March 1, 2022

Between February 13th and February 28th, my struggles only got worse. Fear had such a tight grip on me and I felt like I couldn’t shake it off. If you’re spiritual, the only way I can describe this is spiritual warfare was consuming me. It was more than just anxiety and depression, it was a battle between what I knew to be correct and the lies these intrusive thoughts were telling me.

I truly felt like life was meaningless like something terrible was going to happen to me or my family and there was nothing I could do to control it. The terrible thing would happen and I would have to live without them or them without me and there was nothing beyond this world. During this time, we were also pretty alone and isolated. My closest friends had spent the last few months slowly alienating me for reasons I probably won’t ever understand. Beyond my husband, no one else knew what I was going through. If I can share anything, it’s this: mental health crisis + loneliness and isolation is a recipe for disaster. Alex was doing the best he could to shoulder what we were going through. He had to take days off of work to take care of me, take our daughter to school, and so much more, all on his own.

One day I hope for this time to be a distant memory, but for now, I remember how I would wake up in the middle of the night with heart palpitations, struggling to breathe, or from nightmares. For two weeks, I didn’t sleep more than 2-3 hours a night and it was awful. The doctor had given me Zoloft and Lorazepam to help with what I was experiencing, but I was terrified of taking another medication after the previous two. Not to mention, benzo’s, like Lorazepam and Xanax, can be incredibly dangerous and habit forming. Not to say they can’t be valuable tools for those who need them, but I didn’t want to alter my brain chemistry anymore, I wanted to get to the root of what I was going through.

The night of February 28th, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned, cried to my husband, and finally around 1 AM, I made the decision to check myself into the behavioral health unit of the local hospital. I didn’t know what else to do. I was afraid that if I didn’t do something, I was going to leave this earth much earlier than I was supposed to. I couldn’t stop thinking about the devastating effect that would have on my daughter and my family so I knew I needed professional help.

After taking my daughter to school, my husband took me to the emergency room of the local hospital. They discussed my options with me and sent in a psychiatrist to evaluate our situation. She talked to me for about 30 minutes, going over my experience of the last couple of weeks, past several months, and even into my younger years a bit. She told me that if I wanted to be admitted, she would allow it. My husband and I agreed that this was probably the best choice. Later, they came in to give me a change of clothes, including grippy socks, and have me take out all of my jewelry (if you know me, you know I have quite a few piercings, so this was a challenge).

The next thing we knew, I was being wheeled away from my husband (for the second time in our life together) and up to another floor of the hospital. I was terrified and hopeful, thinking that maybe this would be the answer to healing. After two weeks of torment, I just wanted to feel better. Being surrounded by professionals, this had to be it for me, right?

My room was empty besides two beds with paper-like blankets, a small triangle-shaped bathroom made completely of stainless steel, a sink, and a built-in shelving unit next to the first bed. The walls were off-white, the blinds were closed which made the room seem bleak and gloomy, and I wasn’t sure what I had gotten myself into.

The nurse came in to take my vitals and get my health history for my chart. She explained that three meals would be served each day, that I would have access to the phone when I needed it, and that it was highly recommended that I attend group therapy that afternoon and evening.

While we were talking, she said “would you like me to have the hospital chaplain come in to talk to you?” I immediately shook my head. The chaplain? Come talk to me? About what? It had been so long since I had even thought about God that the idea just seemed ludicrous.

I had grown up in the church, being raised and baptized as Catholic. I even did my first communion, but in my middle school years, the church was put on the backburner and I rarely ever thought about God. Growing up in Southern California, you don’t exactly see or talk about God very often. Besides that, I was part of the health care community, under the impression that religion was traumatizing, discriminatory, and hateful, causing the voices of women and LGBTQ+ voices to be stifled which was something I just couldn’t get on board with.

Remember: I had never actually read the Bible or explored it in depth. I had stopped going to church many years ago. I spent a lot of time on social media running a virtual business, but also seeing the voices who preach the loudest, not the ones who preach about love.

However, before my nervous breakdown, I still believed in a higher power. My husband and I were raised in homes of believers. We didn’t identify with the Catholic religion anymore, but we still believed God was present in our lives.

However, did we thank Him for our blessings? Never.
Did we pray to Him? Sure didn’t.
Did we attend church? Nope.
Did we share Jesus with our daughter? Sure didn’t. We were the “I’ll let her explore all religions so she can choose” type of people, without ever really exposing her to anything.

My brother-in-law shared a fantastic metaphor with me a few months ago:
Some of us keep Jesus in the trunk of our car, knowing He’s there but never letting him out.
Some of us keep Jesus in our backseat, hearing His voice once in a while, but not allowing him any say in where the car is going.
Some of us invite Jesus to the passenger seat, letting him navigate, but ultimately we’re still driving the car, telling it where to go.
However, all of us need to give Jesus the keys and let Him drive the car.

We totally had Jesus in the trunk. As a matter of fact, we probably saw Him hitchhiking and drove past Him a couple times without even another glance.

You’re probably wondering if I’m about to tell you that this time in the hospital was my “come to Jesus” moment? Nope. Not even close, but it was a time in my life that I’ll never forget. A time I’ll share with you in the next update.

Thanks for reading,
Dev