Attempting suicide...

I use to have constant suicidal thoughts. I was making so many plans and looking forward to being gone from all my misery. Suffering from all the abuse from my family, I wanted to be dead so that they could be much happier. But I found another way out of this misery.

This is my story....will you listen to my pain and suffering?

I grew up in a foreign family from Asia. So we basically grew up with parents who knew better than to discipline us physcially. (I'm not saying all foreign parents are abusive like that) I don't blame them but myself for not being able to meet their standards. It's especially harder if you are a girl like me.

As far as I can remember, my first attempt to kill myself was around my primary school years. It was just like any ordinary day. My job as a 7 year old was to do the family laundry, cook, babysit, clean, and be obedient at all times. When the sunsets, all of us neighborhood children would gather and play. We played all sorts of childs game, like tag and hide-and-go-seek. Then when its time to go home and have supper, my mother would hunt each one of us down with a fly-swatter. She would hit us, not with the plastic square part, but the metal side.

It was a scary chase everyday. I remember how helpless I was. Its like being chased down by Jason of Friday the 13th movie. Sure felt like a chain-saw being slashed at over and over again. If we do managed to escape her beating, and make it home, she'll still finish us off there anyway. It was an awful experience with all those hard swings she'll hit me with all over my body using the hard wired end of the fly swatter. It felt as if you are being stabbed hard to the bone over and over again. I always end up being cornered somewhere crying and screaming bloody murder for her to stop hitting me. She continues to hit me and hollars at me to shut up. My dad would do nothing to stop her, and hollars at us to keep it down so he could watch t.v. It was a normal routine in the house. Guess this was my crime for not being obedient.

A few times when I get beat up like that, I would run straight home crying. I immediately go open the knife drawer. Pull out anything I can get my hands on just to stabbed myself in the stomach. But I frozed everytime. Drop the knife on the floor and had my back lean against the cabinet crying. I was so mad at myself for not being able to do it.

I really didn't attempt any more suicide until the 6th grade. There, we didn't have recess to play and mingle with one another. I remained quiet the rest of my middle school year. Didn't make any friends. I didn't know how to socialize with anyone. I was so quiet, that the only words I would speak of is my lunch number to the lunch lady. Now how bad is that?

Around that time, I grew very depressed. My mom continues to bully us, not just physcially, but sexually as well. Which it is rather uncomfortable to discuss right now. Not only was my mom a bully, but also my dad. But he's not as bad. My dad would try to read some old culture scary ghost stories to us kids. And if we didn't pay attention or catch on to what he was reading about, we get the beating. The only way I tried to cheer everyone up was to always be helpful in cleaning the house up. Plus my dad gets too embarassed to take the whole 9 family member out because there was too many of us in public. I would always choose to stay home alone so they can have fun. I was considered as no one to them. Even the family dog would deserve better love than some girl who just gets in the way for being alive.

One day, I woke up and felt lost and detached. It was like living in a dream. Nothing seems real. I asked my younger sister. What's going on, is this a dream? She respond, no you are not dreaming, you are awake. It was the scariest feeling ever. I later found out later in life that I had developed dissociative disorder from that point on. For someone with dissociative disorder, we try to escape reality in ways that are involuntary and unhealthy. The symptoms of dissociative disorders ranging from amnesia to alternate identities usually develop as a reaction to trauma and help keep difficult memories at bay. As of to this day, I still have not received any treatment for dissociative disorder. It takes a lot of time and therapy to heal. Not some magic pill to make it go away.

Finally I have had it when it was my on my 13th and 14th birthday. There was no cake or presents for me. Because I wasn't considered as smart and good-looking as the rest of my siblings. In other words, I am the black sheep of the family. What did I get for my birthday? A good old beating from my mom twice because I was accused of stealing a card from my little baby sis from a game of old maids and the other....I don't remember, I got smack so many times for things I did or didn't do. If my birthday was not worth celebrating, then why am I born for? Is my existence so horrible that it's not even worth it to be happy about? That's when it hits me. I had no good reason to live anymore.

It was a very depressing summer. I thought of nothing but finding some way to end it all. I was sick and tired of going through all that pain and suffering. I just want it to go away, but that'll never happen. Maybe it's better if I make it go away, for good.....

So I started preparing my list of things to do before I actually end it. I started to write continuously in a journal about every pain and suffering that I went through with the family. I wrote well over 200 some page in notebook papers. I thought that it was best to leave the family with a journal of why I choose to end my life. I left some notes of how great it'll be when I'm gone. I don't think anyone would miss me. I am such a loser that I can't even have one friend or hell, anybody who loves me. I cry hard every night soaking up my pillow with tears, screaming, why Lord, don't anyone in this world love me?  Do I not deserve to be happy too? I don't know whats it liked to be loved. I've done all I could to please everyone and its never good enough. Maybe it's best if I do die, then my pain and suffering would finally go away.

I also started giving away a lot of my belongings. From toys and rare collections, to money.  I believed I had given away my savings of over $50.00 to my parents. I normally threw away some loose coins over my shoulders to my siblings who scrambles for it. Yes, I was dead serious of getting rid of everything so there would be nothing of my belonging or my being in that house.

As I was planning everything out in detail, it started to be an obsession. I no longer cared about schoolwork or anything. All I could ever think about was how great it would be to finally end it. Or what else do I need to do before I can depart for good? I even though it would be a great asset to my family if they can have my life insurance money. Later I found out, that was impossible since it has to be an accidental death....so I thought of some ways to make it look like an accident. I was also working on writing farewell letters to my teachers.

My idea of suicide was to put all of my favorite things and in a shoe box. Carry it with me along with the smallest knife we had in the house to stabbed myself with. If any one bothers to look for my body, I wish to be buried with all of my favorite little belongings. I had always encourage myself to walk a little further away from the house with my box. I didn't care where I died, as long as I'm not anywhere near my family.

I did wrote a lot of death notes but never had the nerve to leave it for any one to read it just yet. Everybody at school was always telling me to smile. Why do you look so sad? I would always frown and turn away. They don't realized that I had no reason to smile about....Until one day I did leave a note to one of my teacher, my history teacher became very concerned about me. She says that I was always facing the ground with my back tilt very forward. I had the face of child who suffers from an illness.

I was later brought up to the school counselor. And there, I gradually started to get to know someone who finally cares. Can't believe this person was willing to put a lot of effort to help some low life like me? And yes, I got the department of social service involved with all the abuse in the family. (Which will be discussed in a later hub.) That didn't do any good. So finally my counselor took me to see a psychologist. That guy prescribed me prozac, and man, that medicine made me worse than I was in the first place!? I developed a shortage of breath and weakness from not eating. So it was finally decided that I need to go to the mental institute. I need to get help for myself and a safe place to stay in. So I agreed to go. Just so happened, a policeman gave me the ride there. I didn't feel any different from the ride there and actually having to stay in a psych ward.

There, I told myself. I know I can do better here. I finally had the chance to sleep without crying over what happened that day. There, I met some girls of my age who suffered through life just as bad as I had. We get the chance to share our personal experience with one another. Plus help each other through it. It's funny, but I actually start feeling alive again.

Later on I was admitted to three different foster homes. Life was a lot greener from the othe side. I so am proud of myself to live through it and not end it. I decided to take action instead of getting life over with. And now I'm the first one of my 6 siblings to get my drivers license, car, job, and go to college. I still see my biological familiy every now and then. Its as if nothing harmful has ever happened. We all really missed one another though. I was suprised by how everyone did want me back and all.

I now live independently with a full-time job and still offering some support to my family. I'm very thankful to be alive today, and am enjoying every minute of it! I took control of my life and make it worth something rather than nothing. I've learned to accept God as Lord and Savior and that he loves us. I try to offer advice to younger folks and help them grow stronger. Because life can be so much brighter if you will allow it to be. There are plenty of better choices out there. You just have to find the right path that leads to the light.