Testimony

Yeah, Yeah, I know, I have to do better at updating this thing. Sorry. I'll work on it. So what's been going on lately? Hmmm...Well, I broke up with Jon-Michael. There were a lot of reasons, but I know it was what God wanted and it feels like there's a huge weight off my shoulders. And since I broke up with him, God has brought me a really strong christian friend that is actually my age (gasp! rare here in the valley), and I'm also trying to start a bible study since there are some interns over at Horn Creek that I know are around my age. Plus, I found a church here in Westcliffe that I really enjoy

One of the things I wanted to do today was to write a "Client Testimonial" that we can use when we call people to try to get support. It's basically the same testimony that I use when I speak in churches or to people, but in a format you can read over the phone. Mom, please don't cry. I love you, and the girl that all of this happened to isn't me anymore.





Client Testimonial


March 29, 2006

Slowly I popped the little pills out of their foil and let them plop into my well-used coffee mug. One hundred and sixty of them. One hundred and sixty little ways to end my pain. Methodically I picked up the bits of foil and threw them into my otherwise empty trash can. My room was immaculate. My three page letter entitled “My Last Will and Testament” was written, and placed exactly in the center of my desk. There was only one thing left that I wanted to do before I died.

I went down the hall to collect my friend, and together we walked upstairs to another friend’s room, where we spent an hour getting high. All I could think of was, It’s ok. Soon it will all be over and I won’t hurt anymore. My arm throbbed where I had a few weeks earlier spent an hour burning nine perfectly round cigarette holes into it after my boyfriend got through raping me. As we finished toking up and left the room, my friend called after me, “see you tomorrow sunshine!” No you won’t, I thought. Not ever again.

Back downstairs, I locked my door and called my roommate to make sure she was spending the night with her boyfriend. Then I sat at my desk and began to swallow handfuls of pills. I swallowed pills until I got dizzy, and then I watched the printed words “Last Will” grow blurry before my eyes. I will never know why I did it, but in my last moments of consciousness I picked up my cell phone and called my mother, asleep in bed 100 miles away.

“Mommy,” I said, my speech thick and heavy. “Mommy, I need help. You have to call *****.” I dropped the phone and stumbled to the lower bed: my roommate’s bunk. As I lay there, drifting in the semi-conscious place between waking and sleeping, I heard the phone ringing and the campus police leaving a message. I tried to go get the phone, but my limbs were numb, asleep, dead. Just like me, I thought. Dead. I fell asleep.

I woke up, three days later, in the ICU. Nobody knew why I was alive. I should’ve been dead. The doctors were amazed. I was sent to the psychiatric unit. Thankfully I have almost no memory of the time that passed between falling asleep that night, and several weeks later. It is a blank spot in my mind.

When I got out of the hospital my family and I went to Colorado to an amazing place called the Ranch of Hope. There my life changed. At first I refused to talk about God, or allow Hope or Dave to pray in front of me. But as they began to talk to me and care about my pain, my heart began to soften. On Good Friday, April 2006 I recommitted my life to Jesus. My counselor helped me deal with the pain of my past that caused me to want to die. They helped me see that with God, I still have a future. The fire in my heart was rekindled, and once again I have joy, peace, and hope for the future. In the months since I left the Ranch of Hope, God has worked miracles in my life. I used the tools that I was taught at the Ranch of Hope to let God to heal my heart. I am fulfilling a dream of helping people, in a ministry that I believe God is directing. I am a child of the King, and He wants better for me than I could ever imagine for myself.


For more information on how we can help you, please contact the Ranch of Hope at (719) 783 9642