People sometimes say recovery is not linear and for me that is very very true.  I have not met many people who started their journey and understood how to manage the challenges that come with it emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually and got on track to recovery never turning back to the darkness.

My story started when I was pretty young.  I was 17 months old having my first of 5 brain surgeries I have had in my life.  This was followed by some communication, socialization, emotional, physical and mental turmoil within me.  I felt misunderstood the majority of my life.  And there was a day in January of 7th grade my brain and body connected but only through the distress I was feeling.  My body began to shut down. Unable to walk, stand, move independently I was worried that I would forever be a 7th grader.  A pattern in my life was fearing death while being content and accepting the fact that that is the end result for everyone eventually.

I was diagnosed with something called a functional neurological disorder.  This means that when my stress gets too overloaded, I start experiencing symptoms that have no cause shown on medical testing.  Due to my neurological history with seizure and the brain tumor they did MRIs, CT scans and EEGs to rule out anything related to that.  I remember being in bed one day with my mom sitting next to be crying saying, “ I don’t want to die”.  However, that thought process changed and very quickly.

What was once fear of death became fear of living the way I was. A that point it was later in January of 7th grade and I thought I was done and I attempted suicide for the first time.

After years of a challenging battle and more than 20 attempts before 12th grade, most of which people had no clue about it happening, I reached out for more intensive help.  I was admitted to an inpatient until for the first time in February of 12th grade.  There, I was treated as if something was wrong with me.  They assumed what was going on with me without listening to the story underneath because with my communication struggles it would’ve taken too much to really understand.  They thought I was having hallucinations, and treated me as if I was. I was sedated with thorazine, when I would be appearing more activated.  However, that didn’t make the experience go away, it just affected how much I could react and especially communicate what I was still feeling within me.

By my second hospital stay, which lasted over a month, I was still treated as dealing with psychosis.  But if they would just have listened maybe I wouldn’t have had around 40 additional attempts throughout the other years.  Again, people normally didn’t know about them.  If they can’t even spend time to truly let me explain the actual experience happening because my expression was similar to something else, will they turn me away even more if I expressed big feelings to them. Would they actually spend time listening to the why without first turning away because they think “they know what it must be and know exactly how to fix it”.

The actual reality was that the “hallucinations” were actually flashbacks caused by a traumatic experience I had endured less than a year prior.

Within a couple years of graduating high school, I started a mental health and addiction program for young adults.  As much as some things were both helpful and unhelpful, I believe that experiencing peer support was a life changer for me.

I was finally treated as someone who has a story that matters.  I was more than the assumptions people had because they wouldn’t listen.  I was more than the behaviors I was using.  I was more than my mental illness.  And although my attempts were lessening in frequency I was still hoarding meds for my attempts and using behaviors that enabled me to relapse.

There was a point that I did need more intensive help so I went to a higher level of care.  I went in with the feeling of having value to bring to the world and having that and witnessing it be possible in multiple lives, I began to have hope.

On May 26th, 2018 I had my last suicide attempt.  On Wednesday, May 27th, 2026 I will have 8 years free from the addiction  of trying to die. To seeking the adrenaline, the severely intense self hatred, the self doubt, the frequent thoughts of just wanting it all to end.  I mean I still sometimes have passive thoughts but I gain control of them quickly.  Acknowledging the thought, realizing it doesn’t serve me and letting it pass.

It felt at times like I had a broken compass within.  The part that allowed the arrow to move was missing and I was stuck looking for my destination in the same area.  It was only when I was met where I was at, asked what happened,  where are you trying to go and received a personal connection with someone willing to dig with me to find that piece so I felt that there were other possibilities, there was hope within the darkness that I will never need to return to.

I am now someone who has found my missing piece.  But I know there are several others trying to find their way too.  Whether they are stuck in looking for recovery in the same darkness, or they never learned how to read even a compass that is showing they can recover and do have value.

I’m ready to get my hands dirty to look in the darkness and find the missing piece through connecting with them and learning what happened and what caused them to feel they have a broken compass in the first place. Then we can find another way to find recovery if the compass doesn’t work for them together. Whether it’s learning to read a map instead, experiences through living there with others, or something else.  Not all who wander are lost.  Some are lonely. Some are scared. Some feel they need to escape for a while.  There’s always a “why” that is worth listening to.

-Heather S.