“For freedom Christ has set us free…” Galatians 5:1
I feel like sharing my story today. It is kind of long, but I will try to only share the most important parts. I know a lot of my friends know my story, but a lot of people don’t. I don’t share this story to make people feel sorry for me or to glorify myself, but to share what God has freed me from. I want to give Him all the glory! I want people to know that freedom is possible. Even when you are in the depths and feel like there’s no way out. Freedom will come. Just keep trusting.
There are a few parts to my story. The first part started when I was in elementary school. I suffered from anxiety and adhd and no one really knew. It’s no one’s fault. Mental health wasn’t talked about or really understood in the 80’s. I would come home from school most days and just throw these major tantrums. I was bullied VERY badly all through elementary and into junior high. I guess my anxiety and adhd made me an easy target. I was punched in the face and knocked out. I was pushed off a swing and stepped on. You get it. It was bad.
Fast-forward to high school. I was doing okay. I had a job. I was doing decently well in school. I had a long-time boyfriend who happened to also be my brother’s best friend.
I did fine in college as well, but my fiance (we got engaged on my high school graduation day…) broke up with me. I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. For some reason it was a huge surprise. I managed. I worked a lot as a pharmacy tech, took full loads in school, and was on the leadership team of the Baptist student ministry.
Robert and I met and married when I was in college and then we had Karis 2 years later. My anxiety definitely got much worse after babies. Worse each time.
Also during all of this time, starting when my brother was about 14/15, he started struggling deeply with mental illness. Between severe OCD and major depressive disorder, he was often suicidal. It was bad through high school (he was in a mental health hospital a few times). He did okay in college. When he graduated college, the bottom fell out. When I was pregnant with Karis, he was living with us for a bit. He stopped going to work. One day he disappeared. When he was found, he went to live with my parents.
He started working at a little grocery store in the town and met a woman who would end up being his wife. For a short time. They were very unhealthy together, and she left him after 10 months of marriage. It wasn’t necessarily THAT she left him that was the problem. It was HOW she left. She took everything including his dignity. In March of 2009 (two months later), Joey took about 150 pills. He was in ICU for a while, then when he was discharged, he ended up inpatient again. And again and again. In early fall of 2009, he decided to do ECT (electroconvulsive therapy). I found out recently from my doctor that they must have done it wrong because he lost most of his important memory. He said that if they did it right, he would not have lost his memory. He couldn’t remember how to use a computer, how to play his guitars (this was huge), and how to get to his favorite places. He also didn’t remember much about his niece and nephew. It was like there wasn’t much going on in his brain. A week after he got out of that hospital/treatment, he used a rifle to take his life. It was so traumatic that I didn’t know how to deal with it.
I was 7 months pregnant with Levi. It was so gruesome. I felt like I was watching a really terrible movie. It didn’t feel real for years. I will spare you the gruesome details, but just take my word for it. I am writing a memoir at the moment that DOES have the details, but for this blog post, I’ll spare you.
This started the downhill spiral for me.
Two weeks after Joey’s death, Robert was forced into a different position with the promise of the biggest house at camp at the time (not this camp where we are right now). He was miserable (and also expected to do some illegal things… at a Christian camp) and never home. We had an amazing house, but it was not worth it. We moved 6 months later to live with my in-laws. We had a 4, 2, and 5 month old. I started teaching full time and struggled so much.
After we moved from the camp to my in-laws, my alcoholism started.
I remember the first time I drank to change how I felt. I was sitting at my desk (well, my in-laws’ desk), grading papers late at night, and I “borrowed” some rum from my in-laws to make a rum and Coke Zero. I felt immediate relief from the severe anxiety and depression that I had been living with. From that moment on, I was constantly chasing that feeling of relief.
I had some moments that weren’t as bad. I had some moments of relief. But they were always short-lived.
I did decently well when I taught part-time at a pre-school in 2012-2013, but I tried teaching full time again in 2013-2014, and it didn’t go well.
I was inpatient in January-February 2014 (just a week that overlapped months). I did outpatient (partial hospitalization), then went right into therapy 3 times a week. I was diagnosed with bipolar 2 (that diagnosis was changed this year). I tried teaching again the next school year, and yet again had to leave mid-year (this was the fourth mid-year resignation at this point). I did another outpatient program and they tried to convince me that I was an alcoholic, but I fought that so hard.
My understanding of an alcoholic didn’t involve a 32 year old stay-at-home mom of 3 with a husband that worked at a church (and I was super involved in that church).
In March of 2015, we visited the camp where we are now and after a few agonizing months of waiting to find out if we would move here, we ended up moving here in May of 2015. I was so anxious while we waited, and I remember drinking a lot.
I found out that alcohol was allowed here, and I was relieved. I didn’t realize at the time that I was relieved because I didn’t know how to stop drinking.
My depression, anxiety, and alcohol use just got worse and worse. In the fall of 2015, I was suicidal, but I didn’t know how to go to the hospital while having 3 little ones. The counselor I was seeing thought I needed to go in for a month at least. I didn’t. My drinking and mental health just continued to decline.
In October of 2016, while Robert was out of town, the kids and I were staying at my parents’. I drank a lot as usual, and on October 11th, I had a panic attack that night in front of my parents. They were super concerned. I woke up the next morning just so sick of myself and feeling the way I was feeling. Through some phone calls, I ended up deciding on a rehab to check myself into. I took myself on October 13th.
I got sober and have continued that journey now over 7 years later. But it has NOT been all amazing.
I had to learn how to manage my anxiety without alcohol which meant I had to feel it on a level I hadn’t felt since I started drinking. I had to deal with my emotions and trauma. I had to experience a level of anxiety and depression that I didn’t know how to manage.
I had a cough for 4 years straight that I didn’t have relief from that whole time. I ended up finding out it was from anxiety. I was on a LOT of medications. About 12. I suffered and suffered.
I started really having a hard time with God. I couldn’t understand why He allowed my brother to suffer and die and why He kept allowing me to suffer. I was super distant with Him and angry which only made my mental health even worse.
In 2020, I decided to go back to teaching (dumb timing). I taught the full year that year, then the next year I left mid-year AGAIN. That’s a super long story, but part of it involves the district being terrible and part of it involves my poor mental health.
I started teaching with an online public school last year thinking it would be the best fit for me. It ended up being worse than the years before.
I started doing Ketamine IV treatments in in the fall of 2022. I thought that I was just wasting a lot of money on them. I didn’t realize they were helping. By April, I was starting to realize that I wasn’t as depressed (despite a lot that I had been through this year with one of my kids inpatient twice in the spring and having to quit my job again). I started homeschooling the boys which made me so happy and my boys were doing so much better. I still had anxiety, but the depression was minimal. I ended up coming off of all but 3 medications (and one was cut in half). Over the summer, I worked on my anxiety through nutrition and movement. And honestly, my relationship with God started becoming so much more intimate as well during this time.
The intimacy with Jesus has just grown and grown. I have learned to trust Him in a way I never had before. I have started spending time with Him every morning and worshiping Him all day.
This fall we started the journey of seeking out other job/camp opportunities. Like I have mentioned, there are many reasons that I don’t feel the need to share.
It has been anxiety-inducing for sure. But at least this time, I knew it was circumstantial. When I feel anxious, I have been able to remind myself of that. The main reason for the anxiety has been the unknowns and how some of the details would work out if we moved out of state (especially since Karis is a senior). Also, we didn’t know how to go on with life here while we waited to figure things out. Again, it was all circumstantial.
In October, I decided to have some “booster” Ketamine IV treatments as I started going into the fall season (usually when my mental health declines). I have done a few treatments, and it is amazing how much they help. I have zero depression and very little anxiety. I know part of that is God’s provision as well! I do also believe that God has provided these treatments for me. I also did an EMDR treatment that made a HUGE difference for me as well (with my amazing counselor that I will miss!).
I have gone from YEARS of depression and severe anxiety to freedom. Part of it is also just seeing how much God has worked out with this whole new job/move situation. He has provided in ways I could have never asked or imagined. I feel light. I feel free. I feel liberated from the heaviness that I have lived with for so long.
There is also a lot of heaviness that we are leaving behind by moving. This place has been a place in which I have done a lot of healing, but it has been a place of a lot of struggle as well. I’m not saying moving to a new camp will take away all struggle. Life is hard. But I know that I am leaving this place a new person and going into a new state, camp, and way of life with a renewed sense of passion for Jesus, His people, His creation, and service. I am leaving behind the heaviness and moving forward. I don’t have to live in my trauma and mental illness. I can live with light and joy and peace. We have also been super intentional in this job search about avoiding specific things that have made where we are so hard. We have sought God’s plan and will more than ever before. We were patient as He closed doors that could have taken us into more struggle. We trusted Him.
One more thing that I didn’t realize was weighing me down was attempting to live with-in a label of “homesteader” and all that I felt that came with that. I didn’t realize until we gave our chickens to friends here that I was walking around feeling like I could never measure up. I followed a ton of “homesteaders” and “real foodies” and thought that if I didn’t eat all organic/grass-fed/pastured meat and (raw) dairy, didn’t use all natural products, didn’t make everything from scratch, ate any processed food, allowed my kids to have food dyes, didn’t continue to grow our homestead, etc, that I was a failure. That I was doing it all wrong.
I have gotten into the trap many times over the years. Part of it is my ADHD. I’m an “all in or all out” kind of person. I struggle with consistency with imperfection because I am very all or nothing. I recently decided to shed that label (yes, again) because I can’t be that person. I just can’t. I want to just eat balanced, move my body in ways that make me happy, adventure, listen to my favorite music, love others and have hospitality, play games with friends and family, teach my kids, be involved in an amazing church, use products that I can afford and that are “good enough,” and be light and free. I don’t need a label. I don’t need the prison of expectations that aren’t even necessary. Even if we decide to get chickens again one day, that doesn’t mean I need a label. Knowing my ADHD, I’m sure I’ll want to go back to some of these things, but I hope I remember the freedom that I feel now not trying to live up to some label that I can’t fit in.
I am “Simply Courtney,” and my identity is in Christ alone!
It is possible to not live with-in the chains of mental illness. It is possible to find hope and healing. Just keep taking one minute at a time. Focus on gratitude. Seek Jesus. Remember who you are and whose you are.
simplycourtney.org 