September is National Suicide Prevention and Recovery Month and I promise you no one can truly understand what it’s like to go through that darkness unless you have been there personally and unfortunately I have. Though it has been several years since I walked through that pitch black madness I can tell you it was not an easy journey, even with a strong support system. However, there is hope at the end of the tunnel but that Hope is the Hope of the World, Jesus Christ.

My story is like a lot of others – it has two sides to it. Some might say I was the good girl gone bad or the prodigal daughter who left to do her own thing but there’s a lot of layers to the young lady I was who struggled for years to the old woman I am today that finally said “Enough is enough.” I want to live for Christ.

I recently read a poem my coworker sent to me that spoke about staying when you cannot find the strength to stay for yourself: It said to stay for the sunset you were meant to see in three years and to stay for the stranger that you will comfort on a random day in June, to stay for the milkshakes you will share with a friend and stay for the song you will send to a friend that will keep them alive on their darkest night. I know now I was supposed to stay because I still had a lot of people and animals to help. But it would be a battle that I would literally fight for most of my life.

Maybe because I was the baby of the family and the only girl, I might have been a little spoiled. Of course both my older brothers would immediately agree, but I always wanted to please everyone too and so began my first rude awakening that you can never please everyone and trying to please others will only make you miserable.

I would say that being raised in a middle class family had its perks but it also had its drawbacks. On one hand you had all your basic needs met but sometimes that was because you “borrowed from Peter to pay Paul” to keep up with the Jones’.

I guess trying to live in this “fairytale world” of perfection really made me struggle with my selfworth. I felt like I lacked something or wasn’t good enough, which was my second downfall.

Lastly, I struggled with my identity in Christ. Being raised in church all my life, I was told over and over again how sin would separate me from God. Which I found out later in my life this really wasn’t what God was all about. He wasn’t just waiting for me to slip up so He could condemn me to hell. God actually had bigger plans for me that I just couldn’t see. That’s why He sent His son to die for me. Jesus didn’t die to save us from suffering. He died to save us through His suffering. He went through it all so we would know that we can make it through it too. Sin didn’t separate me from God. It drew me to Him because I realized I couldn’t save myself. That’s the falsehood that society tries to make you believe, that if you try hard enough and have enough support you can save yourself. But I’m here to tell you that you can’t. It’s only acknowledging that you can’t do this on your own anymore and turning back to the One Who can change everything that can get you to your testimony. Your testimony is the test you passed and finally didn’t fail. It happened, but you found the real Hope. Yes, it hurt like hell, but now you can say “This is what I went through but here’s what I got out of it.”

When I did fall from grace though, sin did separate me from my family, my former church and my own sanity. Ironically hitting rock bottom and putting myself in ICU actually brought me back to my faith though. Because I had nowhere else to go and nothing left to give anyone I finally had to trust God with my life completely. I firmly believe I would not be here if it wasn’t for God’s grace and mercy. He had a divine plan for my life even when I didn’t want to live anymore.

After three decades of contemplating and even attempting suicide not once, not twice, but three times, I am grateful that not only did I fail, I also fell back in love with my Savior.

Now that I’m older I know I had several factors that triggered my trauma and pushed me into the darkness that surrounds suicide. Aside from being molested as a young child, I also struggled with self-identity and generational curses which I will try to explain a little. Being a spiritual person I grew up knowing about the reality of heaven and hell, angels and demons and generational curses. Every family has a history and many things we struggle with or our children struggle with go back to generational curses. From addictions to diseases, these family curses come from spirits.

There are several demonic spirits actually named in the Bible. They are: the Spirit of Divination, Spirit of Jealousy, Spirit of Whoredoms, Spirit of Infirmity, Spirit of Bondage, Spirit of Fear, Spirit of Poverty, Spirit of Error, Seducing Spirits, Spirit of Antichrist, Spirit of Haughtiness, Perverse Spirit, Lying Spirit, Familiar Spirit, Deaf and Dumb Spirit, Spirit of Heaviness and finally the Spirit of Death. The last three all have manifestations of mental illness, excessive grief, rejection, hopelessness, depression and suicidal thoughts which lead to attempts.

These spirits often plague families for years because most do not know how to break free from these curses. I didn’t know how to break free when I was younger and so I struggled with the Spirit of Heaviness just like my mother had and her mother and probably several generations back. I also struggled with the Spirits of Bondage, Fear and Infirmity, along with a Perverse and Familiar Spirit from my father’s side. Because when you open the door to one spirit, they invite the others.

I know by saying all this I have just been judged by all my Pentecostal friends who are looking for their anointing oil while all my Baptist friends are just looking for the exit sign because they are out of here. But if you will just hear me out a little longer you will see how God was still working in the background all along. Though I couldn’t always see it or feel it, He kept me in many ways.

My first suicidal attempt was at age 12. Then I battled the thoughts for years before becoming overwhelmed with circumstances and trying again to kill myself again and then finally attempting it one last time. But God. Yes, He stepped in and saved me from myself. He rescued my testimony and the proof is in the puddles. All the puddles of tears I had cried since I was a child who had been hurt to the tears I cried as an adult who still needed to be healed, God had captured in His hands. God had to heal my heart and heal my hope again and He did. But I didn’t cry that hard to not get something from it, so He gave me His peace. I’m not saying that I don’t sometimes hurt emotionally or have pain in my body or chaos in my home, because I do. However, now I have peace with God and suicidal thoughts are a part of my past. Suicide can be stopped by a Higher Power. The proof is in the puddles.