Moving Forward

So, my sister died and I decided that I couldn't take my own life because of the pain that it caused my family. However, there are many ways to die. Some people choose one or more every day. We eat too much, drink too much, smoke too much, take drugs (pharmaceutical and illegal) or we take risks that are just plain stupid.

I was also majorly po'd at God. I had prayed for him to help my sister. He let her die, but he made me stay here. I took that very personally.

In the era that I was growing up in, women weren't encouraged to get an education and have a career. We were supposed to go out and find ourselves a husband. That is what I was doing and I was doing it the only way I knew how at the time. I was hanging out in bars looking for Mr. Wonderful.

I was a regular party animal. I would go out drinking and take any drug anyone offered me. I didn't care. I thought I was having a good time, but I know now I was just heading down another road to my own destruction.

One night I had a dream. I was lying on a stainless steel table like they have in a morgue. Someone was trying to get me to do something. I said, "I can't!" Then, poof, my sister is in the dream and she said, "Yeah, she can't. She's stuck in a speed trap."

That dream was a bit of a wakeup call for me. I quit the drugs but I kept on searching for Mr. Wonderful and drinking way too much, thinking I was having a grand old time.

I had a few brief relationships in this period. Most of them were the "wham bam, thank you ma'am" type of brief encounters. Then I met a man who I thought was "the one". We moved in together and a new drama began in my life.

I met him in a bar and we both were pretty hammered that night. After I met him, I thought we would settle down into domestic bliss. I would show him what a wonderful person I was and then we would get married and have kids and the whole nine yards.

After I moved in with him, he became Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. When we were out in public or visiting my family or his family, he was as sweet as can be. Everyone just thought he was the greatest guy. When we were alone, things changed. He was never physically abusive but the verbal and psychological abuse was there most of the time. He loved to tell me things like, "If you were smart, you would go out and find someone who really loves you."

I lived with him and put up with his abuse for 15 months. Then, one day, it was like I woke up from another bad dream. I walked out and went to the bus stop. Then I took a bus down to the town where my mother was still living and stayed with a friend of mine for a few days. She helped me to get a car so I would have more freedom of movement, then she went with me back to the city I had been living in and helped me to move my stuff out of the apartment I had been sharing with Mr. Wonderful.

I moved into a house that I was sharing with 6 other people that was located outside of the city. I loved sharing my life with these people. There were 4 women and 2 guys sharing the house and the landlord also became a friend. We had some great times together.

So, I started my life again and I started looking for Mr. Wonderful, again. I went out dancing and drinking with some of my house mates and I thought I was really living it up.

Then I lost my job. I wasn't particularly unhappy about it. To me, it was just a job. I started looking for another job and kept on partying with my friends.

One day, I called one of my brothers in San Antonio, Texas to wish him a happy birthday. He asked what I was up to. I told him that I was looking for a job. He said, "Come down to Texas. You should be able to find a job here."

I made all the same old lame excuses for why I couldn't leave Iowa. He told me to think about it and then we hung up.

I started talking about Texas with one of my male house mates. He told me, "You'll hate it. They have bugs down there that are huge! You'll never go to Texas."

Oh no....no one tells me that I will never do something. This has been ingrained in my personality since I was very young. If someone tells me that I "can't, won't or shouldn't" do something, I will do it just to prove that I can, will and should.

God knows how to get me motivated and those words from my house mate got me moving. I went downstairs and packed my bags. I then called my brother back and told him that I was coming to Texas. He asked, "When?" and I said, "Now!"

I think it was about 6 p.m. in the evening when I loaded my bags into my car and headed south on one of the biggest adventures that I had experienced in my life and it was amazing.

(To be continued.......)


© Pamela Sawyer, 2011

Why I Choose to Live

Life can be hard and painful at times. I don't know anyone who has a perfect life. That only exists in the movies and on television.

So, why go on? I think that was the main question I had when I was 17 years old. All I could see was pain. Pain in the world around me, pain in my family and I felt the pain that was inside of me.

From the time I was 17 to 23, I tried to kill myself a few different ways. Needless to say, I was a non-fatality. I survived every time and today I can truly say that I'm glad I'm still here. Then, I wasn't so glad.

When I was feeling like I wanted to die, I felt trapped. Trapped by pain. Trapped by my circumstances in life. Trapped by all the pain in the world. I also felt like there was no one who understood what I was going through.

What saved me? A few things. The grace of God, Allah or whatever you want to call him; writing things down in journals and writing poetry; friends; and the death of my sister from suicide when I was 23 years old.

When I was 23, I was once again thinking about ways to end my life.

One day my sister came to see me. She told me that she was going to kill herself the following Sunday and I could come over to my mother's house and take any of her belongings that I wanted.

On Sunday, I went to my mother's house and I told her what my sister had told me. There was lots of drama and the sheriff was called and my sister was taken out to the mental health facility that was in our town.

I used to go visit my sister in the hospital. The last time I visited her she told me, "If you and mom really loved me, you would let me die."

My sister was released from the hospital after about 30 days. The hospital told my mother that my sister was okay and there was nothing else they could do for her.

My sister came to see me a few days after she was released from the hospital. I could see the pain in her eyes. I knew she wasn't okay. As soon as she left, I called my mother and told her that my sister wasn't okay, that she needed to go to a place where they could help her. My mother told me to wait and see how she is.

Four days later, my sister was dead. I can still remember exactly what I was doing when my grandfather and my stepfather came to my apartment to tell me what had happened.

The whole process of grief, planning the funeral and gathering the family together was too surreal. It felt like a bad dream that I was wishing that I could wake up from.

My sister saved my life. I saw the pain that my family went through and is still going through after almost 30 years. When I saw that, I knew I couldn't take my own life and leave that kind of pain behind.

I wish I could say that life was all roses and sunshine after that. Of course, it wasn't. Life is life. We have good days and bad days.

I read a poem years ago that was written by a child in a concentration camp and the main idea of the poem was that she would be sad tomorrow and if tomorrow came, she would say again, "I'll be sad tomorrow."

So I choose to live today. Tomorrow, I will say again, "I choose to live today."

(To be continued...)

© Pamela Sawyer, 2011