To the Bottom and Back

I've climbed up a lot of mountains and tumbled off of a lot of cliffs in my life. If you met me before I turned 16, you would have seen the girl trying to be invisible in the back of the class room. I was lost and I didn't have a clue as to which way to turn to climb out of the hole I was in.

Falling To The Bottom

When I was a little girl I was passes around a lot because my mother and father couldn't take care of me. It was to the point where I never expected anything of my parents. I was sent from one relative to family friend and back again. If I got to spend even a week with my mother every couple of months I was ecstatic. Then after I turned six I started to feel like my life was going to actually be a life. I got to move in with my mom and I was the happiest child you'd see anywhere. I finally began to trust again. I couldn't have wished for more if I tried and I didn't ask myself why no one wanted me anymore.

However my happiness was short lived. Just after I entered my seventh year my mom had to leave. I understood all the reasons why she had to leave, her mother was very sick and she needed to be with her. She left and I lived with my 16 year old sister. That summer I got to go visit her and again I was happy; for a while... I got to Washington with my mom and we went and saw my grandmother. I knew she was sick. Even at the age of seven; unlike many kids that age; I understood things like pain and loss that many people never know. My grandma died a few weeks later on mother's day. I knew inside that I really had nothing to do with her loss but for almost the next decade, I would blame myself for my mother not getting to say goodbye. It was a long time before I understood in my heart that there was nothing I could have done.

From there my summer seemed to only get worse. My mother was devastated and I didn't know what to do to help her find her way back. Soon after my grandmother's death my mother sent me to Oregon to stay with my uncle whom I'd never met. I fell to the bottom of the well and didn't even have the inclination to try and climb back out. I'd go days without eating or showering. I'd lock myself in the library converted into a guest room and not re-appear for long periods of time because I didn't want anything to do with the outside world.

After a month of living with my uncle, my mother came and got me and sent me back home to Alaska a few weeks later. I begged her to let me stay, we were both bawling and security at the airport let her come through with me to my gate. I got on the plane and cried myself to sleep. I landed in Anchorage Alaska after midnight on 9/11 on one of the last planes to be grounded in the U.S. The next few months in grade school went by in a haze. I wanted the one person I couldn’t have; my mother.
The years that followed were hard years. I lived with my sisters and we had to move from house to house a lot. There were times that we had no food, no money, not even power in our house for heat and hot water. I remember one time; my sister was stressed out about how we were going to get money for the heating bill among other things. We couldn’t do the dishes or take showers or anything so one day she had to run in to town so I did the only thing I could to help out. I dug out the coffee pot and heated up water so I could do the dishes and clean the house. It seemed to take forever but I did it. I was eight.

We had a lot of help from other people who didn’t know us at all but somehow knew we needed it. They weren’t family or friends, ironically enough no one in our family seemed to help out at all. They were people who heard about our situation from someone who heard from someone who knew someone else. The free lunch program at school was the only meal I could really count on because I didn’t know if we were going to be able to get milk let alone food. My sisters did everything they could to make sure my brother (when he was home) and I got what we needed and they always seemed to have something up their sleeve to keep us happy.

After I entered my double-digit years, things got a little easier because I could get myself to the bus and stay at home alone. But I was still lost. I had no self-esteem or self-worth. The two people in my life who were supposed to be there were the two people farthest from sight. For the sake of my sisters and their future I tried to do the best that I could while I was around them. I did my homework and my chores and pasted a smile on my face. It was at night when everyone else had gone to bed that I was in relief because I didn’t have to pretend that I was okay and I felt good and I was having a normal childhood. I just kept sinking lower and lower and putting on a ficant during the day. My mother was back in Alaska now but she still wasn’t around. I only saw her every once in a while.

When I was fourteen and a half, I started hurting myself. I figured that since no one wanted me, why should I want myself?

Climbing Out

My friends all knew what I was doing and they also knew that there was nothing they could do to help. I had to fight my own demons. Eventually I saw how it was hurting the people around me to hurt myself so I stopped and I began to let myself dream and hope. I also began to explore Wicca.

Four days before I turned 16 my three year old neice died from lukemia. I didn’t know what to do at first, I wanted to run as fast as I could but then I wanted to curl up and pretend that it was all just a dream. I was scared that I would lose myself again. The next day I went to a metiphysical/pagan store. I know the owner and as soon as I walked in there I knew that I wanted to devote my life to Wicca. For my birthday the owner of the store gave me my first set of Oracle Cards, they were called Angel Therapy for helping you learn to listen to what your guardian angels are telling you.

When I began to use them they began to open up doors for me that I never knew were there. I finally understood that I wasn’t alone and I began to turn my life around. I was happier and I could smile and laugh more freely. My confidence and courage began to build (as the store owner said) I began to bloom into my light like a late winter flower. I also began to forgive myself and others. I accepted that the bad things that have happened to me weren’t my fault and I was stronger because of them.

I wouldn’t have said or even thought this a few years ago but, I wouldn’t change the way my life went for anything because of the lessons I’ve learned from it. I understand now in my heart that the things that have happened to me, good and bad, do not define who I am but they have influenced who I’ve become. I am my own person, with my own beleifs and fears and tastes and dreams. I know now that I can be whoever I want to be. If I believe in something enough, I can make it real.

To anyone who reads this and has self-confidence/esteem issues, know right here and now that that’s not who you are unless you let it be. You are not alone and I know how you feel. I’ve lost people dear to me and I’ve hurt people I love and I can’t take all that back but I can forgive the people who have hurt me and I can also forgive myself.

Now if you met me, you would see the girl at the front of the class voicing her opinion with passion and confidence. I know that I still have a long journey ahead of me and climbing out of my hole was one of the hardest and easiest things I’ve ever had to do. It was hard because I didn’t want to acknowledge the pain I’ve been through or the things that I’d buried but it was easy because I knew that once it’d been done, I would be a better free’r woman than I ever was as a child. Some of the most important lessons you’ll ever learn are the ones that are hardest ones to get through.


I just want to say that I am as happy as ever now. I still don't see my parents often but I'm okay with that. I still struggle sometimes but I always fight through it. I'm not perfect, I'm not without problems, but I have hope.