No one wants to be sick. No one wants to be in pain. But, that was the exact dilemma I found myself in almost overnight 14 years ago. I was a young healthy independent working professional woman, respected by my peers and prized by my boss who hired me the same day she interviewed me. Having spent a fun Labor Day weekend out of town with a friend at her church’s annual retreat, I returned ready to drive into work. Unbeknown to me, my world would turn upside down that Wednesday I went back to the office. Literally, my body felt like being tossed about in a rocking boat in the middle of a storm. The sensation was so real that I couldn’t find my footing. I couldn’t feel the carpet underneath my feet. The office looked warped. By noon, I felt so sick that I had to go home early.

I woke up the next morning trembling in fear and crawled up into a fetus position, crying. It was September 6, 2001. I finally broke out of the fetus position when a friend called to inform me of the terror attack at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. I got out of bed to turn on the TV in the living room.

Doctor diagnosed me with a delayed Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). A simple adjustment disorder was formally replaced with depression. It was determined that the feeling of being tossed about in a rocking boat in the middle of a storm was my body’s memories of what actually happened years earlier when my family fled China for Hong Kong in a boat. During our escape, we snuck out in the middle of the night and encountered storm in the open sea. The storm was so strong that our wooden boat could only submit to its forces. The little eight-year-old me can only cry in silent as Mom comforted my little sisters and Aunt wrapped herself around Brother. As usual, there was no one to comfort me ever since Dad died four years earlier.

Following the onset of PTSD with the boat incident, I also had body memories and flashbacks of how Dad died suddenly while I played in front of him; how we just locked our door and escaped Vietnam in the middle of the night; wading across the river from Vietnam into China; the Hong Kong refugee camps; and so much more.

In addition to the fear and pain from the body memories and flashbacks, I also had to deal with physical pain and insomnia due to nightmares. My head hurt as if a knife had been stuck into it. The pain intensified when I closed my eyes because then I would see a picture image of a head with a knife stuck in it. Another picture image I used to see is me hanging on only by a string attacked to my head with the other end attacked to the bottom of the Earth. Hopelessness. Helplessness.

The awful sensation of pins sticking over my entire body was a constant struggle for a period of time, then the stomach spasms. These symptoms lasted on and off for years.

Thinking back, the mental and physical pains weren’t the hardest thing during my illness. The hardest thing was people not sticking by me. Some left. Some distanced themselves. Some ignored me. The emotional pain of rejection and abandonment was overwhelming. The sense of betrayal was hurtful. So the logical conclusion became: Since no one cares I live or die, why live? I wanted to end all these miseries. The pain and depression were unbearable.

People didn’t understand what was happening to me. Honestly, I didn’t know too much more while I was going through it. Guess they don’t know how to help me so they stay away. I wished that I had cancer or some kinds of open wound so people can see that I was really hurting, really sick. A visible, tangible, and touchable wound would be easier to explain.

For me, the emotional pain of rejection is worse than:

• the pain of excess weight gain from taking antidepressants and other medicines
• the pain of losing a job, a career, a livelihood, an identity, dignity
• the shame of being labeled “disabled”
• the shame of being institutionalized at a mental hospital

God carried me through. The only thing I could do during those testing years was cry out to God and I did it often. I cried out to God in tears and on paper. It helped me immensely to express my inner turmoil in writing to God. My biggest healing break-through came when I started spending time with God in the morning daily.

Hope. About the only thing that kept me going was the belief that God will use what I am going through to help others someday.

II Corinthians 1:3-4 says,
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”

Even during those trying years, God never left me. Sometimes it felt like God wasn’t there. Truth is, God promised to never leave us nor forsake us in Joshua 1:5.

God had turned my tears into joy. Today, I am happier and healthier with many friends and good relationships with family. I’m so joyful and active these days that most people are surprised when I tell them about my struggle with mental illness. God is the almighty Creator. He is able to make my life even more beautiful as I continue to walk with him. The years of careful pruning by God is starting to bear fruit. Now, life is exciting.

If you are struggling with mental illness, don’t be afraid. The first step to healing is acknowledging that you are sick. Cry out to God. Seek professional help. Having a psychiatrist and a good Christian therapist really enhanced my treatment. Being healed truncates all negative stigmas.