Me

I was always the different one at school. The one who acted older. The one who looked older. At a young age I loved God, but that love was lost. I lost his trust when the bullying started. The same three girls. Jade, Samantha and Stevie. Thought they were my best friends but they were far from any sort of friend I wanted. They pushed me in corners and kicked me. They set me up and made it seem I was a thief. They verbally, physically and mentally destroyed me bit by bit. That�s when I stopped understanding God�s work. I was always taught he protected his people and gave them the best. Was this my best? Had I done something to deserve this torture? All I wanted were answers and a reasoning behind what was going on. But I never got that.
So, what reason did I have to think he was there? I had people in my class who were from different religions and their God�s seemed to be doing something in their lives. In my mind I firmly decided Jesus was a lie.

In year 6 I had read a book about a young girl who had made herself sick. It seemed the perfect way to deal with my problems and also get rid of the fat and ugliness I had always been told I had. I used it when I was sad, angry, nervous or just simply annoyed with life. I took it out on myself and punished my body for what others were doing to me. However, very soon it became a way of life. By the time I was in year 8, I was a bulimic. I looked absolutely fine and would eat a few meals a week just to show people I was okay. But inside I wasn�t. I was filled with pain all the time and looking in the mirror was a nightmare. I couldn�t sleep or think and I barely had time for going out or making friends.

I became used to settling for whatever life would throw at me. I became friends with anyone hoping for a new start in life. Once again I got into a crowd which belittled me and made me feel even worse about myself. The people around me were slowly turning to drinking, smoking and drugs and it made me turn more in on myself. People were getting boyfriends and going out on dates, and I just felt alone and unloved. I became angrier with myself and weirdly, at God even though I didn�t believe in him. I began to self harming and started taking too many pills. I was sleeping all the time and just wanted to be left alone in the world. But deep down, that was not what I wanted. I wanted love and friendship. My family were they for me the whole time, but I just pushed them away and thought they were pretending when they said, �we love you�. My heart was slowly breaking, and loving others was impossible whilst I hated myself.

In the summer holidays after year 9, August 15th 2006, I went away to a PGL camp on a dance holiday. Dancing was one thing I had always loved and had kept my spirits up. The feeling of expressing yourself through dance was a way of controlling how sad I was. But one night at the camp, there was an all night disco. I remember the setting clearly. We were upstairs and we were all sitting round a table. Someone had bought me a slush pupi and I happily agreed to drink it. However, everything from there is a blur. I remember being hot and someone taking me away from the place. Who I�ll never know, but my drink was spiked. What exactly happened I wouldn�t know either and to be honest I�m glad I don�t. I was either touched up and molested or raped. I didn�t tell my parents for a year. How could I? I had always been the first child who did nothing wrong, and now this. What was I meant to do? Bring it up at dinner? I just left it, but soon it began to eat away at me, damaging every part of my life. The school had found out from a friend I had told. They carried out STI and pregnancy tests and I was clear but that didn�t clear the pain or how scared I was. I couldn�t walk near guys for a while after it had happened, and I remember all those bruises up my legs on my stomach and up my arms. Nightmares haunted me for months and I always had the same dream. The dream of a huge hand coming down from above and grabbing me. The hand would then push me into a small area and strangle me. People could see I wasn�t the same. The old bubbly Paige had gone and a sad, lonely one had taken her place. Teachers would fix my tie and as they would touch me, I would jump. My life had changed. I couldn�t walk in the dark and friends had to be with me all the time. Even if I needed to toilet at school, I always made sure I had a friend with me.

Once again I questioned God�s work. He seemed to act more like the devil than a Holy God. He was meant to look down on you and keep you safe. But that idea had obviously left his mind when I was born. Where did it say in the bible that these sort of things should happen to people? I never knew the answers but could never ask them because I was ashamed. Religious Studies was a struggle. I argued that God was wrong and that he was not a great superior guy. I ignored my aunt and Nan�s opinions and brushed them aside as stupidity. At this point I was still bulimic and it was more regular. In year 10, I made a decision that those friends were not what I needed in my life. I moved to another group of people and was starting to feel happier. My confidence had soared and I felt comfortable being with these new people. I had realised that I could make friends and I was worthy of love. People were giving me compliments and I stood bemused. My life was starting to become something and I was thrilled and yet still looking back at the past and still not trusting a soul.

But in February 2007, I took a turn for the worse. I started having seizures. My first one was at school after the injections. I thought it was a one off. However, they lasted about 5 months. I was in and out of hospital and taken out of school. I soon became physically restricted and could not be left alone. My mum had to wash me and I spent days just laying on a couch or bed and constantly fitting. My speech was slurred and my eyes were rolling in my head. I was rushed in and out of different hospitals and had scans and tests running all the time. The worst part was that even though I could not communicate, I was still completely aware of what was going on. I couldn�t talk my thoughts but I cried them. I was in serious pain and slowly losing all normality in my life. I was starting to lose my memory and I had forgotten who I was and who the people around me were. Having to watch the struggle my friends and family were going through destroyed me. My heart started breaking again and the fear I had that people from school would start to hate me and think I was an attention seeking freak was aching away at me. I became paranoid and scared of my own shadow. I sat and cried for days just thinking about what my life was going to be like. I would not be able to drive or become the teacher I had always dreamed of being. I missed my exams for GCSE mocks and was failing in school. I wanted nothing more than to work and be a normal teenager but I could not even hold a pencil.

But one day, on a regular visit to the hospital, I was lying in a hospital bed in the Casey ward at Epsom Hospital. I looked at the young boy next to me who had anorexia and the girl opposite who had a lung infection. I saw the pain they were going through and was angry as these defenceless children did not deserve this. There and then I realised that I didn�t either. I was still a child. I didn�t need to carry the weight of the world on my shoulders.

I was crying and shouting at God. I wanted him to look after me and treat me like his child like he does for everyone else. I wanted a pain free life and I wanted to turn back the years and start a fresh. I looked out the window and there said to myself, �God I need you!� It was hard. Those four words were the one of the hardest things I had ever said. I had always been factual and believed only what I had seen. Believing in something which is invisible to the eye was a hard thing. But I needed to do it. My life was a mess, I was insecure, sad, bulimic, scared of life and slowly becoming iller.

My aunt Colette looked up Hillsong in leatherhead and she took me. I was sitting in the theatre not understanding the preaching, yet feeling it in my heart. I was singing along whilst still fitting and making uncontrollable noises with my mouth. But when they asked people to put there hands up and ask God into their lives, something in my heart said �do it!� I raised my hand and felt God there. I felt him in my heart and in my bones. I felt safe and free from all the heartache I had in the past. I realised from that moment what he was doing. He never left me hanging or made these things happen to me. He never stopped the devils work, but he was there, to guide me through and keep me strong. He pushed me through the rough times instead of guiding me. For that, I�ve come out a stronger person. The poem Footprints never made any sense to me, but now it is the most relevant thing to me. He helped me walk into that school and face the bully�s everyday and never change who I was to fit in. He gave me the strength to stay focused on getting better when I was ill rather than giving up and dying. He gave me the strength to believe in him.

God loves each person in the world and the things that have happened to me have helped me to help others. I talk about my past to most people and they start to realsie that they can get through anything. Life gives us tests and stresses, but it�s how we wish to handle them that matters. Running away from problems and hurting yourself never fixes the issue. However, asking for guidance and moving on does. God is that person you can ask for guidance, forgiveness and simple help. He hears everyone�s needs and cares for each individual whatever the circumstances.

I have not had a seizure since I turned to God and I have slowly recovered from the bulimia. Trusting someone has been hard and moving on from events and forgiving what happened has been harder. However, doing it has been the best thing ever. I�m starting to feel like a teenager again. I have the confidence to make new friends and interact with everyone. I can look in the mirror without wanting to shout and hurt my body. God has led me down a new path which I would never have found without him and he has helped me to become more confident and find new friendships.

God is powerful and when you can love him with all your heart loving yourself is ten times easier.

Currently 7.75/10
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Rating: 7.8 out of 4 votes cast