So Much To Talk About… So Little Time

Since I was about three years old I was told my life would be become better for the events that played out later.

My parents split when I was three (no I am not heartbroken about it, I have not talked it him in almost 15 years). I was told that my life would take a step in a better direction now that a toxin was gone.

I was sexually and physically assaulted when I was five. No one in my life found out until I was 12/13 because hell at the time I didn’t even know what that was. It was my mom’s boyfriend at the time, someone that I was under the impression I could trust. Yet, he was almost identical to my father. Alcoholic and stayed at home doing absolutely nothing with his life.

When I was eight my mom started talking to an old friend of hers from when she was 15. He was a great guy, had three girls of his own, one being two years apart from me so we where close enough in age. My brother and I started hanging out with him while my mom was at work and we thought that he would be very good for her. In some ways I was right, others I was wrong, however I still call him dad until this day. After they moved in with each other, his true colors started to come out. Yeah, again another alcoholic and this one liked to scream and yell, punch holes in doors, destroy christmas trees. But yet I could not be mad at him because he also stuck up for my brother and I against my father, got a pencil to the eye and ended up going to jail for hitting him. Some things you don’t forget.

By the time I was 9, I was sexually assaulted by my brother. Again another secret I held in until I was much older. When I mean older this time though I mean 21. It about ripped my family apart, my brother would not let me see my nephews, my mother, I love her, but still saw him as her baby boy and that he could do no wrong.

Most of my elementary school years where fine, except for being picked on for my very thick and afro like hair. I even tried to improve myself more as I realized the school system I was in was not going to work for the things that I wanted to achieve in life. This is where I started learning that unfortunately life is going to let you down all the time. I applied to a magnet school in Buffalo, NY (where I am from) called City Honors. The reason I said this is where I would learn that life was going to let me down because shortly after I took the entrance exam, I found out that my mom and now my step-dad (through this he will be referred to as dad) where going to uproot me from everything that i had known and move me to the west coast, specifically Reno, NV.

Between becoming a teenager and being moved from my home, I started becoming very rebellious when it came to school and to numb the pain, middle school is where the self injuries started occurring. Had my first true love in middle school (you can think I am crazy but we where friends for 10 years, the only reason he does not talk to me anymore is because he never ended up with me as his spouse and I ended up with someone he absolutely hates). Everything in life was starting to make since, I was reaching for goals, I was doing things that made me happy, I had friends, I communicated with my family back in NY very often. It even poured over into high school.

Highschool only became horrible after my freshman year and even then it was intermittent. I had my first serious boyfriend freshman year, the one everyone wanted me to stay away from (and for good reason). I was a freshman, he was a sophomore, he already had a car, every parents (or at least my parents) worse nightmare.  One night with him changed my life. I was out with him at a school movie night. He was into classic cars and everyone wanted to see him show off after the movie. Well, he peeled out, made a turn, his clutch stuck, he lost control of his car and we ran straight into a wall with the impact on my side of the car. I fell unconscious until my ex was able to push the car to a safe place and pull me out of the car. I finally woke up, puked on someones shoes and complained of right shoulder pain. When my parents showed up to the scene of the accident, they immediately took me to the ER. I was fine but something was very off in my brain. I started becoming very closed, I did not want to be near my boyfriend or friends. I was in a sling and could not really take notes that great because I was not ambidextrous, I could not play my instrument because I played french horn and in requires that you cuff with the right hand and just being able to do my hair was a pain. For some reason, when bad things happen to me (and I realized it this day) that I always thought that everything in my life bad that happened to me was my fault, it made me ashamed and therefor I would hide.

Obviously I healed, life moved on and my relationship still remained. I should have left him the minute he knocked my head against a car and I blacked out. I have no idea how I got home, how I got upstairs into my house (btw with out my parents knowing) and how I got into bed. I am not going to type here though and say that I was innocent through are entire relationship. Towards the end I did kiss another guy and I was upfront and told him about it and he left (I don’t blame him one bit). From then on he made my life a living hell from Sophomore year of high school 2004 until I moved to Las Vegas in 2012. He would always pop back up in my life, making it seem like I had a chance to make things right and then he was gone again. He had a lot of friends so all the friends that I had met of his while we where together where gone and gave me hell for the next three years. But like I said, not all of high school was horrible.

I made my own friends outside of his circle, one I am still friends with today (11 years). I was active in ROTC, Band, Color Guard, Winter Guard and Yearbook. But about junior year, after years of not harming myself, I started self harming again. I started loosing friends for reasons I did not understand and I was unhappy. I should have been happy with life, I was out of high school next year with a scholarship in music and academics, I wanted to be a doctor at the time so I got into the biology program at the University of Nevada, Reno. I had everything going for me. But my little cloud full of water always has come over everything good in my life and there would be another with due time.

My senior year was the first time I admitted to a family member that I was depressed. That I was stealing a family members opioids to get high so I would not have to deal with the pain that I did not understand. What finally sent me off the edge was a long distance relationship I was having at the time. My boyfriend had joined the military out of high school, he graduated a year before me so his basic training date was pushed until December of 06.  When your young, those few months that you are together make a huge difference in your life. I was kinda bummed out around are five month anniversary because he was away and did not know when I was going to be able to see him. I wasn’t eating, I was isolating and a ex/friend of mine started to notice so he tried to take me out to eat. My boyfriend called me, asked me what I was up to and he freaked out because he could not believe I was out with another guy on our anniversary. I could not take him yelling at me, my friend (which by the way, ironically is now my husband) took the phone and tried to explain to him what was going on with me and that I was not doing great and he still did not care. I finally turned my phone off because I  did see where he was coming from but he was being extremely selfish at the time to think that revolved all around him. Eventually I turned  back on my phone and I had a bunch of messages of him telling me he was going to OD on sleeping pills, that he didn’t want to live without me and that the last message was him saying goodbye. I had panicked, I had never been put in that position before and it didn’t help that he was like a 1,000 miles away. I tried calling back and his room mate answered the phone telling me that he had gone unconscious  but that he had already called 911 and that they where there about to transport him to the hospital. I lost my shit. I started bailing and then I got made and I started hitting the windows in side of my friends car and he had to physically restrain me because I was really starting to hurt myself. I did not know what to do, it sucked knowing that I caused him to feel this way and that I couldn’t do a damn thing about it being that far away. So, I went upstairs, took a good handful of pain meds and started to relax, however it was not working this time, I felt as though I would rather take the rest of the stash of pills I had and just go to sleep for good. However, I did not, I finally asked for help.

I knew my mother would not take it well so I contacted someone that I knew would understand my situation. My sister-in-law has bipolar depressive disorder so I called her and to had her bring my brother to talk to my mom because I knew me doing it would do nothing. Look, its not that my mom did not care, she learned to bottle all of her problems and anyone else for that matter a long time ago. As I have grown up, it is almost a protective mechanisms, a side effect that she did not really get a chance to grow up because she had my brother at a very young age. So my brother and sister-in-law came over and sat down with my mom and told her that I needed to go to the hospital because I was not safe with myself anymore. Even though she did not get it, she took me anyways. This whole thing to begin with never made our relationship right after that.

I stayed one night inpatient because my mom’s health insurance did not cover for mental health. When they released me they told me that they wanted me to go to my General Practitioner because that would be the only way around me getting any medication I needed. My dad took me the doctor and the nurse practioner that I was seen by asked if I was still suicidal and I told her if she let me go I would hurt myself again. She told my dad that she could not let me go without getting CPS involved unless she knew that that he was going to take me back to an inpatient program.

My mom was at work when my dad brought me home to pack a bag for the hospital, she came home on her lunch, asking what the plan was and my dad explained what needed to be done. The one time in my life I needed my mom there, she told me she had to go back to work. I understand now as an adult that jobs can be a pain in the butt but my mom never asked for time off or to go home early for anything. I hurt and it still hurts because unfortunately at 17 years old, your wise enough to take that for what it is. I spent a week inpatient after my family was able to get some assistance to pay for the stay. The gentlemen that did my assistance for me to stay inpatient, also became my therapist for about three months (because I turned 18). My therapist was even nice enough to try to locate another therapist for me, that was on the college campus so that I did not have to make it inconvenient with my studies. Needless to say, after seeing her once, I did not go back. However I also did not have any problems for three or so years after that.

School was rough, I honestly believed my entire life that I had a little bit of a concentration problem when it came to learning which made it extremely hard to obtain and maintain the information that I needed to pass my classes. I tried finding outlets to hopefully express enough energy that when i did need to study I would be able to. I got into Rugby and absolutely loved  it. I got my energy out, my grades where doing great and I was able to let all of my emotion out on the field. Unfortunately all good things come to end. When I was having a hard time my first semester, I lost both of my scholarships. I was able to obtain both of them back, however, my music scholarship was cut in over half and in order to keep my scholarship I was doing marching band, pep band and an ensemble band all of which took up way too much time for me now because I had to work to pay the rest of my tuition. So I was able to make it through a full year and half before I was not able to do it anymore and I decided to go to Truckee Meadows Community College. Again, I beat myself up forever because I made it further then anyone in my family in school and I wasn’t able to maintain it. On top of it my dads family is very ritz and frowned upon the fact that I could not cut it. I had one good semester. I stayed for two years, graduated with a AA in Fine Arts that I can not even use.  That’s when I gave up on everything.

Within the two years that I went to TMCC I found a new sport for me because I could no longer play rugby. I decided to do roller derby. Again, another sport I absolutely loved. Broke my first bone ever doing and although it sucked, it was an accomplishment for me that I was able to pass all my profeciences to play in an actual game with my cast on, both on a flat track and a track that was banked. With Reno being a small town, there was not a whole lot of game play except against each other. I was able to play one game before I had to stop. The ultimate reason I decided to play another sport after Rugby was because I had back problems (in my head I promise you this makes since). I started having sciatic pain on my left side and it was only getting worse. So I finally went to see a doctor about it who told me that I was too young for any thing major to be done with it. So, I said screw it, if I’m gonna be in pain anyways, I might as well enjoy my life. That first and final game I was able to play was because I had to have surgery three months after that due to the fact that my back had gotten so bad.

I had just started the a new semester in school when I finally snapped. I just ended my derby career for at least several months to a year, my grades where slipping, the boyfriend I was with at the time wasn’t really there (smoked a lot). I did not have any friends anymore outside of what I had in derby. Life just didn’t seem to be worth it to me anymore. I was 21 years old, with no clue when I would graduate with a degree I could use and that had to have back surgery already. It was very concerning. I remembered after years of not self harming of starting to punch myself, pull out my hair, flick myself with rubber bands until I would bleed. I was at my boyfriends house and I told him that I needed to go to the hospital because I really did believe I was not far off from taking all the pain medication I had for back and saying F the world.

First off, the mental health programs in this country suck! Because I still did not have mental health coverage because I was under my mom’s insurance, I was sent to the state hospital. I knew a few of the nurses due to a current job I was working, so it made it a little bit more comfortable for me until i met the doctor who was treating me and one of the nurses. The doctor diagnosed me with BPD. I didn’t understand what it was and they where defiantly not explaining. So, I started getting upset. Then, on top of it, one of the nurses kept implying that I was a drug addict because I was taking pain meds. It was like really? I am having surgery in two months but yet I’m faking this all. I was done after that. Me self harming has never been for attention and it never will. I always self harmed in places people could not see because it was known of there business and I didn’t need there input. However, in the hospital I didn’t care what anyone thought of me anymore. I started cutting up my arms, my hands anything that I could see without removing. So what did they do, they threw me out, great care.

It just so happened that I had made an appointment with a psychiatrist shortly before this happened so I was set up for after care when I left. That is when I told my family about what happened with my brother. It just made it all the harder.

Surgery came around, I was able to see my now husband who had lived in Vegas and was up in Reno for the holidays. The aftermath was a little rough in the beginning but it was nothing that I could not handle. After that, life was okay for a while. Even my brother was talking to me so I could see my nephews.

A few months after that and a of me and my ex from Vegas talking, I moved to Vegas. Everything that could have gone wrong, did go wrong. I had a transfer to a sister facility from where I was working in Reno and it never went through. So I was now in Vegas with no job. I was making decent money as well and that had dropped to minimum wage when I finally just took a position that would allow me to have income. I was fired due to exploding at another co-worker just a week before Christmas. Luckily, because I was not happy with the amount I was making, I had another job so it was not so horrible. I was making even less money for a bullshit job and my now husbands only client in IT he had left laid him off due to selling the company. We had to move in with his parents. That was very hard for me because I have always been one to be on my own and I had to go back to my parents house when I was in Reno once already and then to have to impose on someone else just made me feel like I failed again. I started going to the state hospital in Vegas in order to seek treatment with a group therapy and medication as well. I started skating for Sin City Rollergirls, trying to find some happiness, some drive to make me whole again. That only lasted a few months and then I started isolating and I don’t just mean your typical not wanting to talk to anyone isolating. I am talking I could not drive anymore because I was afraid of everything, I could not leave the house at all because I felt like plans where going to fall from the sky and a war was going to start. My anxiety was so horrible that my now husband was out of town and I couldn’t stop pulling out my hair and screaming and moving and my nerves where 100% shot and I just stopped going to work. I didn’t call or give notice I just stopped going. When he came home I told him I needed to go impatient. Due to current self harming and suicidal issues and medication instability, I was admitted for two weeks.

So, months go by, I am still not leaving the house and I realized what I really wanted was to go home. My now husband told me if I could find a job (as well as him) that we could move back to Reno. Well, here I am, two years later and me and my husband have been married for 1.5 years and have known each other for 11.

Since I have been back in Reno, I have been hospitalized three times, two against my will. The last time I was a hospitalized may not have been fatal but it could have destroyed my way of living for the rest of my life. I don’t remember being moved to ICU or having a catheter put in, I though I was talking loud enough to be heard and making since and I was not, it was so hard on my husband that he did not come to visit much. Luckily, it was only temporary, I was able to move to a regular floor in three days.

Everything I have done in the last five years has hurt someone, or disappointed someone. I try to make the people that matter the most my first priority in life to make happy and I can’t even do that. Intimacy is a huge part of a marriage and I can’t even provide that because every medication I was on was against me when it came to having a sex drive. I stayed at a job for 2 years on graveyard which made it impossible for me to see my husband and he started getting mad. So, I left comfortability which was hard for me because that job was the first job after not working for six months that I had after my anxiety got so bad. However, I loved it. I was not in harms way anymore, I was awake during the day, got to spend more time with people, had weekends off, learned a lot of computer skills, it was great.

I got laid off almost two weeks ago due to lack of work they had for me. They where very unprofessional about it. I got a call at home after I just left work telling me that my assignment was over and that I could pick up my belongings at 9am the next morning. I have been a complete reck since.

I did everything I was asked to do. I was even told by a manager how to get hired on full time. I started reaching out to all of the departments and trying to see if I could sit in with them to see what they did as a job. I should have seen it as red flag when no one responded. I really don’t understand what I did wrong.

Right before this happened my husband quit his old job for a better opportunity. The reason this was a problem is that we would be losing our health insurance for 90 days. This being said I was not going to be able to see any of my doctors anymore and I was/am having a lot of problems. Psych/Back/Thyroid/OBGYN. Also my meds where not working again for psych so my doctor wanted to change them around again and I had had enough. Being on the medication or not has never stopped my suicidal thinking, it just stopped me from thinking it as much. So, I decided we should try a clean slate because doctors have done nothing but switch my meds around for years and at this point, no one has a clue what works. It was a great idea and I was doing great and I am still doing better then expected. But here is where I stand:

• I’m sad
• I’m depressed
• I’m angry
• I’m mad
• Extremely emotional
• Numb
• Don’t want to live (it is almost strong enough to out way the fact that I don’t want to hurt anyone anymore).

Where do you really go from there. My pieces are so scattered that I don’t even know where to start picking them up. Because of that, I don’t want to talk to anyone because I don’t want my emotions being displayed in the wrong way towards those I care about and love. I am already mad at people that I shouldn’t be. My husband being one because if he didn’t make me leave my last job this wouldn’t have happened but, would are relationship still exist if it hadn’t? I am also mad at every single person that keeps telling me that it is going to get better. The reason my story is so long is because my life has been full of people telling me that it will get better. I couldn’t even enjoy my own wedding and it was absolutely perfect.  I am done with the games and I am done with the bullshit. My hands are up, I surrender.