Be honest. Are you someone who keeps their feelings to themselves or wears them on your sleeve? Do you have people in your life that you share your happiest moments as well as your deepest secrets? We all have our own personality that dictates how we approach our lives.
I am the type that keep things to myself. This has potential to lead to deep depression and the reason for this blog. I now share a lot of my past so that I can possibly help someone else going through similar situations in their lives. I want to walk you through a dark week in my life and how God stepped in and took over. It showed me that He is always with me.
It was New Years Day 2005. I was really struggling in my marriage due to events that took place over the past year. I was battling with the feeling I should get a divorce and the commitment of the marriage vows that I made, including “till death do us part.” My finances were out of control, with no clear improvement in the near future. My wife decided to go to a friend’s house for the day with the kids. She told me that she preferred for me not to join them, even though I normally would go to this person’s house in the past. My depression went out of control that morning.
I decided to join the Lord that day. I went out to the garage and hooked up a hose to the exhaust of the car and fed it into the back window. I started the car and started to pray. I do not remember all that I said, but I cried the whole time. God stepped in and pulled the hose out of the window. I did not see Him, but know it was Him. I had it wedged in so it could not fall out. I knew at that point, God had plans for me. He loved me enough to save me from myself!
I drove myself to the medical clinic to get help. I did not tell them that I tried to commit suicide, but that I had thought about it. They took it seriously and had a police officer take me to the hospital so I could be assessed by a doctor. When it was time to be released to go home, I had to call my wife to pick me up since I was not allowed to drive myself home. I told her that I had thought about suicide and that is why she had to pick me up. She was upset that she had to leave her friend’s house. She said that I should have know better than to tell the doctor that. I should have just told them that I was depressed.
OK, enough negativity. Let’s get to the positive part of the story. That Sunday morning, I was in Sunday school class and was keeping to myself because I was still trying to process everything that had taken place. My dear friend, Sherry, came over to me and sat down. She said that she had received an e-mail from me that had prayer request in the subject line and nothing in the body of the email. She asked me what was on my mind. Wow, I had not sent her an email. Then, it hit me. God had stepped in. He was speaking to me through her. I did not tell about the extent of my depression, but did finally open up about my feelings. The class prayed over me that day. It was the first start to healing.
Fast forward to 2013, and I decided to write a book on stress management. That was my final step to healing and putting this in my past. I finally opened up about it and told my family what had happened. Through those 8 years, I had developed a deeper relationship with God and worked the stress out of my life with His help. I now live stress free. I do not even try to say that bad things do not happen in my life. I just do not stress about them. God gets me through whatever is in front of me. As a follow up from my last blog, this has been my Red Sea.
It has been close to 15 years since my life was turned around in a good way. We have the holiday season quickly approaching. If you would like to share this blog with those close to you, feel free to do so. There may just be someone like me that is holding everything inside and needs help. I share my story so others can avoid going through it like I did. If you have a group that would like me to speak to, let me know. I hope this finds you healthy and blessed and I wish you the happiest Thanksgiving. Tom
