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Lori's Story
Dear Friend,
Blessings of peace and grace to you.
I am 50 years old. I am now living a very happy life.
Without going into the details, I can tell you that I
have been severely depressed for so
many years. As I look back a few months, I would call myself a
functioning depressed person. I could go about my daily activities
appearing to be fine, but inside I was ready to kill myself. I hated
my life. I just wanted to die! Death could not come soon enough for
me. There were days where I could not even get out of bed or leave
the house. I felt hopelessness, despair, sadness and apathy. Overall
I felt gloom. I had no will power. I had started to lose my
perspective on life, on my work, and my family.
All of my friends and relatives thought I had it all. I had the
perfect home; the perfect husband and the picture perfect life. I
tried telling my loved ones that I was extremely depressed, but they
would not believe me. It did not show on my face, and I would never
cry or freak out in front of them. I cried inside, but my outward
cries did not come until I was alone. Therefore, nobody took me
serious. Yet, I was the most miserable person on earth! Everyone
around me seemed to be so happy, so I felt all alone. Even the bums
in the street seemed happier than me. I thought I was the only woman
on earth that was depressed. There was no one that I trusted enough
to share my feelings. If I did share some things, no one took me
serious enough, so I would close up and not discuss them with
anyone. I felt pushed aside or that my experiences of my depression
were minimized. I cried myself to sleep many nights.
God has always been the center of my life. I even called out to God
for help so many times, and even He seemed to be asleep. He appeared
to be on strike. He did not answer my prayers. In reality, God did
answer my prayers, but I was too depressed to recognize it. I
thought I was going crazy or losing my mind, because there was no
physical or logical explanation why I felt the way I did. I waited
and waited for God to send me signs, and yet the signs did not
appear to manifest themselves to me. I hated God! I would drive
alone far into the mountains and shout at Him. I would blame Him for
my misery. I could see no way out! Although, I had much success in
my daily life, I saw it as a failure. My depression became so bad
that I had to end my life. Then one day, I decided I am going to do
it! I am going to commit suicide. I will show God! I am going to
teach Him a big lesson! This temporarily sick way of thinking, made
me (so called) happy. I was so happy that now, I could finally get
back at everyone and especially, God. He thinks He is so powerful!
He thinks He can control the universe! etc. I was going to teach Him
a big lesson! Since He gave me this miserable life, then I was going
to take it!
I thought of ways that I could kill myself. I must have come up with
at least two hundred or more ways to do it. I wrote them all down.
However, I was a little hesitant because I thought that maybe those
ways would just leave me half-dead. And maybe someone would find me
and try to save me.
You know, I forgot, I never told Joseph this but I even prayed to
God to help me commit the perfect suicide. One day I logged onto the
internet to look for ways that others had committed suicide. Since I
had decided that I definitely was going to do it, I wanted to make
sure I did not make a mistake. It had to be permanent.
My mind is a little cloudy now, but I think I typed in the word
suicide, or suicidal thoughts. I did not understand how to go to
chat rooms, but I thought that this would put me in a chat room
where people were talking about how they were going to kill
themselves. Anyway, I typed in suicide and I clicked on a link. The
link was strongfaith.net. When I entered that site, for a split
second, there was a sense of peace that came over me, but quickly
left. I saw the beautiful happy faces of the people on that link. I
continued reading over the different subject matters. Without
reading everything, I found myself typing in one of the subjects
that I would like discussed, was suicide. I still thought that they
would tell me the best way to do it. Instead, I got back an email
that said Joseph at hotmail.... "I want to talk to you." I was very
hesitant but unconsciously, I must have emailed him back. Then
another email from Joseph came saying that God's will is that you
enjoy life. It was as if God himself was speaking to me through
those words. You know, "the voice out of the sky." Another sense of
peace came over me after reading that, and it quickly left. Joseph
wrote that it isn't our circumstances that dictate our happiness. It
is our response to them. But I thought there was no hope for me. I
wanted to go ahead and just die! But again Joseph responded and said
"Yes, you can be helped, and I'm not giving up on you, and nor is
God for that matter." For me, this was like a mystical experience to
hear someone say those words to me at a time like that in my life.
So, I continued emailing back and forth up until now.
The thing that helped me so much was the Power Lines page. I read it
everyday without fail. Sometimes I read it repeatedly. I apply the
Power Lines to my every day life. I even stay up late at night
sometimes reading them. I printed that page out and laminated it.
The Faith and Guilt Page helped me a lot too. After reading the
entire website at strongfaith.net, I have come from a very dark
place to a shining light place. Every day I go back and read over
the website again and again. Each time I read it, I learn something
new. That website is ever fresh to me. I have also reaffirmed my
faith in Jesus and God. And I have asked Jesus to come into my life.
The most important thing that I have learned from Joseph counseling
me, is Faith. Faith is what has saved me the most. Faith in God.
Faith in Jesus. I knew about faith, but I did not have it.
I just finished listening to some tapes that Joseph sent to me about
"Pulling the Plug on Fear". Have you heard these tapes yet? They are
really powerful and nice. I know that I have a long way to go to
beat this depression, and I am not out of the woods yet. But one
thing for sure, by developing faith in the Lord Jesus, it will set
you free. No matter how bad my depression gets, I will never ever
dream of killing myself again! I have also asked for forgiveness
from the LORD. This part of my depression is over for good. I have
something to live for! I have strong faith in Jesus. I have God. I
have new friends at strongfaith.net.
When Joseph told me that there was a chance that I could correspond
with others who have something in common with me, (depression) I
felt like a child all over again. You know, like a kid in a candy
store. I got butterflies in my stomach. My heart became overjoyed to
know that I am not alone, and that there really are others like me
in the world, that want to, or have chosen to choose life.
You know, I am learning about Jesus and studying the Bible all over
again. This time I would like to focus on faith. Maybe you can help
me in my studies. I would be forever grateful to you. And if not,
that is okay too. The most important thing is that you get better.
Coming from a person who has been there, please trust me when I tell
you this. Whatever you do, "don't trust your thinking" right now.
With a whole heart, I gladly endorse the wonderful knowledge and
topics that you will find at strongfaith.net. I trust it will do for
you what it did for me. I pray that you give the people a chance to
help you. Remember that you are not alone. The best is yet ahead of
you! The Holy Spirit will embrace you and restore you!
Take good care of yourself. May the Lord impart to you the Spirit of
encouragement that all things are possible to those who believe!
Blessings, and thank you.
Questions or Comments
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