I Don’t Know What I’m Doing Anymore

01/10/2023

Trigger Warning! I talk about suicide, pedophilia, and child abuse in this entry.

If I had to describe myself in one word, I would choose: “fearful.”

Growing up was realizing that nearly every aspect of myself could be attributed to the way I was raised, and that was probably the reason I always thought of myself as strange.

I spent my entire life from birth to age nine as a preacher’s daughter. I spent the first nine years of my life in skirts and dresses, restricted from watching Disney channel or Nickelodeon, and memorizing bible verses every Sunday and Wednesday. My parents chose a Christian homeschooling curriculum for my four sisters and I that I’m not sure taught us anything that wasn’t rooted in Creationism. Lana (my younger sister)–and I were lucky: we were still little when we moved out of state and began public school. My other sisters were not as lucky. While Michelle (the oldest) and Mariah (the third) adjusted well to the public school curriculum and managed to sustain A’s and B’s throughout the rest of school, adjusting to the culture was a whole different story. Abby (the second) didn’t adjust well to either. Lana and I did pretty well in school and managed to make some friends, but we developed our own set of struggles as well.

Growing up with four sisters taught me empathy. All of us were entirely different, but we shared similar foundations. I got to watch the way our childhood affected each of my sisters and learned how different personalities handle trauma. I never fully understood my own personality type, though. We all developed depression, anxiety, and PTSD at some point in our lives, from one thing or the other. Some of us were lucky enough to add Bipolar Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), OCD, and/or ADHD into the mix. The abuse hit us like a truck–it definitely began there for all of us.

My dad was the scariest person in the world to me. No one person or fictional character scared me as much as my own father. He was 5’11, bald, with a goatee and a booming presence. When he’d punish us–for whatever bullshit he decided on that day–he would have us wait in the bedroom for him before he’d go in there. He relished in the fear that accumulated inside of us at the thoughts of what he was possibly going to do. It was never good. We were spanked with belts until we were bruised, and I can’t remember a single time that any of us deserved it. The only life we knew was church, whatever TV channel and movies we were allowed to watch, and the monster that was our dad.

My mom was always physically present with us, but not so much emotionally. She also had a rage like my dad, but hers came from a place of sensory overload from having five kids–not sadistic desires. It doesn’t make it right, but it does help me understand as an adult the way she acted when I was a kid. She would spank us with whatever object she could get her hands on, and she would pinch us so hard we bled if we weren’t acting right in public, while snapping at us through her teeth. But that’s not all my mother was, and it would be defamatory for me to define her by the things she hates the most about herself.

Many times when I was little, my mom would hold me on her chest while lying in bed, gently stroke my hair, and sing to me until I fell asleep. Although our homeschooling curriculum did not teach me much, my mom herself taught me a couple things. She would read stories to me and, while she did, would teach me how to read. I started reading at three or four, and I developed a deep love for it. We also had this radio that would play a tape that went through the multiplication table with sing-songy phrases like: “six times eight equals forty-eight.”

I don’t think any of us could’ve predicted the way things would go. My sisters’ stories are theirs to tell, and my mine is my own as well.

I’m pretty sure I was born with anxiety, because I don’t remember a single time in my life without it. Although, the depression didn’t begin until later. My parents got divorced when I was nine. Immediately, my dad started seeing his side piece on the regular. My mom didn’t start seeing other people–as far as I know–for a while after the divorce. She married her second husband, Shitforbrains, when I was eleven, I think. According to my mom, he was a nice, God-fearing man. She didn’t mention that she met Shitforbrains because her childhood best friend Nikki was his niece, and Nikki had warned my mother that Shitforbrains had previously been caught looking at CP. My mom believed Shitforbrains when he explained that he was changed man and would never do any of that stuff again. Not long after that, when I was eleven or twelve, Shitforbrains broke his promise by putting his hands on me while he thought I was asleep. Me being a very quiet, shy kid with an overwhelming fear of adults (probably the reason I was chosen by Shitforbrains) didn’t tell anyone about this. My mom went on to have a baby with Shitforbrains, my youngest sister, Love.

In an unexpected (but what should have been expected by every adult who knew about this man’s history with children) twist to the story, when I was thirteen, Shitforbrains’ daughter came forward to the police that she had been molested by her father from age four to age twelve. She wasn’t able to remember the exact number of time that her father had violated her, and, therefore, Shitforbrains was only charged for the amount of years he had molested her, rather than the amount of times. Shitforbrains got eight years in prison, and it wasn’t until later that his daughter actually remembered a time as far back as when she was three that her father had violated her.

After all of this came to light, my mom, in another shocking twist, stayed with Shitforbrains after he went to prison. She even read letters from him to Love and also delivered letters from him to my sisters and I. Before long, it became clear that this choice my mom had made was going to make her lose her daughters either by CPS or by our own choice. I felt as though the only way to get my mom to wake the fuck up was to come forward about my story with Shitforbrains. I first told Michelle, who told my dad, who took me to the police station to file a report. After hearing the news, my mom, finally, ended her relationship with Shitforbrains. I didn’t see her for a while after that, because the idea of facing her after coming out about a secret I thought I would take to my grave sounded terrifying.

After coming out about what Shitforbrains did to me, my dad told me I would be put into therapy as soon as possible, whether I wanted to or not. I did not object and actually felt like I probably really needed to be in therapy after everything. But therapy never came.

Something I neglected to mention that feels important to mention is that, after being molested, I still chose to go to my mom’s house any chance I had. I still chose to stay in a home where I had been violated, with the perpetrator, over staying in the same home as my dad. This is because although Shitforbrains definitely traumatized me, I was still more terrified of my dad.

Not long after that whole ordeal, I was fourteen and began realizing I was definitely attracted to women. I started to realize that maybe it’s not normal to repeatedly play the drawing scene in the movie Titanic. Or going to a private search on Google and looking up “girl in bikini.” But this would quickly become another (not-so-secret) secret I wouldn’t tell anyone except some school friends until I was seventeen. When I was a Sophomore in high school, I had a class with a friend of mine from elementary, Lily. We sat next to each other and talked casually about our lives. It wasn’t until towards the end of the school year when I was sixteen that Lily made it obvious that she was interested in me. She would blatantly flirt and leave sticky notes on my desk with cheesy pickup lines. And on the last day of Sophomore year, she handed me a sticky note with her phone number on it. I sent her a message just days after, and we fell for each other within a couple of weeks, as lesbians typically do. Throughout this time, I didn’t tell anyone in my family about Lily except Michelle, and I told her not to tell anyone. Right before my Junior year of high school began, because Lana would be a Freshman in high school and would likely see me around with Lily, I told Lana I was bisexual, and Lily and I were dating. She was like, “Okay?” and went back to watching something on her phone, because apparently everyone knew I was a little fruity since I was a kid. Although two of my sisters knew about our relationship, it was becoming increasingly hard on Lily that I was keeping our relationship a secret from my parents, as she had been out of the closet since middle school.

I was terrified to tell my parents, especially my mom. While my dad had strayed a little from his strong religious beliefs, my mom was still deeply religious and very against the LGBTQIA+ community. Even so, coming out went better than expected. My dad actually asked me if I was a lesbian, and I immediately started crying and told him I was bisexual. He told me he didn’t care and asked if Lily and I were seeing each other romantically, to which I told him yes. Months after this, I left a letter for my mom on one of the weekends I stayed with her before heading to my dad’s house. In the letter, I came out about my sexuality and Lily. I also tried to explain it to her in a way I thought she would understand. She texted me after she read it, telling me she was confused and disagreed with it, but she still loved me. She went on to refer to Lily as my friend throughout the four years we dated, and she told my sister that she wont be there if Lily and I ever got married. This enraged me at the time, and it’s still a sore spot for me now.

My depression started when I was eleven, but it only got increasingly bad over the years. I started having suicidal thoughts at age thirteen. Life at my dad’s house and my mom’s inability to accept the person I loved had begun to take a real toll on me.

When I was probably fifteen or sixteen, Mariah and I somehow got to the topic of how depressed we were living with our dad and–quite literally–wicked step mother. We also shared that we had journal entrees in which we talked about how suicidal we were. I even mentioned the many suicide notes I had written and thrown away. Not long after this, Mariah moved in permanently with our mom, mostly cutting herself off from our dad. She ended up sending him a text stating that she was scared that I was going to harm myself. He never responded to this message. When I asked him about it years later, he said he, conveniently, didn’t remember it.

It had gotten so bad that there were many times I told Lily that I wanted to distance myself from her because I was scared I was going to kill myself and wanted her to prepare herself for it (as I’m writing this, it doesn’t really make much sense, but I was severely mentally ill–keep that in mind). Lily dealt with her own struggles with her family and severe depression, as well as suicidal thoughts. Somehow, Lily or I decided that if I asked my dad to put me in therapy, she would ask her dad to put her in therapy. We both kept our word. I messaged my dad one night and told him I was struggling a little mentally and asked if I could be put in therapy. My dad doesn’t like for there to be physical evidence of him being a neglectful dad, so he responded really well and put me in therapy quickly after. Lily’s dad, on the other hand, said no when she asked to be put in therapy. There were many occasions where I really struggled not to fight that man, but I digress.

When I was eighteen, I started seeing a psychologist and psychiatrist. In the new patient questionnaire for the clinic, I stated that I used to have suicidal thoughts when I was thirteen, but I haven’t had any since. This was a complete lie. I had heard horror stories from Lily and other friends about how awful psychiatric hospitals were, and how you can be sent to them if you tell your psychiatrist or psychologist you have suicidal thoughts. In an effort to avoid being sent to a hospital, I downplayed all of my symptoms. I admitted to having depression and anxiety, but I told them my anxiety was worse. Most of my sessions were focused on anxiety coping mechanisms. I only shared the information that I felt wouldn’t raise any alarm bells.

I expressed to my psychiatrist that I wanted to be put on medication for my anxiety and depression, and she first started me on Prozac. Prozac made me very suicidal, and I stopped taking it not long after I started it. I was then put on Trintellix–a small dose at first, and then working up to a larger dose. The medication was known to cause nausea, and it was pretty severe for me. I tried many different ways to alleviate the nausea to no avail. It gets a bit blurry from there, but Lana told me I started taking half a tablet, and one of my old friends said she’d remembered me saying that I had missed many doses of the medication. Going on and off antidepressants like that can trigger suicidal episodes, which I hadn’t known at the time, or I could’ve been in a deep state of psychosis the entire time.

I don’t remember the buildup to the act, but I do remember the day of the act–or, at least, the sequence of events with a few details here and there. I do remember never believing myself when I was suicidal. My extended family was the type that didn’t really believe in mental illness, so I just thought I was being dramatic when I got that way.

Four months after I turned eighteen and began seeking help, I attempted suicide.

I woke up that morning and decided I was going to kill myself. Looking back now, I can clearly see that I was in a state of psychosis. I’m not sure how long I was in that state prior to this day. I went through my day as though it was any other day: rode the bus to school, saw Lily a couple of times throughout the school day, said bye to her before getting on my bus, and then the day strayed a little from typical. On the bus, I pulled out my mini black notebook from my backpack, scribbled a line underneath the last line I had written in it, and wrote a half-assed suicide note. I wrote something along the lines of “I’m sorry, but I was really sad” and also basically called my aunt out for being a bitch. It seems downright fucked up now, but, once again, I wasn’t in my right mind at all. The previous suicide notes I had written had been very emotional, but I never felt like anything was good enough and would throw them away–which is why I didn’t have anything prepared before that day.

When I got to my bus stop, Lana and I got off of the bus and walked to our house together. I went straight up to my room, slapped a sticky note on my notebook with the words “for my family” written on it. I grabbed my shoebox full of memorabilia from moments with Lily, and I put a sticky note on that which said “for Lily.” I then got another sticky note, wrote my dad’s name and number on it, folded it up, and put it in the breast pocket of the shirt I was wearing. I left the notebook and shoebox on my bed and headed outside. My dad and stepmother were working on putting up a new mailbox in the front yard. I strolled down the driveway and casually told my dad I was going for a walk. I’m sure he said something along the lines of “Okay, don’t be back too late.” I would frequently go for walks around my neighborhood, so no one would’ve found this unusual. But this was certainly an usual time.

Instead of going straight or taking a right out of my culdesac, I went left–toward the entrance to my neighborhood. I don’t remember the walk much at all until I exited the neighborhood. Conveniently, there was an overpass right outside of my neighborhood. I walked along the sidewalk on the bridge, climbed up the railing, and jumped.

Everything went black for a moment, and then I was being carried to the side of the road by a group of strangers. I could hear someone moaning in pain, and it took me a moment to realize that someone was me. My vision was blurry, and I was going in and out of consciousness. The strangers set me on the side of the road. I don’t know what they were saying, but their voices were panicked. I couldn’t feel anything, but I could hear myself moaning and crying in pain. One of the strangers–a middle-aged lady who looked sort of like an angel in that moment–asked me if I believed in God. I told her no, and she asked if it would be alright if they prayed over me. I agreed to it. I don’t remember their prayer, and I’m not even sure I was conscious for it.

The next thing I remember was being put inside an ambulance. I was more coherent then–pleading with the EMTs to “Please let me die” and also screaming that “it hurts!” I don’t remember either of them responding to this, as they were more focused on getting me stable. I was so terrified of what everyone was going to think. I was so terrified for the hospital bills my dad would have to cover. I was so scared my dad would be angry.

I remember getting to the hospital and being rolled down the hallways. The lights on the ceiling were so bright, so I looked away, and my left wrist caught my eye. I lifted it and saw that my hand was positioned inches to the left of my wrist. I panicked at the sight and tried to get the attention of one of the people rolling me by holding up my left hand and weakly saying, “My wrist,” but I think the internal bleeding in my pelvis took priority over a deformed wrist because they didn’t pay this much attention.

I might share more about the hospital later if I feel more up to it. But after my attempt, I ended up having many surgeries, going to physical rehabilitation and physical therapy, and being wheelchair-bound for six months. After six months, I was able to start walking with a walker, and from there, I moved on to forearm crutches. I now get around with one crutch and am able to walk around my house without it.

When I was nineteen, I moved two hours from home to a three-bedroom apartment with Lily and two of her close friends, and we went to college in this city. When I was twenty, Lily and I moved back to our hometown and got an apartment for just the two of us. It wasn’t long after this that Lily and I broke up, and I ended up moving in with my sister Mariah, who lived in a small town about thirty minutes away.

I’ll add more when I feel like writing again. I just needed to put thoughts into words today, and telling some of my life story felt like a good place to start.