It took thirty six years and three suicide attempts for my recovery journey and trauma healing to start.
Thirty six years of trying to find help, begging for help and never getting it.
Sure I would get medication, the wrong ones at the wrong dosages and a lot of them.
However, I was never really taken seriously and never listened to. Just blown off and given medication, maybe a pamphlet with basic information on depression.
Had I received help at my first suicide attempt at fourteen years old I may have started recovery sooner.
Most people think that a fourteen year old who’s had a suicide attempt would get help, a social worker or a doctor, a police officer but no. No help at all.
At fourteen years old I had been being abused for seven years by my mothers boyfriend. I had been exposed to drug use by my addict father and I knew neglect from my mother who stayed out of the house, working two jobs I could only assume to stay away and pretend she didn’t know what was happening at home.
My suicide attempt at that age was blown off as me being a dramatic and angry teenager. I told everyone at the hospital about the abuse and neglect but nobody listened. In fact they sent me home with my abuser the next morning.
At sixteen years old my best friend was killed in a drunk driving accident. I had never known that kind of loss and was too young to know how to grieve. So I used drugs and alcohol to cope, again nobody there to intervene or help a struggling me.
By seventeen I was pregnant with my first child, declaring I would be a better mother then I had had, I decided to have my baby. I would be everything I didn’t have. But after having my baby I was back in that dark place my depression was back full force and my emotions like a tsunami inside and I had my second suicide attempt. Once again I begged for help, begged for anyone to listen and find out what was wrong. Once again given more medication this time however I was sent to my first councillor, but when he told me to just dress my age and I’d feel better I never returned.
I then made the choice to push all my trauma down. I made the choice to wear a mask and be what everyone thought I should be. I became the perfect mom and wife. Field trips, after school activities, baking all the holiday treats, big birthdays and lots of sleepovers. Dinner on the table by six o’clock, the house cleaned and everyone but me happy. I lost who I was pretending there was nothing wrong. No sadness or emptiness, no self loathing or anger I was fine. But I really wasn’t.
By twenty seven years old was married with 3 children and still wearing that mask.
My husband and I worked hard to go from nothing to having a car, house and disposable income by the time I was thirty one years old.
And then like the snap of a finger it all was taken away.
My husband lost his job, I lost my job, our daughter got very ill, we lost our car, we lost our house and all I had tried to hide deep inside came bursting out like hot lava from a sleeping volcano.
At thirty five years old I had a nervous breakdown and all I knew to do was to take myself out of the equation. All I knew was to give up because there was no help, I had tried so many times. There was only one answer, one way out of the pain.
I told my husband I was suicidal and had a plan and he asked me to try just once more for help. I hesitated and then reluctantly agreed and so he took me to the emergency room and sat in the prison like psychiatry room with me waiting for a doctor.
That night I was finally heard, finally given a path towards healing. I was sent for a proper assessment and to psychologists and psychiatrists. I was started on medication that worked at proper dosages that worked. I started therapy and I was given my official diagnosis’s of borderline personality disorder, persistent depressive disorder, cptsd, general anxiety. It all had names, I hadn’t been making it all up. It wasn’t all in my head, there was validation. I found out not only were my mental illnesses not a death sentence but I could do the work to heal and live my best life despite them.
I’ve been in recovery for 5 years now and though I know I’ll be in recovery for the rest of my life I hold so much hope for what my life can be even with mental illness.
I’ve learned to never give up on myself, to keep persisting and to advocate for the help that is out there. It’s not easy, our mental health systems are flawed and need continued support and work, but there is help. There is those out there that want to listen to you and want to help you live!
There’s no age for healing, no timeline and no right or wrong way. It’s a lot of work and making the choice everyday to keep going, but it’s all possible and there is hope!
