4. Public School, Boyfriends, and the Dangerous Road to Depression.

I decided I would start attending public school when I got to 8th grade, this is something I was excited for, but also super nervous about. This was right after we moved, and we were in the middle of building our house. For the time being, we were living in a trailer on our property while we built the house; my dad and brother built almost the entire thing from scratch, and the rest of us girls would help out where we could. During this time there was a lot of stress going on within my family, because of the finances, how busy everyone was, the small trailer we were staying in, especially since there were 9 of us living in it.

Since there was a lot of other things going on during that time frame, there seemed to be that much more contention going on within the family, and between my parents. There were some things I enjoyed about going to school, but for the most part I felt completely out of place. It was around this time that I developed the feelings that if I didn't have a boyfriend I was No One. I think a lot of that attachment sense was developed because of the sexual abuse earlier on in my life, but the feelings of that seemed to explode once I started attending public school. I had my first "boyfriend" about halfway through the school year, and was completely devastated when he broke up with me. Even though the relationship was silly, and completely pointless, I felt that since I no longer had a guy, I must be a loser. It seemed like from that time forward I learned to draw any feelings of worth from whether or not I had a boyfriend. It was such an unhealthy way of thinking, and led me to get into so many relationships with stupid guys at a young age just because I was desperate to feel "wanted" to feel like I had some worth, to feel loved. In a way I felt like my ability to feel love or worth was robbed from me at a young age because of the sexual abuse; and now the only way I knew how to recreate those feelings was to have someone to use me again.

I could go on all day about all of the complete loser guys I fell for because of my lack of self-esteem, but I will just share some of the main things that contributed to who I am today, and my need for recovery. Overall my depression, and feelings of complete worthlessness took a dramatic rise by being apart of the public school system. I never loved my appearance much, but it wasn't until I started going to school that I started completely hating everything about my image. I hated my face, I can't tell you how much I wished I had a different face; I thought I was so ugly. I did not like the rest of my body either, a lot of the time I was uncomfortable with my weight. I was very skinny for my height, and I was always hearing comments about how tiny I was. Normally some people might enjoy receiving those comments, but where I already hated my image, I hated these comments. It was everything from "You look like a twig," "You're so skinny it's gross," "You look like you're anorexic" all I could think of in my mind, is: "Yes, thank you, I already know I look gross, but it's not like I am trying to look this way." I ate normally, I didn't starve myself, and there was no way that I was anorexic; but always hearing those comments made me very self-conscious about my image/weight. 

Between the years of 8-9th grade I felt like my self-esteem was steadily getting worse, and by the time I reached 10th grade I felt like my life consisted of daily fighting thoughts of suicide. I hated school, I absolutely hated it; I loved learning, but I felt like public school was filled with so much social drama and negativity that it wasn't even worth it. I was a good student, had a 4.0; but I hated the social aspect of the school, and since it was a small school there was a ton of drama. I was so obsessed about my appearance by this time, it felt like I spent hours and hours each day checking myself in the mirror, even if just a hair was a little out of place I felt like I must look horrible. Looking back now, it was completely ridiculous how much I cared about my appearance, and how badly it affected my depression. Not only was my ridiculous obsession with my appearance and hating how I looked spiking my depression, but the guys I began dating were getting worse and worse when it came to standards. It didn't take long for me to start getting used by each guy I dated, I gave into so much stuff that I did not want, and had no desire to participate in. My views of wanting to feel worth, and longing for love had become so skewed that I would go against everything I believed in just to feel like someone wanted me for a moment. I come from a strong LDS background, and had always been such a good girl (not to mention naive) I had no desire to participate in anything sexual at that time, I knew it was wrong, and I knew what I believed. But somehow in the mix of my depression hitting an all-time low, I would sacrifice everything I was just to feel loved for a short amount of time. Of course, naturally guys took advantage of that; telling me that they "loved me" just so that they could push me as far as they possibly could. At this point I still would not allow myself to lose my virginity, because I wanted that for my marriage, I wanted to make sure that I saved that for the guy that I knew 100% that he actually loved me. 

My life turned into a cycle of getting a new boyfriend, dating him until he would use me to the point where he knew he couldn't push my boundaries any further, then getting dumped. Then it was onto the depression pit; not only because I was the loser that got dumped, but because I lowered my standards for that loser that was so willing to pretend like he loved me, just so that he could use me. Then I would make my way to the bishop's office, trying to repent of my mistakes, trying desperately to fix who I was becoming. Not long after, I would get asked out by the next guy, who of course would do the same thing, and I would fall for it because I was so desperate to feel some type of worth. I was forced into doing a lot of things I did not want to do, but since I felt worthless, it was hard to feel like it mattered that people did this to me. This cycle is how I spent high school, and in the midst of it developed a lot of unhealthy coping outlets. I started cutting; wrists, arms, legs, wherever I felt the urge. Call me a freak, but even today I still have the scar of a name carved on my leg of an ex boyfriend, as a depressing reminder of the nightmare of a life I used to live. I felt so hollow inside, so dead, that I think I longed to feel the physical pain to at least help me feel a little alive. I never slept at night, I would stay up thinking about how much I hated myself, I could not shut the thoughts off, I wanted so desperately to just shut them off. All I could think about is that I needed to die, that there was no reason for me to live, I had no worth, I was nothing. I started overdosing on random pills I could find around the house, out of attempts to end my life. Of course at that point I was a little naive as to what it would actually take to kill myself with pills, but the attempts were still very real, and very frightening. I would inhale harsh chemicals just hoping that it would do enough damage to maybe fry my brain or something, I would use myself as a punching bag, trying to beat my head on anything I could find. I was so hopeless, all I wanted to do was be free of this life, I had enough of it. There were many nights I would just plead with God, begging him to please end my life, take me home, I had no place here, I did not deserve to live. I had a best friend that stood by my side through this all, she is literally a god-send, that girl has saved my life on more occasions than I can count. I am so grateful I had her in my life, and at the same time felt so unworthy of her friendship and the love that she showed me. 

To understand a little how I was feeling, you have to understand just how I was before I hit this stage of my life. I was a good girl when it came to church standards (even to the point where I would get made fun of by my other church friends, because I was "too churchy" for them)  I read my scriptures cover to cover time and time again, I prayed, I loved my parent's and obeyed them, etc. I was so excited to some day be able to marry in the temple, it was my ultimate goal, and I wanted nothing to keep me from getting there. That being said, when I hit this point in my life, the mistakes I was making were completely devastating to me, I did not want to be that person. The last thing I wanted to do was sin against God, I wanted so desperately to be acceptable in his eyes, and worth it. So when I would make mistakes, I would blow it up to the point where I felt there was no way I deserved God's love, or anyone's love for that matter. Those feelings would take over my depression, making me feel like my only option would be to kill myself. (Of course my mindset was very skewed at the time, but those were my true feelings, and it was terrifying not knowing how to escape them). The other thing that was so devastating for me was the fact that my parent's always saw me as the good child, the helper in the family, the peace-maker. So when I started struggling, I knew I had completely disappointed them, and that was something that was so hard for me to bear. Of course they still didn't know of the turmoil I was facing from my earlier years, and they didn't get why I was depressed, so it was hard for them to understand what all of a sudden flipped the switch, and where their good little girl went.

By this point things were getting serious enough that my good friend decided she had no choice but to let my parents know what was going on, and at this point my bishop was also made aware of my severe depression problems. Nobody understood why I was depressed, to them it was "Kelsie, you are so pretty, how can you be depressed?" but they couldn't see how I felt on the inside, I felt like trash, like I had already died on the inside; like I was robbed of worth long ago. I spent many nights supervised, just to make sure that I would not harm myself, and that I would actually be alive the next morning. Of course my spike in depression/suicidal tendencies didn't help how people viewed me at school; I already felt like a freak, but now people were starting to notice it more and more. During high school, I'm pretty sure that I had heard every rumor about myself that you could ever imagine, and had been categorized into every cliche possible. Some called me a prep and stuck up; because I dressed nice, didn't talk much, and had the blue-eyes, blonde hair look. Other's called me a stoner and a druggy because I would go to school with my eyes bloodshot, and be barely coherent because of my lack of sleep and my tendencies of self-harm. Some called me a Gothic; because I would listen to angry music, walk with my head down, dress in dark clothes, and they would see my scars. I got called a slut, and a whore, because of the rumors of me apparently "sleeping with every guy in the school." I got called a freak, because rumors would spread about me attempting suicide, or my cuts, or my depression. I got called a loser, because I had pretty much one friend in high school (other than the guys that would pretend to be my friend for long enough to use me) I had heard every name and rumor in the book; and to say the least, it hurt, especially since I was already fighting just to stay alive. 

My bishop finally decided that I needed some counseling, so he offered to help pay for me to see a LDS counselor. It was very low-key, and he wasn't very professional, we would meet up at a church building weekly. Problem with trying to do counseling, at this point I had about zero desire to get help, all I wanted was to just escape the pain. So mainly the counseling would consist of him trying to get me to talk, I would say very little if anything at all, then he would tell me that I was just wasting people's time and money (Great thing to tell someone that is already suicidal, ha!) It got to the point where he threatened that if I didn't start talking, that he would send an ambulance to my house, they'd put me in a straight jacket and haul me off to the mental hospital, and they did not need my parent's permission. Well that was comforting....NOT. By that point I was so ready to be done with the stupid "counseling." I knew he didn't care about me, he acted like I was a waste of space, and was threatening to put me in a mental hospital. It was then that I finally started doing a little talking, but mainly just lied through my teeth acting like I was doing fine so that I could be done having to deal with that guy. I definitely resented counseling at that point in time; and felt like NO ONE could ever understand me, let alone actually help me. 

3. Primary Years

I was a very shy kid growing up, and the fact that I was also home-schooled contributed to that fact, because I didn't have much of a social life outside of my own home. The main social interaction I would get with other kids my age was from church, but I was so very shy, so I did very little talking to my classmates. A lot of times I also felt very picked on going to my primary classes, because some of the other kids would make fun of the fact that I would not talk. I felt bullied going to primary, and bullied when I would go to other activities such as Activity Days. The teacher would ask us questions, and I felt like I almost always knew the answer to them, but I was terrified to actually voice my answer. The few times that I would actually share an answer, the teacher would always be very impressed with what I had to say, because I would give very thorough/thought-out answers; but when I did share an answer, I would get ridiculed by the other kids in the class. It was always, "Oh my gosh, did Kelsie actually say something?" or "Shh Kelsie! You talk way too much!" which would be followed by a chorus of laughter and jokes. That treatment made me feel even more like a freak and a loser, causing me to want to keep my mouth shut that much more. For some reason I always seemed to have problems with other girls my age, mainly because I would get picked on a lot and made fun of by them. For that reason, I have had very few friends that are girls throughout my life. It seemed like any attempts I did make to have friends which were girls were only met with being made fun of, having my name trashed, stabbing me in the back, etc. So instead I turned to just having guy friends, I would always be hanging out with the neighbor boys; we would play football, Cops & Robbers, Night-Games, etc.

I loved the fact that my Mom cared about us kids enough to keep us home and teach us herself, she originally made that choice when my older brother and sister were getting bullied in Elementary. After that, she gave the rest of us younger kids the option when we would reach school age, as to whether or not we wanted to attend public school. I chose to be home-schooled, up until I got into 8th grade, at that point I started attending public school. Although the downfall about being home-schooled was the fact that you would also get ridiculed for that from the other kids, and were basically just seen as a complete weirdo. Not because we weren't smart enough, or good enough, but just because everyone assumed that it just made us "different" and that being different, must be a bad thing. I loved learning, and was always at least one grade ahead in my schooling;  that was the beauty of being taught from home, you could actually move at your own pace, instead of just having to progress by grade year. As I grew older, the fact that I did not go to public school made me feel even more like I just DID NOT BELONG, and that I never seemed to fit in anywhere.

When I was 12 years old, and just recently graduated into Young Womens, my family decided to move. The new location that we would be moving to was a very small town, basically in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. I was scared to move, because I would have to leave the only friends I had, the neighbor boys from across the street; and I did not have a good track record for making new friends. The ward that we moved into was a great ward luckily, with so many great people, that they welcomed us right in. I was able to make some friends with a couple of the girls in the ward (mainly because their parent's were my young women's leaders, so at first I kind of felt like it was forced) But later on they would end up becoming my best friends. I did however still feel like everyone looked at me like I was a loser because I did not attend public school. Now that we were in this new ward, I also tried to share my voice a little more; but I got similar reactions as I did in my old ward. I feel like I would share something, and the other kids reaction would be "Okay misses smarty pants," or acting like I was such a "goody-good" just because I actually knew the answers. This drove me nuts, I knew the teachers appreciated my answers, but I felt like I didn't belong in my age group. This again drove me not to want to talk much at church, because the other kids would treat me like I must be Miss Perfect, when in reality I felt oh so far from perfect, I felt like a messed up freak.

One of the things that I did love to do when growing up was playing sports. My parent's had put me in soccer when I was 5, and basketball when I was 8. I was obsessed with sports, I felt like it was my life, and one of the few things that I felt like actually brought me happiness. That was the other thing I was scared to lose by moving, because I did not know if they would have the teams in such a small town, and if my parents would have the money for it after we moved. I was able to continue playing sports once we moved, although it was not near as much as I had before. I wish I would have been able to continue playing sports throughout middle school and into high school though, because I feel like playing on sport's teams is one of the things that helped me feel like I had some purpose.

This was also a hard time for me, because during this time frame I found out that my little sister ( 9 or 10 at the time) had started participating in online chat rooms, and in the mix of things got involved with some not-so-great guys. We would play games online, so my parent's were okay with it from time to time, but they did not realize that the games also included chat rooms so that you could chat with the other players. Most of the time it was just innocent and random conversation, but of course as with anything online, it has the possibility of being bad as well. It was there that my little sister started chatting with guys that were much older than her, at least 16+ (honestly who knows how old they really were) but it got to the point where they started talking dirty to her, sending her nude pics, and requesting her to send pictures in return. My dad is a mechanic and owns his own small car lot, so us kids would always help out there and get paid a small amount in return. One day as I went to take pictures of some of the cars on the lot so that I could post them online for my dad, I found naked pictures of my little sister on the camera. I was shocked, and was so scared of what I would have to do. I ended up feeling like I needed to tell my mom about it, so I took her the camera and told her what I found. After that instance, I continued to find random evidence that my sister was chatting with older guys and sending inappropriate pictures, I was scared for her because she was my little sister. I hated having to tell my mom about it, but I felt like it was something I needed to do, and ever since then I feel like my sister has hated my guts for it. I knew I rated her out, so I expected she would not be happy with me; but I did not know what else to do, I was concerned for her safety. Either way, I again felt like I was the hated one in the family, the one that was always getting people into trouble. I turned a lot of that hate inward toward myself, feeling like everyone would be better off without me around

2. Fighting & Trying to Play the "Hero"

Of course, just like in most every family, there is always some sort of fighting that goes on between the siblings, this was also the case with mine. My oldest sister is mentally handicapped, she is pretty normal for the most part, she just has the mindset of a child because of the handicap. I've always had the personality from a young age where I try to be the Peace Maker, I hated when anyone in my family would fight, I absolutely hated it and it terrified me. When I was young my oldest sister, and the sister right above me in age would always get into fights. The fights would always turn out to be a little more intense or get more out of hand because of the fact that my oldest sister was handicapped, so she lost control of her emotions easier. These fights would always take place when my parents would be gone, my sister LaKan would always try to instigate Annie to the point where she would get so frustrated and they'd start physically fighting. This always scared me, and especially since I was younger then them I was so terrified that they would hurt each other, and there was nothing I could do about it. One of them is 3 years older than me, and the other is 10 years older than me; but despite the age difference I would always try so hard to stop them, beg them not to hurt each other. It didn't make a difference, it was as if I was nonexistent, and it hurt me knowing that I could not control it, that I could not make them stop hurting each other. I would beg and scream and cry my eyes out, and it wouldn't make a difference.

It got to the point where I was terrified of having to be in the house without my parents at home, my parents would always go on a weekly date night on Friday nights and us kids would stay at the house. Everyone acted under control when they were there, so they saw no concern with leaving us there without them since some of my siblings were old enough to take care of the others. But they didn't know that these fights would happen every time they left, and I was too scared to tell them, out of fear of what my siblings might think or do. I would beg and beg my parent's not to go out, but of course they would still end up going, because they didn't know the real reason behind it. So instead I learned to run and hide from my fears. As soon as my parent's left for the night I would go directly outside as far as I could get away from the house and hide, hide, cry and wait as long as I could until it was safe to go back inside. Even though it was coming from a naive child's perspective, to me at that time these events were terrifying, and I was honestly scared that someone would end up getting killed because of it. The thought of that sent me into sheer fear and trauma. These events were also something that I did not realize affected me so much until it came up in a counseling visit only a year or so ago, and my psychologist finally explained how events like these in our childhood shape how we act and feel as adults. It made so much more sense after she pointed that out; I have always struggled so much with anxiety problems, I always feel terrified, many times there's not even anything I can tie the feelings back to, except for they are there, and I feel like the world is probably out to get me in some form, or some type of danger or stress is always lurking. This is also where I believe I developed the response of running away from my problems, anything that I was scared or unsure of, I ran from. I avoided all forms of uncomfortable conversations (or almost all conversations in general) I avoided any type of contention between people, if I even heard or felt the least amount of contention in the air, I would try my best to escape, I did not want to be anywhere near it because it sent me into trauma mode; when I felt like my depression was too much to bear I wanted to run from it by ending my life. I literally trained myself to RUN from my problems, there were a couple instances when I was a teenager that I ran away from home, because I felt like I just couldn't deal with the messes that were going on at the time, and my childlike mindset still told me that running was how to fix that.

I also feel like this is where I developed a lot of my feelings of feeling as though I am completely worthless and useless; no matter how hard I would try to help out and stop the fighting I could not do ANYTHING, and if anything I would end up making it worse. I felt like I had zero purpose, like I was one big problem. Especially because a lot of the times the fights would get started over me, like who "got to play with me" etc. so that made me feel like even more of a problem. I also felt like I had no voice, my siblings would not hear a word I said, and did not care that emotionally I was torn apart with their fighting, and I felt I had no voice to tell my parents the truth.

So by this point, my negative feelings towards myself were at an all time high, between the sexual abuse that went on from my brother, and the helplessness I felt towards my siblings always fighting. All ranging from the ages when I was between 6-10.

As silly as I'm sure this all sounds to an outsider, it effected my emotions greatly because of my personality. I felt like who I was, and what I was did not matter. In all honesty, I felt like a complete ghost, the only thing I felt I was good for was causing problems. The fact that I had the personality of a "peace maker" also hurt because that would cause my other siblings to get so upset with me, I always felt like I was the hated child, like I was the one getting people in trouble (even though I didn't mean to) The only person I felt like appreciated who I was, was my mom, but I felt like I was mute to her because I did not feel like I had the ability to talk because of all of the emotional chaos and confusion going on inside of my young brain. I hated the fact that everyone acted like I was the "perfect" child, like I was the "goody-good" because deep inside I felt like a complete mess, and I hated myself, I didn't feel perfect; I felt like I shouldn't even exist. I felt like a mess, one big useless mess.

1. Childhood Influences

The family I grew up in was very loving, but also very strict. Although I always felt that my parent's wanted what was best for us, and that they loved me, I always felt the sense that I wasn't quite Enough. It felt as though there was very rarely meaningful conversation in my home, and that sharing your feelings was completely unheard of. I come from a family of 9, with 5 sisters and 1 brother. I felt very much like a mute as a child, like no matter how badly I wanted to express myself I just could NOT get the words to come out of my mouth. Granted, I'm sure a lot of that came from the shame I felt because of the fact that my older brother had sexually abused me at a young age.

I was somewhere between the ages of 6-8 when it started, my brother being about 6 years older than me; it would happen frequently for a period of time, then there would be a space of time where he would leave me alone, only to have it reappear months to a year or so later. I believe this happened up until I was around the age of 10 or 11. I do not see my brother as being a bad guy at all, and I believe the things he did back in the day was merely out of a sense of curiosity and not to hurt me; but either way, the trauma that has developed throughout my life because of those days has been overwhelmingly hard to bear. Although I've dealt with a lot of shame and depression because of those events, it actually wasn't until I was sitting in a counselors' office a little over a year ago that I finally realized that what my brother did was WRONG and that I was truly effected by it. I had been in complete denial about the whole ordeal until it finally resurfaced in that office, I had done so well at denying it that I had almost managed to wipe it from my memory. The only problem is that the pain, anxiety, depression, etc. were all still there; and I had not realized that a lot of these feelings I had been battling my entire life could actually be traced back to the sexual abuse. I had told no one about what my brother did to me, NO ONE, I had been living with the burden of the abuse for almost a good 15 years before it finally came out in that office; although it brought back a lot of very bad memories and feelings, in a way it was also refreshing. Refreshing to know that maybe I wasn't as crazy as I had lead myself to believe over the past 15 years, maybe I wasn't as screwed up as I had made myself out to be; there was real trauma there, trauma that I had been dealing with because of a situation that I had been completely in denial about.

I did not want anyone to know, I did not want anyone to think of my brother as a "bad guy" and me being the younger sister I did not even know if my feelings were valid. Was this sort of stuff okay to happen? Was it actually abuse? Did it really matter? YES...But it wasn't until my psychologist blatantly validated these feelings that I was finally able to accept them. This wasn't me, this wasn't my problem, it was abuse, and I had been dealing with the trauma and effects of it throughout my life. Once I shared it with my counselor the memories that I had tried so hard to block out of my mind came rushing back. I remember how dirty I felt, how used, how worthless, how confused. I was just a little girl, I didn't know what sense to make of it, and I didn't dare share it with my parents. I remember when I reached the age of 8 to be baptized I felt so guilty and dirty that I did not know if I should be baptized, or if God would see me as someone that was fit to be baptized. It was something I had been looking forward to for so long, and was so excited for; but now even as an 8 year old I felt worthless and like I had no right to become a member of God's church. Seriously, 8 years old, and I already felt like a complete piece of trash? No wonder I've struggled with depression problems my entire life! Even to this day, almost 15 years later I still feel the trauma; as much as I wish it didn't, it effects my marriage. It is so hard to be intimate with my husband without a lot of those negative feelings coming rushing back; my brother had literally made me feel like a science project, a freak of nature, an object to be explored, and now trying to have a healthy intimate relationship with my husband was sooo difficult (not to  mention the other sexual abuse added on top of that which I would experience throughout my teenage years).

It was also during this same time frame that I remember feeling some of my first suicidal thoughts; of course they were much more naive at this point. But even then I recall developing the unhealthy thoughts of "well maybe if I were to kill myself then I could escape these feelings", or "maybe it would show everyone how much I am hurting". The fact of the matter is, I developed a lot of very unhealthy ways to deal with my feelings at a very young age, and those behaviors have continued to haunt me throughout my life.