alright i ddont have time to read all these repys, and i cant change anyones minds, i want to tell ya'll two things and then share my story in Jesus.
first: i was to ask you if this is who you dreamed of being when you were a child, when you were a kid and had everything to lose is this who you wanted to be? without Jesus this is as good as it gets, are you happy, are you satisfied?
second: i am a girl of almsot 16. i was more hung up on the facts and logistics of how i could prove Christianity as a religion as fake as them all but then i hit the worst place, worst then most of you have been, and sometimes in the worst places, you find the most hope, here is my story:
Black Turned Crimson
By Kallie Royal
October 29, 2002
When life gets bad enough, when you feel as though life, hope, and happiness is just a pool of quicksand, you start to wonder where you draw the line between sanity and crazy, between what is worth living for and what is not. When life gets bad enough you'll do anything to deal. I was always a happy kid-on the outside. I always seemed so perfect to others-on the outside. I was a model student with straight "As", involved in sports teams, student council, and clubs. If there was a new experience or club, I was there. I knew almost everyone and had a plethora of friends. At the end of fourth grade though, I changed school, which would be the beginning of my new life. A life in which I couldn't hide all my pains, because eventually I cracked and had a breakdown that would last for years.
Life started to slip from my hands in fifth grade. I developed a deep hate in my veins for myself, and soon for life. Nothing seemed right. Others who I thought were my friends just made it worse by telling me on a daily basis how ugly, fat, and horrible I was. At first I could repel their insults but if you hear an insult enough you start to believe it. After a few months I realized what they were doing to me was wrong but I wasn't sure what to do. I didn't fit in with anyone else well so I decided to just wait it out.
I thought that going to middle school would give me a fresh start. Maybe life would be a little better. I was wrong. Going to Jenkins meant seeing old friends, real friends. What I found though, was a year apart changes people more than I could have imagined. I didn't have much in common with old friends and, though we talked, I was kind of an outcast. I kept falling further away from life and towards a dark hole. Though, at the time, I thought that life couldn't get much worse, I would soon find that this was only the beginning of the hell I would soon know.
My life kept spiraling down in seventh grade so I made a decision. Instead of just moping around, I would change what I so deeply hated about myself. I began to fast. For three months I didn't eat anything except for dinner (so my parents wouldn't suspect anything). When I still didn't lose the amount of weight I had hoped, I searched for something else to achieve my goal. I tried so hard to fit in-but the girl who people knew began to change-they really didn't know me at all. I was becoming someone I thought society wanted me to be. I had friends now but I felt so alone. I hid myself from the world because I felt like a freak. Suicide began to flicker across my mind but I dowsed it everytime. Somehow I just kept going--day by day, breath by breath, I was holding onto a thread of hope.
That thread tore in eighth grade and I violently tumbled down. Something happened that year that made me hit rock bottom. I still can't quite put my finger on the exact event that made me lose control; the whole year is now just a blur. Memories of that time are only fleeting fragments of a nightmare that lasted nearly four years.
My thoughts effected every aspect of my life. I never felt hungry. I was always tired, but could never sleep. I couldn't concentrate. I was never even semi-happy. I couldn't cry, though I hurt so badly. I had horrible headaches every day and I never wanted to do anything. Within a week I lost ten pounds-not because I was trying to lose weight, but because the thought of food made me nauseous. It would take me hours to finish a homework assignment that would normally take minutes. I would daydream in class, which caused me to fall behind in school. All I ever wanted to do was stay in bed-I dreaded volleyball, made excuses to stay home, and lied to my friends so that I wouldn't have to hang out with them. It's not that I didn't love my friends-I did-I just was never in the mood to be around anyone.
I began to feel hopeless-like I would never recover. Questions flooded my mind. What is life for? Why am I here? What is wrong with me? Is life worth living in this hell? Do others think or feel like this? What's the point? I couldn't see anything that was worth getting through these feelings, so I stopped dreaming and setting goals for my future. I also began to fantasize and hope for death to come upon me. I didn't want to live anymore-there was nothing for me to live for. It's a scary thing-to not want to live anymore and to hate who you are so much that you know if you met someone like yourself you wouldn't befriend them. The good in life was drained from my spirit while hate and depression came rushing in with a powerful flood.
Once again, I began to search for a way to cope with life. Then I made a decision that I can never take back and will haunt me for the rest of my life. I devised a plan to hurt myself since I hated the person I was so much, thought I should be punished, and I wanted to get all the disgusting waste inside of me out. It took me awhile to follow through on my scheme but after a few weeks, I did it. One night I went to take a shower. When I picked the razor up to shave I began to remember all that happened in the past few years. As I reminisced, I half-consciously pulled the blade across my bare leg. When I stopped, I got a major high and felt the best I had in years.
The next months went by in a whirlwind. I began to cut more often, and reached a point where I couldn't go a week without it, then a day, then an hour. Soon all I could think about was when I could cut next making my concentration dissipate completely. Since it was too hard to cut at school, I began to hurt myself in other ways also. For example, I would burn myself; bang my body against hard objects such as cabinets, table tops, doors, windowsills, and bars; pull my skin off with my nails; bite myself; stick sharp objects in me such as staples and pencils; and scratched my skin until I bled.
To the average person it sounds sick and twisted, but sometimes you'll do whatever helps you to deal with life. Most people will never even begin to understand how this helps, and before I began self-injuring I had no idea either. There are many reasons for self-injuring, though. Mine included a total high and release; my ignorance on how bad cutting was for me; a last resort before suicide. Seeing the blood makes you realize that although you feel dead, you must still be alive on the inside since you're bleeding. Self-injuring is a fuel to get through each day, and a way to see that you really can heal because you cut yourself, you bleed, but eventually you scab up and heal.
Scars and scabs soon covered my body-my hips, legs, ankles, feet, stomach, wrists, and hands-as a result of knives, broken glass, shards or metal, my fingernails, and razors. Cutting basically kept me alive while I sorted thoughts out in my head. For months it was my life support and my best friend-when I cut, nothing was wrong. Self-injuring was only a temporary solution though, so months later I was still broken. Finally admitting to my best friends that I had a problem was my first step to recovery. They helped me more than words can say, but I was still stuck in a rut. My friends were always so worried about me and I felt so guilty that I put my problems on them. Eventually, they talked me into telling one of my teachers. Mr. Sjoerdsma, my eighth grade science teacher, convinced me that the only way I could get the proper help was to tell my parents. This task seemed impossible. It was, and probably will always be, the hardest thing I have ever done. I set a night though, invited one of my friends over, and had Mr. Sjoerdsma come to my house. Then I did the dreaded duty.
The five of us awkwardly gathered in our living room. As I began to explain what had been going on for the past four years, tears filled my parents eyes. They kept hugging me and asking if they had done anything to cause these feelings. Mr. Sjoerdsma had been a huge help. He not only researched self-injuring and talked to a counselor, but was also a great support. My friend also comforted me by just being there-through everything. It was so hard to tell people-some doctors and people say that cutting is for attention, and maybe it is -for some people-but for me it was my last resort of staying alive, and I was so ashamed of it. I only told my closest friends because I thought people would think less of me and consider me a freak. Most of the time my parents were very helpful. They set up counseling and got me medicine when I was diagnosed with clinical depression. Though I, at last, got the medical and psychiatric help that was required I still fell further down into darkness. When my parents took my razor away from me and supervised my usage of such objects, I was unable to hurt myself further, but life (if that is even possible) got worse. Without my razor nothing kept me from suicide.
One night, I had enough. I couldn't handle living anymore and I decided, that since I had tried for years to become happier but instead got worse, that I would end it. I downed 22 aspirins. As the drugs stole my senses though, I became terrified. I could barely keep my eyes open, became extremely dizzy, and panicked. I called my friend who convinced me to call and tell my father. He came home immediately and called 9-1-1.
Meanwhile, I sat in the kitchen and sobbed as an ambulance, fire truck, and police car pulled up to my house. I was transported to Memorial Hospital on oxygen, a heart monitor, and an IV. When I arrived in the emergency room I had to drink two cups of liquid charcoal. Honestly, I would much rather have drunk ANYTHING else. It was so horrible that with every sip I had to force myself not to throw up. Almost a year later it still makes me nauseous to even think about it. I almost lost it a couple times, but I was determined to keep it down. Otherwise, they would have to pump my stomach (they put a half-inch wide tube up your nose and fill your stomach with fluids until you throw up).
Six hours later they said I was released, which is amazing since most of the time a suicide attempt lands you in a psychiatric hospital. Though I was released from the hospital, the affects of the aspirin stayed with me for weeks: my blood was extremely thin (making it easy for me to bleed to death from a cut), my ears were constantly ringing, and I had ghastly headaches and horrendous memories of a night I want to forget.
My suicide attempt was probably the point where I hit rockbottom. I began to work harder at getting better. Though jerks at school made it hard to recover and majorly set me back, I eventually got on my feet-for good. Though I can't honestly say that I am completely better, or depression free-for the most part I am. I am still not stable, or entirely happy, and the simplest things will set me off. In fact, not a day goes by that I don't want to hurt myself, not because I still feel that dark hate anymore, but because self-injuring is an addiction, like a drug. Now I go on, step by step, making a promise to myself that I will make the best out of my day-without using a knife.
I learned a lifeful of lessons in those few years, some of them most adults still don't know. Even more, I can relate and help others who are dealing with the same issues. Since I have opened up to others, I realized many things: everyone has had similar struggles, though some are on a much smaller scale. Everything happens for a reason. Sometimes when you have everything on the outside, you still have nothing on the inside. Most of the people you think you know are really the people you know nothing about. You have to talk and not keep feelings bottled up because you will explode sooner or later. And you can never give up-no matter how bad life seems.
Most importantly though, true friends help you through life. I know I couldn't have made it through this nightmare without them. My friends mean the world to me-even when I felt like I didn't have any, someone always reached out. I also found my own sense of anger management. Besides my friends calming me down, talking to others with similar experiences, writing poetry, and playing sports were all extremely therapeutic. Though my past is always with me, I go through each day, hoping to be completely recovered…hoping to be one simple word. Happy.
I began dating a guy in the beginning of ninth grade. He was my first real boyfriend and I fell head over heals. We would hang out constantly, almost everyday after school and every weekend at least twice. I would constantly hang out with him at school, during classes, passing periods, and lunch. Even if I invited a friend over to my house, he would come too. We were inseparable and everyone knew it. I always had people coming up to me and saying how cute we were together and how much they wish they could have a relationship like ours. Little did they know or even little did I know what I was really in for. We went out a total of six months but it seemed like days. He made me feel so awesome and the depression seemed gone when I was with him. The problem was there was times when I wasn’t with him. In those times I would fall into the sick cycle of reality and began to question our relationship. I was going much further then I had planned to and it was scaring me. Sometimes he would even do stuff when I told him to stop. In December he went to Oklahoma for winter break. The world I had made in the past couple months was revealed in all its ugliness. I began to realize how controlling my boyfriend was and how much I missed just hanging out with the girls, or even by myself. I now knew that this guy was another coping method of mine but it was only making life worse. At the mall one day everything flew at me. I realized just how bad my relationship with him was and how it was effecting me. He was always with me and if he wasn’t he would need to know who I was with, what I was doing, and if I was all right. He would constantly worry about me and make me feel guilty that I wasn’t with him. If I was hanging out with one of my guy friends it just made everything worse. He didn’t trust me with anyone and would be jealous if I hugged them.
I began to know what I had to do but I was so afraid. He would be so angry and hurt with me. I wondered if he would hurt himself somehow or turn into the angry man his father was. I decided it would be better than it was though so I went for it. He freaked out to say the least and was so hurt and sad that I said I would go back out with him. After a week though I remembered why I had broken up the first time. I told him that I still couldn’t handle this relationship. This time was even worse. He would call me all day long and yell at me and try to figure out why I broke up with him. I would tell him and talk to him for hours trying to resolve it. Then he would call back the next day and say he forgot what I said. He would constantly harass my friends, call me, email me, threaten me, break into my email, and send his family at me to yell even more. I was sick of it. I broke off every form of communication with him and his family. My mom stopped ordering Avon from his mom, I blocked him online, and I wouldn’t answer the phone when he called. It took probably a month or two for him to really leave me alone but he and his family still do every once in a while. I felt like I had a stalker for those couple months and often feared he would hurt me or my friends physically after all he did emotionally and verbally.
March 2003--Since I wrote this I have had a lot more problems. I over dosed on Corisidin and began to cut again. I knew I was spiraling down quickly but I didn't want anyone to worry. I didn’t want to talk again or go to counselors. I was finally getting the freedom from my parents that I had lost and I wasn’t about to lose it now. Many times suicide was the best option again but I never tried it but for some unknown reason I didn’t. Soon I reached a point though that if anything else happened I would definitely kill myself. Luckily my AMAZING friends told the counselors at school on me. To say the least, I was pissed...I wouldn't talk to anyone at school and worse, I wasn't talking to my best friends. After my Mom lost it on me and starting yelling about how I treated my friends for trying to help me, I realized I couldn't do this on my own. I wanted to die, again. I remember sitting in my grandparents driveway hearing my mom sob because I had told her that she didn’t know me. She didn’t know what it felt like to wake up every morning wishing you were dead. My parents and I admitted me into Cedar Springs Mental Hospital where I stayed for four days. I was changed to Zoloft and Welbutrin after being diagnosed with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Anxiety, and Major Clinical Depression. When those medications made me feel like I was going to pass out at any moment they again changed me to Paxil which also made me sick. I still had hope of getting better but it was tough because the medications were preventing me from playing volleyball. I would black out or fall over or feel so dizzy I couldn’t stand up and I wanted to quite the medications so bad but I stuck with it. Again they changed me to Lexapro which I didn’t feel was working and finally I am on Prozac. I now know I am on the up and am getting better each day. I know I am not over my illness' but I am moving again.
After being in the mental hospital I knew that I couldn’t get better by myself. I knew nothing in this world could help me get completely over my mental illness. I saw little kids in the hospital that were only five that had already killed animals, abused people, and tried to kill others. Six year olds had tried to kill themselves or had done drugs. Some were in the middle of domestic violence and poverty. Fights, cursing, screaming, threats, attacks, and the worst of reality were constant during those four days. During this time, the scariest most heart wrenching time of my life, I began to find God. I decided I wanted Him. The man I hated and sometimes didn’t even believe in was the one who could save me from this pain and I wanted that more than anything. Though I hated Cedar Springs, it was the best place I have ever been, it is where I found God. Although I found Him I still had a couple months before I would give my life to Him.
One day in late April I was reading a book on Rachel Scott. I was amazed by this girl's faith. I knew what I had to do and I was excited! I prayed to God and asked him in my life, I wrote that I was "scared, clueless, and lost but on a mission to find God... today I am beginning to believe, I am ready to know you, talk to you, trust you...[and] for the first time in years I am excited for life!" That day I became a Christian. That day I started on my road to recovery.
Now it is almost August, I have been through crazy stuff. I have fallen but rose higher, I have doubted but believed more then ever, I have seen God, I have witnessed others. I have had others tell me that they have seen God change my life and that I have changed theirs. I have been loved, hurt, persecuted, depressed, hated, hateful, but ultimately joyous. I know God and He is amazing. I cannnot express on a page how much he has changed me. He has set me free from depression, cutting, hate, and other sick carousels. I buried myself alive almost to death but God unburied me and I have never felt so alive. Everything I do now is for him. I have lost friends and gained them. I have broken habits and begun them. I have cried in sorrow and cried in joy. I have doubted and I have believed. But He is worth it. I know where my heart is now, I know God has said that "this one is mine!" And I am His, I have given my very soul to him.
º╖§Kallie§╖º
