This is my personal testimony I typed up one night. I hope that you will enjoy it and hopefully be inspired:
I can’t even think of where to begin. I guess I should start at my senior year of high school. I had gone through awkward phases during middle school, but who doesn’t go through those. Still, even if I had matured greatly since then, I still felt the same inside: Alone. Shunned. Scared. For as long as I can remember, I had always felt out of place in this world. I felt like no one understood what I was going through and that I was alone in my suffering. I can honestly remember crying each night as I went to sleep. I wanted to end my suffering so badly, but I didn’t know how and I invariably made it worse over time. I can tell now that I had lost my faith during all this as well.
Despite my sadness, I always wanted to be the one happy person in life who is always chipper no matter what happens. People seemed to enjoy me when I was fun-spirited, and it made me even happier making other people happy. But life, it seems, is not a happy little cruise; it’s filled with ups and downs. And for me, it seemed like if I crashed, I crashed hard. I would have days when I wanted nothing to do with anybody. I now know that when you give off the vibe of being in a perpetual bad mood, it makes you look depressing and people don’t know what to do with you, so they tend to stay away from you. Which of course only made things worse. I would get angry that no one noticed or cared about my gloom. Why couldn’t they see that I was in pain? My mind convinced me that they didn’t care and no one ever would. Eventually this path led to one way for me to feel slightly alive again: cutting.
I knew it was bad for you, I knew it did absolutely nothing for you, I knew it was dangerous. But what amazes me is that even though I knew all this and more, it didn’t stop me from doing it over and over and over again. I would tell myself “I do not have a problem” while I administered both physical and mental scars to my own body. I would cut in places that were easy to hide, and the cuts were never deep or painful, but those scars are still there. I wanted to tell my parents at times, I wanted to get help, but to be seen as a weak person terrified me and kept me silent. I grew up thinking that people who hurt themselves are mentally unstable and that I would never be one of those people. But I was. I realize now that I wasn’t only hurting myself, I was hurting God. My body, like everyone else’s, is God’s temple and I was destroying it bit by bit. I always promised not to go too far with my cutting, but how would I have known when too far was exactly? That’s the thing with cutting: you never know when you’ve gone too far until it’s too late. Even to this day, I’m not completely free from it. I haven’t cut myself in 6 months, but I still keep the little piece of glass I used just in case. I don’t plan on using it again, but I’m still not strong enough to throw it away completely. Until that day where I can finally let go, as far as I’m concerned I still have a problem.
Anorexia was another problem I faced. I openly admit it now, but back then it was sort of a joke for me. I would skip out on meals and laugh about my “eating disorder”. People around me, including my family, noticed a change in my appearance. And I loved it. I would say that I was comfortable with the way my body was, but every time I looked in the mirror, I was disgusted by what I saw. Only after reading about anorexia online and what exactly it does to your body did I become scared. I didn’t mean to form another bad habit, but somehow I had managed to. My friends now showed their displeasure at my eating problem and I noticed subtle clues from my family that they knew what was going on as well. Again, I never thought I’d be the person to feel so bad about themselves that they didn’t eat, but there I was. It’s still a little bit of a problem for me to eat a lot of food, but I try to maintain a healthy diet and exercise, not to lose weight but to stay in shape. I still feel a tiny bit uncomfortable about the way I look, but I remind myself that I am beautiful in God’s eyes and that the world’s view of how I should look doesn’t matter at all. Yes, it’s hard not to be swayed by the world’s point of view, but that’s because we are fed lies like this every day.
Despite all this, I still feel sad. I still feel lonely. My counselor told me my temperament was that of a Melancholic and that emotions run deep for me. Knowing that makes me feel better because I know it’s not depression. But still, sometimes I feel so alone and afraid that I consider suicide. I know what you’re thinking: suicidal people are weak and they’re just calling out for attention. YES. They are weak. They’re weak because they lack the strength to hold onto hope, whatever the reason they have. They are calling out for attention because most of the time THEY CAN’T BE HEARD. I for one know what it’s like to feel silent, to call out for help and nobody hears you. It hurts. That’s precisely why I don’t like to contemplate suicide, because I don’t want my last attempt at being heard to involve killing myself. Plus I believe with every fiber of my being that once you get past the hurt and the loneliness, there’s so much good waiting for you at the end of the tunnel. I want to be able to graduate and fall in love and have kids and get a job and enjoy my golden years. When I think of all that I would miss should I kill myself, I get so upset about even thinking those thoughts. Yes, I’ve had days where I feel as though I’d given up. I resigned myself that no one would help me and that I would never be strong enough to save myself. I’ve held that bottle of sleeping pills and thought about how easy it would be to just be done with life. I even thought about doing it while I was away from home so that my parents wouldn’t have to find my dead body in the morning. Can you imagine going on a vacation and not coming back, not getting the chance to say goodbye? When I think about how stupid I was acting, it makes me sick inside.
The same night I was considering suicide, I understood that I wasn’t strong enough. I desperately wished for a hero, someone who could save me from my sadness and loneliness. I found myself wanting to be a hero, someone whom others can turn to and trust because I knew what they were going through, but how could I have saved someone else when I couldn’t even save myself? Before I went to bed to cry myself asleep again, a thought occurred to me and I did what I hadn’t done in years, what I should have been doing every night: I got down on my knees and prayed long and hard to God. I prayed for forgiveness. I prayed for guidance, But most of all, I prayed for strength. I know I can’t save myself, because God is the only being who can. And do you know what God did? He took me in His arms that night and made me understand that as long as I am in Him, I am never alone. I AM NEVER ALONE. Whenever I pray to God out loud, I always end up crying. And why shouldn’t I be moved to tears when I’m speaking to the Almighty Creator of our universe. To think that He who created the whole world in 6 days would have time to listen to a pathetic person like me, who loves me even though I continue to mess up on a daily basis, who would NEVER LEAVE ME; it makes me so happy just thinking about it.
I understand now that in my feelings of loneliness and being outcast, I was not alone. People everywhere feel alone at some point in their lives and they all believe that no one else understands how they feel. One of my favorite examples is from the movie To Save a Life. It has a message for basically everyone. One girl is terribly upset and another hands her a tissue. They’ve never even spoken to one another before then and the first girl asks why she’s being nice to her. Her response? “Because I know what it’s like to feel alone.” I wish everyone in the world right now who feels alone could know that there are others out there who know what you are going through. Everyone is hurting in some way or another, but they shouldn’t have to go through it alone. After watching To Save a Life one night at youth group, I went home and thought about the message it taught. I prayed that God would give me the strength to be there for someone should they need a friend. The same night one of my online friends whom I had never met in person asked if she could talk to me. I listened to her problems and did my best to console her. I apologized for not being the best at comforting, and she replied “I’m surprised there are people out there who actually care.” It hit me: there are actually people who don’t care that you are hurting? It made me feel terrible inside. I told her I would always be there for her. And it’s true. I may not have the strength to save people, but I will always be there for those who are hurting. In a way I’m glad I went through such low times in my life, because now I am stronger and have experience because of those times.
It’s fact that at some point in your spiritual journey that you find yourself wanting to doubt in God. I had times where I wanted to scream at him. “Why don’t people like me as a friend? Why am I so lonely? You say you’re always there for me, but you’re not actually there!” Matthew 5:4 reads “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” So where was my comfort?, I wanted to ask. It didn’t seem fair that other people were oh so happy and I was stuck all alone with myself and no one to help me. I had heard numerous times that “it’s all part of the plan.” It sounded to me like my plan pretty much sucked since so much bad was happening in my life. But it came to me at last. I realized that it’s not my plan. It’s God ‘s plan. And God’s plan looks completely different from my plan. Our lives really aren’t up to us at all, they’re up to God. Sure, we decide where we want to go to school and what we want to do with our lives. But God ultimately makes it happen. If you put your trust in Him, He will steer you down the right path.
I’m not sure if this actually does some good for someone, but I hope and pray that it will. I pray that you will be changed somehow, if not by my story then by someone else’s. God is such an amazing being and He loves all His children and doesn’t want them to feel alone and unwanted. Please know that no matter how abandoned and empty you feel inside, I can promise you that God will never abandon you.
