If it wasn’t for God’s direct intervention in Heather’s life, she would be dead today. But instead, she is living to the glory of God and helping others who suffer in the same ways she did.
Her troubles began before she was even born. Heather’s mother was diagnosed with bipolar disorder while she was pregnant and was put on medications to help regulate the mood swings. Growing up, her mother’s condition did not consistently improve, and Heather often felt responsible for the mood swings and emotional turmoil her mother and family went through. She also felt as though it was her job to fix everyone’s problems.
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These emotions affected Heather so powerfully for such a long time that they began to take their toll on her. “By stuffing all of those emotions in for so long,” she explains, “it’s like my world just started to crumble around me. I started to have a nervous breakdown. I could not stuff everything I’d grown up with down inside me any longer.”
Heather began to withdraw from the world completely. She became a prisoner to her own home and an emotional prisoner to her own mind. “My mom would sometimes make me come upstairs from my room in the basement and make me eat. If she didn’t do that, I would just stay in the basement in the dark all the time.” This darkness seemed to creep into her very life. The whole world seemed dark to her. “I remember how awful that darkness was and how terrible it is to live without hope.”
Although she received counseling, she began to contemplate suicide, and the thoughts lingered for months. “I tried to talk myself out of it every day,” she says. “In counseling, they say not to make any impulsive decisions. They say everything will be brighter in the morning. But the thoughts got worse, and I knew my suicide was going to be successful if something didn’t happen to stop me.”
Waking up one day, she knew that the day had come. “I knew what was waiting for me that day,” she laments. At school, she asked permission to leave class to get some water and then went to the kitchen, where she began drinking the different cleaners that were there. “I was choking on the cleaners,” she remembers tearfully. “It was such an awful place to be in.”
But God had a different plan for Heather. While she was there on the kitchen floor, the school chaplain came in, turned on the lights, and spoke to her without alarm—and without judgment. He said kindly, with a bright smile, “Heather. How are you doing today?”
Heather felt she couldn’t lie to this man, so between gags she told him straightforwardly, “I’m – I’m killing myself.” She began sobbing right then.
The chaplain kept calm. He gently helped her off the floor and brought her to his office. She told him what she had drank, and he called the ambulance.
She recovered in the hospital and received further treatment, but all her friends and family were scared for her nonetheless. Although she had wrestled with suicide for awhile, it seemed so unexpected to everyone else. Despite their fears, however, she knew suicide was no longer an option. “I still had the same pain and fear, and I had no idea how God was going to pick up the pieces, but I knew God had spared my life. I had to be honest with Him and say, ‘God, obviously you care, obviously you spared me but I don’t know how you’re going to fix this mess of my life.’”
This was a turning point in Heather’s life. “That was the beginning of me trusting God again and shutting the door to suicide as not ever being an option again.” Heather began to build her relationship with God again and studied to learn more about Him.
As she grew in God’s grace, God used Amazing Facts in a powerful way to teach her about His love for her, His soon return for her, and His calling for her to share these things with other people. Pastor Doug helped her understand that God’s love was a personal love for her. “That is a seed I will never forget. I’m so happy my family didn’t have to go through the pain and tragedy of me taking my life, and that I have the joy of encouraging others that there is always hope.”
Heather realizes the path she had to travel in order to allow herself to listen to God. “Sometimes, God lets you get to that place where you realize there is nothing left, and you wonder if you even want to live because it hurts, and life is dark. But when He lets you get to that place, that’s when He can break through to you and let you know He’s there, and He can work with you to bring beauty out of ashes and hope out of darkness.”
She wants to thank the people at Amazing Facts for helping reveal God to her. “Amazing Facts changed my life,” she says thankfully. “I’m so grateful for their ministry. It’s a precious blessing.”