Sticks and Stones...

**this is an entry from my previous blog I feel is important to share here**

"Sticks and stones may brake my bones but words will never hurt me”, this phrase was obviously coined by a mother trying to protect her child from bullies. People are mean and words cut deep, the wounds from a physical beat-down heal but the wounds from words don’t and people carry those hurts around with them, sometimes, forever. As a victim of bullying I can boldly share the power of Jesus’ healing in my life and those deep, deep, deep, life crushing hurts from words are gone.

I have always been a larger person, I was sick as a child and had so many steroids pumped into my body I have never been “small”. I was the fat kid from the very first day of school and it hurt. No one in my grade in elementary school ever made me feel less then wonderful but there were a few girls and a couple boys in other grades that said mean, mean, uncalled for things that gave me such insecurities that I never wanted to be myself…I hated myself. I hated my skin, I hated my hair, my eyes, my personality, my voice…I hated everything about me and I pushed all that hateful emotion down deep until I had on enough of a mask to not feel anymore pain or really have any truth to my life. I would lie and pretend to get people to like me as I really didn’t think they would like me for who I truly was. I hated that people would laugh at me and poke fun so I constantly made fun of myself, if I could laugh at myself then it didn’t feel so bad when others laughed at me because I made a joke of it. This fake life lead to a deep seeded depression all through my high school years, and because I struggled so much to fit in and be something I was not it became “work” to live and put a smile on my face.

On a lighter note I met Jesus for the first time in a real way at a Christian summer camp when I was 16 and I finally felt I could smile for real. However, I still wore my mask and suffered in private. I remember one time at a youth retreat the pain of faking a smile and joy became too much that I excused myself and cut for the first time to just feel something. No one knew what I did and no one knew the hurts I carried around. I had to be loud, fun, off the wall awesome because then people wouldn’t see my hurts and hurt me in return. My walls were so high it was impossible for me to take them down as then people would know my whole life was a lie and the fact I hated myself.

The summer I turned 17 Jesus changed something in me where some of my walls came down. I shared hurts and truths with some people I never shared before, I left camp that summer more confident in myself, a little more caring toward myself and free from cutting. I had people who I was real with, which I had never had up until this point. However, I hadn’t given my whole life to Jesus at this point to heal me, to touch me and make me whole, so when I went to University with some walls down, letting people in I was hurt by some people and all the feelings of worthlessness flooded back. I was more depressed then ever, away from home for the first time and just wanted to make it all go away, so up went the mask again. My roommate found a note I wrote and got worried and called me on my cellphone to make sure I was ok, and I brushed it off as a joke…but in reality I just wanted to end my life. I was so tired of living I just wanted to go home to God the father and be at peace, but I could never follow through with taking my own life because I didn’t want to go to hell as I was told taking my own life was a sin, so to numb the pain I drank and drank and drank until it went away. Drinking, taking pills, cutting to just feel something continued until God said “enough” and reached out and pulled me out of the deepest pit I have ever been in the late summer of 2010.

Because I felt so worthless, and unloved because of years of putting up high walls I looked for love in all the wrong places. In the spring and summer of 2010 I was in a relationship with a sweet man who totally loved me for me. He showed me love, respect and a life I could have only dreamed of, but by then I was so damaged and emotionally wrecked I could never have a healthy relationship. It became to much for my OCD riddled, secretly depressed, baby christian boyfriend to handle and he broke my heart. It broke so hard I tried to kill myself in his house the morning he broke up with me, he stopped me though. thank The Lord, and called my parents. After my parents came I was immediately put into emergency counseling and that was when I was done with the masks and walls. My heart started to pour out years of pain, wounds from words, and I admitted that I had an issue with alcohol and I cut myself (for the last time the morning I tried to kill myself). It wasn’t the first time I tried to end my life because I felt worthless and that there was no way out and no one cared, but it was the last time!

With everything being out in the open I was forced to face my issues, get help and start to heal. That was when God showed up. I said before the guy I was dating at the time was a new christian, he gave me a book called “The Purpose Driven Life” by Rick Warren and after we broke up he encouraged me to get back my relationship with God, so I read the book. My life started to really change when I started to let go and let God. I went to church and God spoke to me in a real tangible way. I was 4 weeks out from my suicide attempt, and in church; we are worshiping. I am talking to God during this time asking him if he is real and if he really does love me and if I am worth it to show me. The next thing I know a young girl comes up to me while I am singing and says “I feel God is telling me to tell you he loves you and you are special”. I cried and said, “ok God, we will do this your way”.

From that point on I stopped being two people, I was all for Jesus, 100% surrendered, and my life changed. Jesus healed my hurts, the deep cuts from mean kids. Jesus showed me who I truly was and how to accept that. Jesus has shown me love like I have never had, how to forgive and that I am worth it! I had to let down my walls, feel real pain, let Jesus invade my life, lose friends, forgive everyone who hurt me, turn 180 degrees from the life I was living and totally surrender my life to Him to allow him to bring me out of the pit I was in.

John 15:18,19 says: “If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first. The world would love you as one of its own if you belonged to it, but you are no longer part of the world. I chose you to come out of the world, so it hates you.” (NLT), people are going to be mean, and words are going to cut deep, but Jesus died to give you life so sticks and stones may brake your bones but words never have to hurt you! Jesus loves you so much, you are worth it, you are wonderful, you are beautiful and God created you for his purpose!

If you find yourself feeling like no one cares and life isn’t worth it, and the bullies never stop and you have to put up walls or cut to make the pain go away or drink or do drugs to numb the pain know you can reach out to people. If you suffer in silence no one knows you hurt, no one knew I hurt my whole life and I am only alive today by the grace of God to share with you my pain and healing so you can have freedom in Christ.
Also if you know someone who is in a depressed state or cuts or hides from who they are tell them you care and be Jesus to them, because all it takes it stoping for one to make the difference. What if that girl didn’t reach out in faith? Where would I be? She stopped for me, she was Jesus to me and it opened my life to the most incredible journey I have ever been on