You're Worth so Much More

To understand the person I am now, you need to understand my past, especially the depression I dealt with for many years.

It started in middle school. I don’t know exactly what brought it on. I just know I felt alone and isolated from everyone. I thought no one cared or loved me. I didn't think I was important to anyone. I tried for a long time to just block out the pain, fake a smile and move on, but it didn't work. I just got worse and worse.

Eventually, I thought it was getting to be too much. I started cutting myself, just to alleviate the emotional pain. I would feel better for a while, and then fall back. It became a cycle; cut, feel better for a little while, crash harder than before and cut again. It never seemed to end. It had literally become a form of addiction.

At one point, I just wanted to quit. I slit my wrists. That’s when I realized I had let things go too far. In no circumstances was suicide okay. That’s when I went to my mother about it.

She cried when she found out the truth. I had been covering it by lying about where the cuts were coming from. It was always; the cat did it, or I broke a glass and cut myself cleaning it up or that I just didn’t know. She had believed me, even though at times she had been concerned by it.

I also went to my small group and confessed it there. My pastor’s wife was in the group and she, along with the rest of the girls prayed for me, and I realized how far I had drifted from them, and from God. I knew that I did have reason to live, and that there were people who loved me. I just hadn’t been able to see it because I have been the one who walked away.

I also realized that God had been there with me through it all. I had pushed Him away, stopped praying and reading. I had rejected Him. But He never rejected me. He saved my life when I tried to end it, and gave me the courage to step up and talk about what was going on.

Since them, I still struggle with the depression and the cutting, but thanks to God, I haven’t cut in close to two years now. He freed me from a world that, by all rights, should have taken my life. I found my worth in Him then, and knew that no one could take that away from me. 

This piece of my past had formed a lot of who I am now. It strengthened me, and showed me the love of God and the people around me. If it wasn’t for my faith, I doubt I would be here to say all this.

If anyone is struggling with similar problems, I want to say, you are worth so much more. If you are a believer in Christ, that's where your worth comes from. Not in people or money; it's in Christ. If you aren't a believer, He still loves you and is seeking you. He wants you, and if you come to know Him, He is the only one you need.
Life can always get better, even if you don't think it will. I'm living proof of that, thanks to God. Trust that He knows that He has in store for you, and that it is what is best.

"'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord. 'Plans to prosper, and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future.'" -Jeremiah 29:11