Scratched

We have a retreat coming up this weekend and I was asked to do a talk on abusing a gift. Only one thing came to mind and so I wrote about it. It was easy and it came natural. I'm not saying it was a masterpiece but I think it had a good message. Father Greg, however, thought that a single event in the talk would distract the teens from the message. I disagree completely. I believe that saying that is underestimating their intelligence and their faith. I think my story would have an impact on my teens and help them in their journey. But I refuse to say my talk without saying all of it. It's my testimony. The entire thing. Not bits and pieces of it. So, I'm scratched out. I think it's a mistake but it isn't my call. So since I can't say it aloud, this is the best I can do:

To say that I regret anything from my past would be incorrect. I’m a human being and because of that I have fallen. Many times. But my mistakes are so much more than tally marks on the blackboard of life. They’re not a composite of years that I’ve earned in purgatory. My mistakes are an important aspect of the very person that I am today. So in a way, I’m grateful.

Junior high and high school were not the best days of my life. To whoever said they’re supposed to be, well I hope they’re wrong. Those days for me were dark and confusing. In a constant struggle to figure out who I was supposed to be I got extremely lost. All my life I’ve never had many friends. It wasn’t that I wasn’t liked; I just didn’t know how to socialize with those around me. I tried to fill my days with sport practices, games, and homework in order to take my mind off the emptiness I felt inside me. But each night when I laid myself to sleep I found myself crying. Nothing helped the loneliness and desperation that was consuming my every thought.

When I was 14 years old I found my faith. That in itself was a battle but I made my way to the Catholic Church and there I found a home. After that moment I thought my life would change. I had Jesus now, didn’t I? Why wouldn’t life get better? And for a few months things were better. I turned 15 and began high school and I was certain my life was going to change. I began getting involved with my youth group and going through Confirmation classes. I prayed more, I actually had friends, I fell in love for the first time and things were great. But those “good time” feelings were only temporary. I was in a relationship with a boy that for years I tried desperately to justify. I wanted to be loved so badly that I ignored all the red flags that were going up all around me. I got to a point where all I ever felt was pain. I couldn’t look in the mirror because all I saw was someone that wasn’t worth anything. So one night after I had gotten into a huge fight with my mom, my boyfriend, and had to say goodbye to a friend I gave up. I found every pill bottle I could find in my house and poured myself a glass of water and said goodbye. One hundred and eighty-two pills later I cried myself to sleep for what I prayed to God to be the last time.

To this day I’m still not quite sure how they found me. All I remember is waking up but feeling like I was dreaming. There were paramedics around me asking me questions but I couldn’t hear them. I kept trying to close my eyes but they wouldn’t let me. They picked me up and laid me on a stretcher and carried me downstairs and out the front door. I remember getting sick all of a sudden and leaning off the stretcher to throw up near a flower pot outside my front door. The paramedics said some other things but the only words I heard were “pill fragments”. Then my world went dark again.

A week later I was released from the hospital. The night I came in I had to have my stomach pumped. The doctors told me that the only reason I didn’t die was because I actually took too many pills. My body couldn’t digest them all and that’s why I began throwing up. Everyone kept telling me how lucky I was. I didn’t feel lucky though. After all, what had I accomplished? I managed to miss a week of school, great. All my problems were still there. I still just longed for everything to end.

The same night I got out of the hospital there was a penance service at church. I had no intention on going but I was riding my bike around the neighborhood and I just found myself riding toward the church. I didn’t really want to be home so I figured I could just go. I didn’t have to talk to anyone. I would just sit there.

When I got into church it was pretty crowded. There were priests in every corner and parishioners standing in line waiting their turn to confess their sins. I made my way to a pew and just sat there, thinking. My gaze made its way to the crucifix on the altar. I looked at Jesus nailed to the cross and before I knew it I was crying. At first I didn’t understand why. But the more I looked at that Man with His hands outstretched for me in a complete surrender of love the more I began to realize what I had done. God gave me life, the most precious gift, and I tried so hard to throw it away. I made my way to a priest and I sobbed to him the sins that I had committed. When I was done he grabbed me by my hand and looked into my eyes and said these words, “Jesus thinks you’re beautiful. Don’t ever forget that” and then he absolved me. I cried the whole bike ride home but not because I was sad. I cried because, for a reason to this day I still do not understand, Jesus saved my life. I’m meant for something more than I realized.

In Isaiah 41:13 it says: For I am the Lord, your God, who grasp your right hand; it is I who say to you, “Fear not, I will help you”. That night during confession God literally grabbed my hand. I can tell you with utmost confidence that He has never let go. I would be lying to you if I said that since that moment everything has been perfect. It would be dishonest for me to say that at nearly 21 I have everything figured out. Because I don’t, and life is still so very hard. I still fall every single day. The difference now is I know that I’m not alone. I know I’m forgiven, and I know that I’m loved.