I'm Recovering From Being Me

I don't really know why some people seem to live fucked up lives. But, I am a true believer that everything happens for a reason. I don't believe in God, I don't believe in patriotism and bumper-stickers that scream, "UNITED WE STAND!" I'm a normal teen growing up in Suburbia, Absolutely Nowhere, America. My town is affectionately called "Cow-Town" by its younger residents. We are all sheltered kids living in a rural town where getting drunk is our form of entertainment. You see, I grew up in a very loosely Protestant home with a loving mother, father, and a rather cracked brother. I'd seen my share of shit-happenings after having three surgeries, resulting in my entire intestine and appendix removed. 1

But there was one single event that happened in my life that shaped who I am. In the summer of 2000, I was kidnapped, brutally beaten and left for dead in a dumpster. Not exactly everyday living. I had been walking my dog near South Meadow Pond, which is an overly-polluted hole-in-the-ground-type-pond that separated Lancaster, my hometown, from Clinton, a town where my life unraveled. But we'll get to that later. Anyways, as I was walking my dog Champ, a man pulled up in a red pick up truck and asked me questions about fishing. As I was walking away, he over-dramatically pulled a knife on me and told me to get in the car. I complied, petrified (though looking back at it now, I wish I had rolled my eyes and walked away), We drove to a neighboring town, into an industrial park named Jytek Park. We pulled behind a building and basically, this is where shit hit the fan. The sequence of events run together after so many years, but by the police charges, you can guess what happened: Sexual Assault, Assault and Battery with a dangerous weapon, Assault and battery on a person under 14, Kidnapping, and Attempted murder. Did he really try to murder me? Maybe he did, but in all honesty, I think the police just threw that one in there to give him a worse sentence. He had tried to strangle me, but I guess a cool act of what the police called "heroism" saved my life. I closed my eyes and pretended I was dead, and it seemed like magically, the fingers slowly lifted off my neck. I was conscious, but kept shallow breaths so he believed my death, and all of a sudden, I felt a foot connect to my side quite painfully, and I slid out the passenger side door. Head first. I've never felt something hit my head so hard. I blacked out, and woke up in a trash dumpster. Alas, I made it out safe and sound (considering the events...). But what happened after that is what really matters.2

After all the court cases and meeting with important people, I was left alone by the media, my friends, family and relatives because hell, it was old news, and I was a strong girl. No one had a single doubt in their mind that I would rise about everything and be the best little fighter in the world. I kept that act up for about three years, until my world started to crash. It was like I could feel every little piece fall apart and begin to disappear as I developed severe psychological disturbances. It didn't help that on the other spectrum of my family, my brother was literally losing his mind. One night, after what seemed like months of anger, regret, guilt, depression, and basically every other emotion known to man, I snapped. My brother, Evan, began his routine screaming obscenities at my parents and punching holes in the wall, when I found what seemed like my salvation for the next few years. I turned into a cutter. A full-blown self-mutilator. 3

I lived my life by covering my wrists, covering my emotions, and covering my insurmountable psychosis. I began cutting about 100 times a night, and they were all deep. Some too deep. I had gouges in my wrist, 10-inch long slices all up my leg. After two years of this, and three suicide attempts later, I let mt therapist in on the fact that I was going to kill my self that night with Ammonia and bleach. I was whisked into Amesbury Psychiatric Ward and put on lock down. The people I met, and the things I saw there are still with me. I met Schizophrenic patients, molested patients, and patients with Severe Dissociative Disorders (whom I really never got to know). The outcome? Diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder with Psychosis, and Severe Clinical Depression. I was put on an anti-psychotic called Abilify, which make me puke my brains out for three days, and Effexor XR. 4

I still was cutting after the hospital, and was not taking my Effexor. I'd save them up for about a week or so, and then in just one night, I'd down them all, mixed with a bit of Tylenol or Aspirin. A few months earlier, I had started experimenting with alcohol after I had gone to the Caribbean with my best friends. Down there, the drinking age is basically non-existent. We'd float in the ocean all day, sipping rum and coke, or Pina Coladas. After an entire week of being drunk everyday, coming back home was like a culture shock. My friend and I searched frantically to find alcohol, and we usually just stole it. I came into school hungover a lot, but it didn't stop me. During the summer, I went to college parties with this girl (I was 14 at the time), got drunk at our houses, got drunk and dove into her pool with all our clothes on, and most importantly, got severely addicted to binge drinking. I was drunk at least four days a week in the summer. And I'm not talking a couple of beers...I mean slurring my speech, fall-down dead drunk, and waking up in the morning not remembering half the night. 5

As the days progressed, I started to feel old. My body physically fought me, as I found my way to harder drugs. It was one single slip-up in my life that made me stop feeling sorry from myself and move on from my past and all that bullshit. I smoked some pot with my friends Lisa and Chris. We had used a receipt to roll the joint, and my lip gloss to stick it. Not even ten minutes after, I got this incredibly bizarre sensation running through my body. I felt like I was God, I had an Almighty power upon myself and my mind. I told myself "This is it Chelsea. You just fucked up big time, and you are finally going to kick yourself in the ass and realize how much of a bullshit life you're living." I listened up, and I took a look around me. I saw Lisa dancing in the field, Chris was smiling to himself on the ground and for the first time in my life, I wanted OUT. I didn't want to keep hurting myself. I went to my best friend Heather, and told her everything (Heather had been a cutter for quite some years, and we had a mutual understanding of each other) and I told her I wanted to be clean, I wanted to be happy. And so my battle began. I was taken in an ambulance to Clinton Hospital. Tests were done, and it was found that the pot was in fact, laced with LSD. 6

So here I am. I still drink quite a bit, I smoke about a pack of cigarettes a day, but I feel that I'm finally over this 5 year hangover of misery. I've been cut-free and drug-free for over a month, and I promise I will keep it that way. I had always thought that nothing would ever work out for me, but I realized it didn't work out because I didn't let it. I am the controller of my fate, I am beautiful, I have an incredible smile, and I can finally say I enjoy living. Life is what you make it, as cliched as that sounds. After everything I went though, it just wasn't worth it to be depressed. It's not worth it to ruin your body. It's just not. Because once you're happy, you'll look back on all of it and just wish you had spent those years you were depressed putting your energy into something else. The world isn't a miserable place. Yes, there are many miserable people, but you don't have to be one of them. Take it from me: I had nothing going for me, and one day I finally got over everything with the help of no one. As my favorite author said, "Save yourself or remain unsaved." I saved myself and nothing has ever felt so rewarding.7