just sit on the couch all day in your pjs, get out of bed.  Lying in the dark all day, in your bed, does nothing good for you.  Even if it's just something as simple as getting up and then watching a movie, leave the bed.  And if you can, make that bed, and then if you can, do something else small.  But get out and get moving.  I had to start gym class last week, and twice a week, I have to run for an hour.  I have realized that it does wonders for my mood!  Exercise raises your endorphins.  Endorphins allow you to heal faster when injured, and they also elevate your mood.  Get moving.  I have found that when I have just me and the track before me, and my iPod on, I can just let my mind wander and I don't have to think about all the garbage.   I can just keep going.  Get moving.  Don't lay down and die.

4.  It won't be like this forever.   You weren't always this low, you won't always be this low.  Just as you don't have the flu your entire life, you won't always have depression.  When you are that low, it's easy to focus on how ending your life might be the right choice, but it isn't, because it's just a permanent solution to a temporary problem.  And I'm not here to belittle your feelings.  Because I used to have those feelings, every minute, of every day.  With the relapse I've had, the thoughts have crossed my mind, what would it be like if I wasn't here, but I can't act on them, and that is why I am taking the steps to make sure I take care of myself, because I know that I had a 2 year break where I wasn't like this.  And I know that there will be a day when I am in a state of recovery again.   It won't be like this forever.  Keep holding on.  One more minute.  Then another.  I used to count the minutes that passed when I was literally holding a bottle of pills, ready to overdose.  Keep holding on, because you will see the sun again.  These feelings will pass, it can't be like this forever.

Never Good Enough.

Everybody said she was a winner
No one knew the secret kept within her
Starving for perfection
Hating her reflection

She tries harder then the average teen
An overachiever with low self-esteem
Wants to walk like a star
But she takes it too far
She's never good enough
Wants to be Mary-Kate
Perfect weight, 88
She's never good enough

Now her friends all know about her problem
They all try their best to try to solve them
She feels like she's on trial
But she's still in denial

She tries harder then the average teen
An overachiever with low self-esteem
Wants to walk like a star
But she takes it too far
She's never good enough
Wants to be Mary-Kate
Perfect weight, 88
She's never good enough

Who's in control now?...
Who's in control now?...

Everybody said she was a winner
No one knew the secret kept within her

She tries harder then the average teen
An overachiever with low self-esteem
Wants to walk like a star
But she takes it too far
She's never good enough
Wants to be Mary-Kate
Perfect weight, 88
She's never good enough

She tries harder then the average teen
An overachiever with low self-esteem-Never Good Enough by Rachel Ferguson. While there are some things that annoy me, this song is a pretty good look at what it's like to have an eating disorder and the battle that it is.  The only thing that bothers me is the whole Mary-Kate thing, because every girl I've known with anorexia has told me that they didn't lose weight to look like a celebrity.  I've mostly had NOS and I never tried to be like Mary Kate, either.  
Anyway, with an ED, it can quickly become a huge problem.  You try so hard to lose weight and be good enough but you never reach your goals, because as soon as you reach one goal, it's not good enough, so you make more goals.  Who's in control now?  Not you.   You think by doing the behaviors that you are in control, but the ED has you wrapped up and you can't get out.  You're trapped until you give it up forever.
In Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia by Marya Hornbacher, which is one of my favorite memoirs, there is a quote in there that says "Gaining weight and pulling my head out of the closet was the most political act I ever committed."   You can say that the media triggers you, and that it's not fair that girls are expected to be thin, but at the end of the day, you have to realize that an ED is not the way to happiness, no matter what some people might want you to believe.   The truth is, it will rob you of everything in life that you hold dear.   But at the end of the day, you have to let the behaviors go.  You have to realize that most of the girls you see in the magazines aren't even real.  It's called airbrushing and photoshopping and some ads are even a compilation of random body parts, so some of those women that you see don't even exist!
You can stop the cycle though, once you realize that what an ED costs you is not worth the price of being thin or beautiful.  Once you realize that perfection doesn't exist, you can stop striving for this ideal that doesn't ever leave you satisfied.  What it leaves you is nothing but sorrow and misery and in some cases, seriously sick, malnurished, and in about 20% of people suffering, dead.
Eating disorders are not worth it.

It's Friday, I'm In Love.

I know I've posted a lot today, but I just feel like getting this one out there today.  And since, it is Friday, I think it fits.

I don't care if Monday's blue
Tuesday's gray and Wednesday too
Thursday I don't care about you
It's Friday, I'm in love

Monday you can fall apart
Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart
Oh, Thursday doesn't even start
It's Friday I'm in love

Saturday, wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday, never hesitate...

I don't care if Mondays black
Tuesday, Wednesday - heart attack
Thursday, never looking back
It's Friday, I'm in love

Monday, you can hold your head
Tuesday, Wednesday stay in bed
Or Thursday - watch the walls instead
It's Friday, I'm in love

Saturday, wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday, never hesitate...

Dressed up to the eyes
It's a wonderful surprise
To see your shoes and your spirits rise
Throwing out your frown
And just smiling at the sound
And as sleek as a sheik
Spinning round and round
Always take a big bite
It's such a gorgeous sight
To see you eat in the middle of the night
You can never get enough
Enough of this stuff
It's Friday, I'm in love

I don't care if Monday's blue
Tuesday's gray and Wednesday too
Thursday I don't care about you
It's Friday, I'm in love

Monday you can fall apart
Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart
Thursday doesn't even start
It's Friday I'm in love


I'm not the biggest fan of the Cure, but I love this song.  I know I have depression, but I can choose to not let myself drown in it.  I can choose to not focus on my ex, he's like Thursday, I don't care about you.  I can choose to be fighting for my recovery.


I haven't been on a date since 2008.  I haven't let people in that much.  I'm not saying I'm gonna run off and get a boyfriend, because I do need to get healthy first, but I do need to actually let people in and do something fun for myself instead of wallowing.   And maybe someday, I can go on a date and let someone in again and know that it's not always going to bad, but I won't ever know if I don't ever try.


I've gotten good at convincing myself that I'm content with loneliness, because no one is worth the risk.  But I think that's not true anymore.  It's not so good to push people away.  I think I'm going to let someone in.  Because it's Friday, and I'm in love. :D

Therapy.

It Ain’t Such a Bad Thing

By: DAN PEARCE

I don’t understand why so many people are so freaked out by the word “therapist.” Therapy ain’t such a bad thing, you know.
Now, I understand that therapists are like mechanics. There are good ones and bad ones. Those who know what they’re doing, and those who don’t. Those that are happy to rip you off by putting a Band-Aid over the problem, and those that are generally concerned about getting you fixed up. Those that find problems that don’t actually exist, and those that only fix the problems that do.
But that doesn’t change the fact that sometimes you need your car fixed, and sometimes you need to be fixed, and that most of us lack the skills to fix the harder things on our own.
After thirty years of life, I’m far from knowing everything, but I’ve been around the block enough times to know that just about everybody is screwed up in one way or another. I am. You are. Even Jim Bob over there is.
We all have unhealthy ways of thinking. We all do reactionary things that are self-sabotaging and that create more problems. We all have things we’ve been trying to overcome for years, and for some reason we just can’t.

As for me, I’ve been to therapy probably more than fifty times. I love it. In fact, it’s been far too long since I’ve seen my therapist, and even though I’m feeling healthy and with it, I’m aching to setup another appointment to work on some things.
But why does the word therapist freak people out? Why, if I tell you I’m going to see my therapist, do you think I’m nutso or crazy? Why does that put a stigma on me?
Personally, if I’m dating a girl, and she tells me she goes to see a therapist, I think to myself hell yeah. That’s a girl worth a second date! To me, it simply means that she’s one of the few screwed-up people in this world being proactive about getting herself un-screwed-up.
Perhaps one of the reasons people don’t like therapy is that they’re afraid to work on what they know deep down they’re afraid to work on. Perhaps they’re afraid of facing truths that are buried somewhere within. Perhaps they know that overcoming crap in one’s life takes serious effort and serious strength, and it’s easier to just call therapists “quacks” and write off the program altogether.
We all got screwed-up by our parents in one way or another (and subsequently, we’ll all screw-up our kids in one way or another). We all got screwed-up by our friends and our peers. We all got screwed-up on camp-outs, slumber parties, sleep-overs, or while hanging out with our pals. We all got screwed up by lovers and those who should have loved us. We all got screwed-up by teachers and youth leaders. We all got screwed-up by the television, radio, books, magazines, and other media. We all got screwed-up all along the way. There are unlimited opportunities for human beings to get screwed-up.
So why is it so bad to undo some of the worst of it?
Sure, everything that my therapist teaches me I could read in a book. Everything she uncovers within me is something I could probably figure out how to uncover myself. But I didn’t, and I don’t, and that’s why I use a therapist. And I have a damn good one too.
At the very least, when you hear that somebody’s going to therapy, think good for you instead of trying to figure out what might be “wrong with them.” Because no matter how personally good or healthy I mentally get, I’ll always go see my therapist once in a while, and I’d hate to have everybody think I was unstable or whacked because of it.

This Time Imperfect.

I cannot leave here, I cannot stay,
Forever haunted, more than afraid.
Asphyxiate on words I would say,
I'm drawn to a blackened sky as I turn blue.

There are no flowers, no not this time,
There'll be no angels gracing the lines,
Just these stark words, I find.
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this, hurts me.

I cannot stay here, I cannot leave,
Just like all I loved, I make believe.
Imagine heart, I disappear, seems,
No one will appear, here and make me real.

There are no flowers, no not this time,
There'll be no angels gracing the lines,
Just these stark words, I find.
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this, hurts me.

I'd tell you how it haunts me,
I'd tell you how it haunts me,
(cuts through my day, and sinks into my dreams.)
I'd tell you how it haunts me,
(cuts through my day, and sinks into my dreams.)
You don't care that it haunts me.

Oh,
There are no flowers, no not this time,
There'll be no angels gracing the lines,
Just these stark words, I find.
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this, hurts me.

Just how much this, hurts me.

Just how much you...
-This Time Imperfect by AFI.

I was a freshman in high school when I discovered this song.  Davey Havok will always be one of my favorite singers.  I remember pouring over the lyrics of his songs in therapy and wondering when the heck I would start to feel better.   I remember my therapist of 6 years asking me why the heck I loved this song in particular so much.

I remember telling her how it was a lack of colour.  I saw everything in black and white and shades of grey.  I felt like all the colour in my life had drained out.   There were no words to describe how low I felt.  How I didn't think there would ever be colour again, or how tired I was of faking a smile and just trying to get through my day. 

I was put back on anti-depressants today.  The doctor thinks I should just stay on them for the rest of my life since I will have highs and lows for the rest of my life.  That happens.  That's normal when you've been where I've been.  Things happen.  Sometimes you fall, but the main thing is to get back up after you fall.   I went to the doctor today and I've been back in therapy for about a month.  I'll probably have to do something similar for the rest of my life, but that is what I need to do to take care of myself.  Today was a big step in the right direction, because I admitted that I wasn't fine, and I made a plan to get back to the right track.

My goal is to hang on and not get worse until they kick in and start working right so that I can feel more like me.  Even though I've definitely relapsed back into depression, I know that there is still light, even in my dark places. There will be colour again.  Flowers will grow.  I'm not going to stay stuck in the dead of winter for the rest of my life.  I might have to stay in therapy and be medicated heavily for the rest of my life, but I am not going to lay down and die.  I know that the lows are a lot more spread out than they used to be, and I know that there will be light in my life and there will be flowers.

A Simple Lesson.

My best friend and I were just watching A Snoodle's Tale and it made me remember not to let others words weigh my pack down.   God sees us the way we're meant to be.  He made us special and He loves us very much.  I know, it's cheesy, but I can't tell you how much it's true.

There's this one song by Superchick that I think really fits with this.

I have so much to offer the world, but I seem to forget who I am in God's eyes when my bricks are weighing me down.

God loves you so much.   He cares and loves you more than you could ever imagine.  I can't promise that things will be perfect 100% of the time, because I still struggle, but I know that God loves me and He loves you, too.   So, let's let go of our bricks and stop drowning in the words people say.