testimony

    I was born into a loving family with parents who tried their best according to what they knew. Considering the difficulties they had to overcome i must give them credit as doing a good job in my upbringing. I don't remember a whole lot from before i was about 7 years old... i adored my older sister, enjoyed my little brother, and did whatever my parents told me to. We were a "christian" family, went to church a couple times a year, celebrated Christmas... you know. I was taught to believe in God, though i had no idea who or what that was.

     When i was about seven years old my parents got a divorce. I don't remember much from those years besides the fighting, the mind games, the stories of court battles, the hurt behind everyone's faces... and the notion that it must all be suppressed. I can't tell you exactly where i learned that showing your emotions was so terribly wrong, but i feared both my father's anger, and my mom's heartache, which would arise undoubtedly. So quickly i learned the game of wearing masks, and became extremely skilled.

     My dad won custody of my sister, brother, and i... my mom tried to win our devotion every day after. Both of them would tell us things about the other, not realizing (perhaps?) the turmoil that it stirred within us. Their efforts to prove their love and gain ours in return only caused me to construct walls of uncertainty between my heart and each of them. Basically, they wanted to love me and i walled myself off.

     School is rough on a lot of kids. I did well in school to please my parents to try to win the love i couldn't see them expressing, so the academics were never really a problem. The social aspects were where i had trouble from the start. An awkward girl, shy, petit, and very self-conscious even at a very early age, i had a hard time fitting in and making friends. Of course there were good years and bad years, but i can distinctly remember some nights of crying myself to sleep because i was certain nobody loved me. Nobody understood my place in the world. Not even me... I remember night after night of troubled sleep, looking at the glowing red numbers on my clock radio to find them read 2:00... 3:00... 4:00... all that time alone causes even young children to think about abstract things. What would life have been like for everyone if i had never been born? Oh certainly grand! I was the source of sooo many problems... or so i thought. I'm not sure when the thoughts of self-hatred first entered my mind... but it was around that time and i still wrestle with them today.

     A couple years after my parents divorced my dad married a wonderful woman whom i grew to love very much. But even though i knew she cared for me, i believed she couldn't love me like she loved her daughter and two sons. I just didn't fit. So once again i built walls that separated me from healthy growth. I truly believed i was unloved, unimportant, insignificant, and a burden to all. At school and at home i shrank away from healthy relationships for fear they would discover the pain i felt inside.

     It's strange to think about that little child, lying in bed awake so many nights. I remember having a list of things i would pray for God to change every night. I asked to be a normal height, to have curly hair, a smaller nose, a womanly figure, purple eyes, a pretty smile... the list was seriously long and all centered around things i didn't like about myself. I thought if i changed outwardly people would like me. I believed i was hideously ugly, incredibly dumb, and completely unlovable. My list-making of all the things i didn't like about myself caused me to see in greater detail every night how much i disliked myself. That dislike grew to hatred, and the belief that everyone else must dislike me too. Oooh and if they knew the real me, -then- they'd hate me too. Which of course would cause me to think of all the reasons why other people wouldn't like me, and so the downward cycle of my own mental abuse continued.

     My memory is fuzzy according to what happened in my mind at what time, but a few things i remember that are tied to events (and therefore dates) are wanting so badly to end my life in fourth grade, and writing a poem about suicide in the sixth grade. In fourth grade i was in the musical "Annie." I didn't want to let everyone down (because i always do that...) so i planned on killing myself as soon as the musical was over, that way i could at least accomplish one good thing in my life. Of course, i wasn't too bright in the area of overdosing, so my feeble attempt of swallowing a tiny handful of tylenol failed miserably. Nothing happened, no one knew. I was miserable. I couldn't even kill myself right. What a failure. In sixth grade we had to write a poem and i don't remember mine entirely but it ended something like this;

      "...fifty feet up the wind blows hard,
          The pain is making me cry.
          The pain is deep inside of me,
          I jump.
          I fall.
          I die."

i showed my step mom (hellooooo outcry for help here??) and she told me to write about happier things. I told her i wasn't happy and i didn't feel happy things deep inside like i feel sad things. (i remember sitting on the couch and having this conversation, it was so hard for me to talk about my emotions like that, the memory has stagnantly stayed with me.)

     Well, as i got older i began to think about the whole "praying" thing, and decided i was being unbelievably stupid. How many times did i pray the exact same thing and never got one thing i asked for? Well to me the solution was simple: God hated me too. If there was in fact a God at all... and why did he create me if he hates me? That would be stupid. So i knew one of two things: there either was no God, or if there was i hated him. Junior High hit me like a train crashing through a brick wall... my quiet nature and fear of opening up provided no close friendships. I made some friends of course, but none in whom i would ever confide in. Once again i found myself starving for love and acceptance. I continued to strive for perfection to win my parents' love. I brought home good report cards and lots of stories of my "friends" and our endeavors, (many of which were lies.) All of this only brought me more shame, loneliness, and self-hatred as i became more and more two-faced in my emotional life vs. my outward life.

     As my seventh grade year came to a close, i went up to Seattle for my first surgery. I was told my face was going to cave in since i hadn't lost any teeth yet... so this reasonably scared thirteen-year-old played the brave card and went through with the surgery. I had 32 teeth removed that day.

     Hoping the adult set would come right in, i went through another two years of ridicule and self doubt before my second surgery. For eighth grade and my freshman year of highschool, i pretended to not hear the names i was called. I pretended it didn't bug me to not have real friends. I pretended to convince myself i was worth something, when i knew in my heart i was worthless. Thoughts of suicide ran rampant through my mind but the real trouble kicked in with cutting. I discovered that the pain of depression that i had suffered from since early in my childhood was temporarily reduced at the impact of physical pain, and the sight of my own blood. I of course couldn't let any one know about my sordid habit, because then they would find out who i really was, and they would hate me as much as i hated myself. So i only cut deep enough & small enough to still heal quickly, and in places no one would see. Most of the time i'd use thumbtacks and repeatedly scratch or puncture myself until my mind would let go of all the things that haunted me.

     I couldn't find acceptance in any of those cliques in highschool accept with the other "freaks" like myself. I hung out with a bad crowd, started to get into some not-so-great things, but my guilt coupled with my desire to please my parents didn't let me fall into the snare of drugs, sex, or alcohol like some of my other friends that year. Finding it hard to hide that lifestyle i decided the summer after my freshman year to change. I was tired of the self-pity and depression, and i figured if i just changed my attitude i'd be fine. Afterall, i had had my second surgery which brought in a set of teeth (however amazingly crooked...) and with them a whole new confidence. I tried out for the dance team and got on, which insured me instant popularity at my highschool. Sophomore year i was an entirely new person....... on the outside. People told me they were scared of me before and then they found out i was just like them and everything was great. I played the role well. I still went home every day, sat on my bed at night, and cried myself to sleep.

     I still hated myself. I still wanted death. I still believed my family didn't love me, i still believed i was worthless.
A year of "the in-crowd" and putting on a bubbly smile for everyone took its toll on me. Rather than feeling better like i believed i would, i felt worse. Every time someone complimented me i knew it was a lie. And it caused me to despise everything i knew about myself. My depression rolled in and out like the tides, constant and powerful. I was lost.

     In the spring of that year i was asked to write a paper about the last time somebody made me feel appreciated. As i sat in class that long hour i stared at a blank piece of paper and tried to stop the tears from rolling down my cheeks. I couldn't think of a time. Not one. I concluded later on to write that paper about how no one appreciates me, but how it didn't really matter to me, i was fine. We had to hand our papers to a classmate to read them or whatever, and the girl i handed mine to just happened to invite me to her youth group shortly afterward.

     I'm not sure what possessed me to go, but when i did i was warmly embraced by so many people that it dumbfounded me. I didn't know what that kind of love was, and i didn't know what to make of it except that i wanted to go back. I did for what was left of the school year.

     My second week, Pastor Gregg began a series titled "the four spiritual flaws." (yes folks, that 'f' is supposed to be there.) At this time i still believed that either God existed and was an asshole, or he didn't exist at all. So i wasn't too interested in what Gregg had to say, until he started to talk. What he said has changed my life incredibly. That first night, the "spiritual flaw" he talked about was the idea that God doesn't listen. My initial reasoning for putting God in the place i had put him was because he didn't listen to my prayers. So to hear justification (and not from the bible) for why God did in fact listen was eye-opening to me. Not enough to make me believe of course, but it sparked my interest to say the least. The next week the "flaw" discussed was that God isn't fair. Now here i sat, physically deformed and emotionally battered, thinking; there's no way this guy can convince me on this one.              ....but he did.

     Needless to say i was intrigued enough to go with them to their summer retreat, even though i still didn't know anyone really well. I couldn't explain the feeling i had in wanting to go, but now i know it was my hunger to know the Father. It was the Spirit drawing me to Him. Because He loved me.... still unbelievable at that point.

     That warm June weekend up at Alsea was the turning point for life as i knew it. For the first time in my life i heard and understood the purpose of Jesus Christ. That Jesus -is- God, and that he came to earth to suffer in my place. In my place. He came not to show me all the things i've done wrong, but to show me that he loves me and wants to be with me. He died a murderer's death at a young age, was burried and rose himself from the dead three days later. He is God. And he loves me.
unbelievable.

     After hearing that message i sat alone on a cold park bench and looked to the stars for a long time. My mind turned over the things i knew from my experiences and the things i had learned recently. Tears fell as i realized that God was real. That he'd always been there for me, all those nights that i had cried myself to sleep. All those times where my only escape from the emotional pain was physical pain. And he loves me. me. of all people, why me. why would anyone, let alone the creator of the world, die for me?

     The next night i knew i had to give my life to Him. When Gregg asked if anyone wanted to surrender their lives to God i felt the Spirit stir in me and move me despite all my reservations. I fought to keep composure as my friend Jill asked me if i had ever asked Christ into my heart. I told her no, not completely understanding how, and she told me all i had to do was ask. So then and there i trusted my Savior and asked him to forgive me for who i'd been, for ignoring him and hating him, and begged him to come into my heart and stay there forever. The tears i shed that night were seemingly endless, but i remember finally understanding what tears of Joy were.

    Granted, life has not been totally easy since then. I've fallen and gotten back up so many times in the past four and a half years. But all the while that deep-rooted loneliness has not come back. I still fight the battle of depression and self-worth, but God's working on me and i'm growing every day. The story is far from over, but i just don't want to keep you reading forever. His love is amazing and i will never even begin to understand the fullness of it. If you want to know more about this please ask me. Don't continue on without the greatest Love and acceptance available to you. God loves you so much and desires to pour out His heart to you.

Father, i praise you for reaching out to me. Thank you for being my ultimate and intended Father. Thank you for loving me as your own daughter.

"You turned my wailing into dancing;
You removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,
That my heart may sing to you and not be silent.
O Lord my God, i will give you thanks forever."
~psalm 30:11-12