Women Share The Horrific Moment That Changed Their Life

It Took A Suicide Attempt For Her To Realize How Much She Was Loved

“When I was 17, I attempted to commit suicide and was hospitalized. They wanted to keep me in the ER and then move me to a state hospital (a mental institution). My mom made an appointment with the best psychiatrist in the city and made a deal with the doctors to let me leave the hospital on the condition that I see the psychiatrist/therapist.

So I got to leave the hospital and I went to the psychiatrist and she also wanted me to be in a state hospital for at least the foreseeable future. My mom never made me go back to that therapist. She did make me find one who was right for me, though, and I had to go twice a week.

It completely changed how I felt about my mother and looking back, it is the defining moment where I realized how hard my mom was trying to protect me and fight for me. The mental institution I would’ve gone to is atrocious and I think it would have killed me.”

Text Source

A Childhood Discovery Still Gives Her Trouble

“When I was 5 years old (27 now), I found my 16-year-old brother dead in his bed. My family never talks about him unless it’s about going to the cemetery to plant flowers or rake up leaves.

He died of an inherited disease and as a female, I’m left with figuring out whether I want kids as that would mean finding out if I carry the gene responsible for it, and I’ve got terrible abandonment issues (combined with stuff that happened later in life), basically meaning I’m terrified of saying goodbye for even short periods of time.”

Text Source

She Found The Strength When It Was Needed The Most

“When my (then) husband walked out on me, I was six-months pregnant with our third child. I had been suicidal before when I was a teenager and even made an attempt, but I never felt this low.

It was like all the color and joy and meaning washed away. Not to mention I also felt like a complete failure and that my kids would have been better off and that the baby I was carrying probably wouldn’t want to be born into this kind of life.

After a few weeks of just crying constantly, I decided I was going to buy a weapon and go down by the river and lean away from a tree with one hand and shoot myself in the head with the other and fall into the river where I would drown if the bullet didn’t kill me.

There was a little bit of solace in that thought but if I felt bad for my kids. I would miss them even though I was dead. I remember one day after my final decision (I had to save up money for this weapon) that I was lying in bed with my daughter who was almost 3 years old as she was taking a nap. I start crying again just from all the pain that I’d been feeling for the last few months.

In her sleep, my daughter put her arm around me and held me. I was about a week away from doing the deed when my ex-husband’s parents told me they wanted to sell me their car because they were moving back to Maine. So now it was between buying the car and killing myself. So I bought the car thinking I’d get money again later for the weapon.

Well, the baby was born at 2:30 in the morning later that month on the same day I moved into a new house. The suicidal thoughts just vanished the first time I kissed my newborn’s baby cheeks. I could never kill myself now, but watching my ex-husband walk out of the house into the pouring rain was just the lowest moment I hope to ever have to go through.”

Text Source

“The Most Heart-Shattering Feeling”

“I was 16 years old and found out I was pregnant after the absolute first time I slept with someone. After a few months, I realized there was no way I could single parent, and found the perfect family to adopt my baby.

She was placed with her family on Christmas Day and although I knew I would still be involved in her life, my heart broke. Handing her to her mother was the slowest moment of my life. You could see the adoptive mom try and show respect and hide some of her excitement, but she was glowing like any new mom. I was so happy for her and for my daughter, but the car ride home and my empty belly and arms was the most heart-shattering feeling I’ve known.”

Text Source

Setting Her Up For Years Of Issues

“I was physically and emotionally abused by my sister as a kid.

It maybe wasn’t her fault. My dad was mentally ill and took his rage out on her, then she took her feelings out on me. But it was just like any other typical abusive relationship. There was the cycle of abuse. There were the outbursts at no particular moment, so I never knew what I would say or do that would set her over the edge. She would say awful things to me; call me selfish, ugly, stupid. And when she had an outburst, she would scream at me, hit me, and scratch me hard with her nails.

I was always on eggshells with her. I could say or do something completely innocent, and then her outburst would lead to my dad screaming, yelling, and breaking things. Saying horrid things to her. Then we would sit through a lecture on how we were selfish (noticing a theme here?) and we were only fighting to get (insert desirable outcome here).

And then I would apologize to my sister and comfort her.

Rinse and repeat.

There was other stuff too, more manipulative stuff. If I had a friend over, she would isolate them from me, and they would end up ganging up on me and making fun of me. Sometimes she would set me up to hurt myself, like pushing me off our bunk bed.

Basically, this has affected my whole life. I ended up in a relationship with a covert abuser. I have CPTSD and have a hard time coping when people yell or if I get startled. I don’t trust people easily, and I have few female friends because I get nervous around other women.

But whenever I try to explain this to someone (rare), they tell me that’s just how siblings are. It’s not. I mean, siblings sometimes fight and mess with each other, but this was on a whole other level, and much of that was because of my dad.”

Text Source

She Learned The True Meaning Of Friendship

“My best friend in my senior year of high school was failing some of her classes. Her father convinced her that it was because I was a bad influence (they were Catholic, I was Rastafarian). She blamed me for her failure to graduate.

I had no say in it and she never told me, she simply cut me off. I had to find out by asking a teacher, who told me what the school had arranged so we couldn’t be together, and that the school agreed with her father that I was a bad influence. She also convinced our entire clique that I was the reason she was failing. She also convinced the boy that I liked, who I had just arranged a prom date with, that I was a terrible person and a racist, and he cut me off as well.

She was racist against Indians and Arabs, and she told a lot of people at the school that a lot of the terrible stuff she did (like racist vandalism) was done by me. I had to talk to the principal and a counselor about it (I never told them the truth). I was alienated from my entire graduating class, and I still have no contact with anybody from that school, even on Facebook.

Her father never made her quit her after-school job, or thought that her dealer boyfriend might be influencing her negatively, and I never made any effort to expose her.”

Text Source

Breaking The Cycle

“I was in an emotionally abusive relationship when I was 17 years old.

Thankfully, his reach was minimal since we were so young and I lived with my parents still, and he lived almost an hour away. We didn’t see each other much, but we IMed all the time. He would constantly pressure me to come see him, yet put in no effort to come see me. He would guilt me into stripping for him via webcam and tell me that if I didn’t, or if I didn’t start wearing thongs all the time, he would just find a girl who did when he went to college the next year.

He often cursed me out, told me I was dumb and worthless, and refused to commit to dating unless I did what he wanted (and even then, he never would). At one point, we went for over a month without seeing each other, and he told me that he had been in a motorcycle accident and had a leg amputated. I didn’t believe him at first, but this guy was absolutely adamant it was true and would make me feel horrible for doubting him (this was a decade ago, so using the internet for confirmation wasn’t as easy as it is now).

He would refuse to come to see me, saying he couldn’t drive with one leg. I was utterly devastated once I started to believe him. Turned out to be a complete lie and he just brushed it off as a joke. There’s a ton more I don’t remember, but the biggest one was probably when I was with him and he pointed an unloaded weapon at my face and pulled the trigger. It has taken me YEARS to realize how insane this guy was.

At the time, I had no idea it wasn’t normal. As I was coming to terms with it, I kept bringing it up to people to kind of try to get closure and talk it through. Just last night, I kind of had a, ‘Holy crap, this was an abusive relationship,’ moment and told my current partner.

His response was, ‘Yeah, all teenage relationships are messed up.’

It’s kind of ancient history, but it changed the way I interacted with men. I spent way too long after that letting guys walk all over me because I was desperate for approval to prove to myself that I wasn’t worthless.”

Text Source

“I Love You Boo! Goodnight!”

“My life changed the moment my boyfriend of four years phone lit up with a message from Hanna saying ‘I love you boo! Goodnight!’

I remember staring at it for a long time. He was in the bathroom and I wanted so badly to look through his phone, but I didn’t. I just stared at that screen until it went dark.

The feeling of him coming back into the room and kissing the top of my head was one of the worst moments of my life. For so long, it had been a loving gesture, and now it was just empty. He didn’t love me the way I loved him.

He had cheated on me with her for about a year. It destroyed me. But the person I re-built is a much stronger, smarter, and overall better person.”

Text Source

An Action She Can Never Take Back

“I had an abortion at the insistence of my then-boyfriend. He drove me home and I slept all night and part of the next day on his couch.

When I woke up, he told me he had no feelings for me anymore and that I’d have been a horrible mother anyway.

I got my stuff and left. I remember making it about two streets away before I had to pull over because I was sobbing so hard. It’s why I’m scared to have kids – what if I am a horrible mother?

I’m in a much better place now; it’s just something that I think about as I inch closer to being 30 since the clock is ticking a bit. My ex-boyfriend was a total jerk, but I don’t regret what happened. It worked out the way it was supposed to, and if I decide to/get to have kids, that’ll all work out, too!”

Text Source

“I Would Never Hear Her Voice Again”

“My mom died when I was a senior in high school. It all seemed very surreal and like she had never actually left since everything of hers was still in the house, where she had left it.

At her funeral, after hearing my brother and sister speak, make morbid jokes (as our family tends to do) and just generally do the normal funeral stuff, it finally hit me. It had been several days since she had passed, but it just hit me all at once like a bag of bricks that I would never hear her voice again. She would never be there to nag me when I needed to take out the trash, clean my room, do my homework, or the million other things that she had to constantly remind me to do.

That was the moment that I broke down and started sobbing. I hadn’t shed a tear up until that point–maybe it was shock, I don’t know. At that moment, I realized that I now lived in a different world; one where I would have to finish growing up without the aid of my mother.”

Text Source

When You Lose On Of Your Biggest Support Systems

“I’ll never forget when the husband of a close friend told me that she’d died, as well as her unborn baby, in a freak incident a week before giving birth.

I haven’t talked about their deaths in a while and didn’t realize how hard it still is for me to discuss. One of her internal arteries ruptured. Because it was their first pregnancy, they didn’t know that her ill feelings were from bleeding internally, and not from going into labor (it was a week before her due date). When she passed out, her husband carried her to their car, called the hospital (they lived close by), and got her into the ER. Unfortunately, she died from internal bleeding and so did their baby. My sweet friend and her baby are buried together in the same casket.

It was truly a freak accident that had nothing to do with the pregnancy. The artery would have ruptured even if she hadn’t been pregnant. The timing was just absolutely terrible. I think her husband said it was like a 1 in a 10 million chance that could ever happen to anyone. That’s why it was so freaky. Not likely to happen again.

I felt agony for her, for him, for their baby, for so many for so long. She was there for my baby when she was born, and I was going to be there for her. It’s been almost eight years, but I still want to cry.”

Text Source

They Chose To Stay With Dad…They Chose Wrong

“My father took my brother and me to Spain (we grew up/live in New Zealand, my parents were divorced) when we were 7 and 10 to visit his family there. My father and his family had a bad relationship because he struggled with substance abuse, was fat and rebellious as a teenager, and they are extremely attached to their image. This was our first time meeting his family.

About two days into the trip, my father got ridiculously wasted and had a massive fight with his parents. They decided he had to leave my grandmother’s house so my uncle said to my brother and me: ‘You can stay here with us or go with your dad.’ Of course, we picked our father, who we actually knew considering the rest were basically strangers to us still.

We ended up staying in hotels in Barcelona for the next week and a half while my father was out of control on an assortment of substances. He spent all his money, took us to dangerous parts of town at night, left us sitting in bars alone while he went to the bathroom to take some more. We had to beg for food. At one point, my brother and I were locked out of the hotel room and spent about at least six hours in the lobby because he was passed out wasted. In the end, my father hit a woman over the head and stole her purse, and the police found us at the hotel.

We got taken back to my father’s family for a few days and were then flown back to New Zealand to my mom. No one ever spoke to us about what happened; my brother and I only just talked about it recently. Over 10 years have passed. We tried to talk to my mom about it, but she didn’t want to listen. My father ended up dying from an overdose, which is another thing we don’t talk about.”

Text Source

Losing A Child

“My son died when he was 6 months old. Boy, that sure is a conversation ender.

He was born four years ago and he was my first child. The birth was all natural and very easy considering he was so small. He came at 24 weeks, so it was like giving birth lite. He spent a lot of time in the hospital and came home healthy, but later died from something unrelated and unknown (‘SIDS’ probably).

The things I remember most are his smile, his sounds, nursing, and babywearing.

I have an older brother who died before I was born and my parents rarely spoke of him because he was born in 1990, and it was different times. But since my son died, my mother speaks of her son a bit more. I’m lucky that I have lots of pics and vids whereas my mum doesn’t have that many.

I don’t really care that it makes people uncomfortable though, I still talk about him.”

Text Source

Luckily She Learned Of Her Ailment Early Enough

“Five years ago, when I was a sophomore in high school, I went into cardiac arrest during a cross-country meet. I now have an Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator. To this day, we are still unsure about what could’ve caused me to collapse. I have been tested for various genes that could’ve possibly caused this, but the tests have come back negative.

I used to be an athlete. Soccer was everything to me. I played club soccer and I wanted my stamina and speed to improve, so I joined the cross-country team at school. I wasn’t the fastest but I would say I had the most stamina and always came in first for my high school. I also wasn’t the best soccer player but I would say I was pretty good, and I wanted to improve in high school, to eventually play college ball.

I was about one mile into the race when I collapsed. Runners ran back to get some help. The route for the race was near a freeway and some drivers had pulled over to help as well. Coaches performed CPR until the ambulance arrived, which took about 24 minutes.

My mom tells me that during my first few days in the hospital, I had lost color in my skin. There was one point where doctors let all my family and friends see me, all at once, because they didn’t think I was going to make it out of that hospital. My parents were basically told not to get their hopes up as things did not look good for me. My parents and family stayed positive and had faith that God would get me through this. Whether you believe in God or not, I do. I believe that I would not be here today without God.”

Text Source

She Was Twice Burned

“I had a terrible ex-boyfriend who cheated on me with two different people. I took him back after the first one but dumped him after the second one.

Then my next boyfriend cheated on me too, and I caught them in bed. She had the gall to tell me she understood. I tried to kill myself, failed, and decided then that I was done with dating. I would date to commit and for no other reason. Shortly after, I met the man I eventually married and we’ve been together 17 years.”

Text Source

From It Girl To Total Nobody

“When I was 16 years old, I dated a bad guy. My parents hated him. They found out that we slept together and sent me to live with grandma in another state. I cut contact with all my old friends because it was pointless just texting them while I was living in another state.

Anyways, when I went to this new school, I thought it would be easy for me to make friends. I was popular at my old school; someone was always with me when I walked somewhere. But I was definitely wrong. Being the new girl sucked. I tried making friends there, but by the end of that school year, I was just alone. It felt like being isolated because I could’ve gone a day without talking to anyone except saying hi and bye to my grandma.

Though, this was one turning point in my life. I realized I didn’t need friends; I don’t need anyone to make myself happy.

It just changed the way I looked at people and old friends.”

Text Source