I went to the therapist this morning. Her name is Margaret Anne Brown. She’s a little off-the-wall, but she’s very nice. She genuinely seems to care, you know? I was a little hesitant, bearing my soul to a total stranger, but she knows what she’s doing, right? I have another appointment next week, so we’ll see how that goes. I’ll keep you posted.

I practiced some with JoHo tonight, and my tentative set list for my performance on the 27th is as follows:

“Bless the Broken Road” — Rascal Flatts (w/ Jordan)

“Hallelujah” — Leonard Cohen (w/ Jordan)

“I Hope You Dance” — Lee Ann Womack

I need the CD from Darcy for more ideas. I can add 2 more songs in there if I get the right ones.

BAH! I hate this. I wanted to do “Falling for You,” but there’s another girl in the showcase who’s doing 2 different Colbie Caillat songs. I just don’t want to over-do one artist, you know? Rah. Decisions, decisions.

♥MagWils

“Fallin’ for You”

—Colbie Caillat

♥

This song is adorable.

About a year and a half ago, I started going through depression. I felt really alone, and I felt like I didn’t have anyone to really confide in or who was there to support me. I made friends with the wrong people (not that they were bad people, just not people who were really friends), and I clung to them. In doing this, I ignored my schoolwork, my family life, and the problems I had going on in my mind and my heart. I was also working at Cracker Barrel at the time, and I felt like I was completely disliked there. I didn’t feel like one single person there cared anything about me at all. I felt just as alone there as I did in my personal life.

During this struggle I was dealing with, I began to have serious panic attacks. I would be perfectly normal and then, all of a sudden, break out into sobs to the point where I couldn’t breathe. These always scared me because I would just be crying for no reason, with no way to stop. Eventually, I told my mom about the panic attacks. One day, I had the worst panic attack I have ever had in my life in the middle of the dining hall at KSU. And even worse, I was sitting there at a table with two friends of mine, and they didn’t know how to help me, so they just sat there as if nothing was wrong. I know now that these girls do care about me, but at the time, I felt hurt at the fact that they made no effort to help me stop crying. I called my mom in tears, and she immediately had me picked up from school (I didn’t have a car at this point.) and made me a doctor’s appointment. My mom brought me to the doctor, who diagnosed me with Major Depression and Anxiety, and that was when I started to go on anti-depressants, as well as sleeping pills for insomnia. The doctor told me and my mom that the medication for depression and anxiety may take some time to get in to my system, but I eagerly started taking it. My mom wanted me to talk to a therapist, but I refused to go. I was scared that I would be labeled as a freak or people would think I was nuts. I told her, “Only crazy people need therapy. Normal people can handle their problems on their own.”

Eventually, it got to the point where I failed out of college, and KSU told me I had to take a semester off before I could re-apply. My parents finally let me quit my job, but it was around this time that I started having thoughts of suicide. I wondered multiple times a day things like “How many ibuprofen would I have to take to die?” or “If I used this knife to slit my wrists, would anyone find me before I bled to death?” I began trying to find a way to ease my pain by cutting myself - first with scissors, then with a razor blade. It was something I knew I shouldn’t be doing, but at the same time, I couldn’t stop. Looking back, I think deep down, I wanted someone to notice and help me stop. I think I was looking for someone to show me that they loved me and wanted me to get better.

October of 2010, my parents bought me a car. I didn’t know they were going to, so it completely surprised me. My car, which I named Tina-Tina, gave me an independence and freedom that I had never felt before. My mom told me upon giving me the keys, however, that the conditions of the car were that I pay for my own gas and insurance, and I make an appointment with a therapist. I told her I would, but I never did.

Right before Thanksgiving, I got in a car accident (Yep, I hadn’t even had my car for a month, and I wrecked it). At this time in my life, I was cutting myself more than ever before. I was upset with myself for getting in a wreck, embarrassed by the whole thing, and scared that I would not be able to have anything to drive anymore, knowing that my parents couldn’t afford to buy me a second car. I had almost totaled my car, but thank God, we had full-coverage insurance and a reliable auto body repairman who talked our insurance company into sparing my poor car instead of totaling her.

During the weekend of December 31, 2010 to January 2, 2011, I worked a Chrysalis weekend (which for those of you that don’t know, is a Christian retreat that I am involved in). I gave a talk, describing my struggles with suicidal thoughts, but I left out the part of my battle in which I was causing physical harm to myself. One night, someone noticed a cut that I had on my arm, and though I lied about it being from cutting (I joked about it, telling her it wasn’t), I cried that night because finally somebody was realizing that the cuts were there.

A few weeks later, after the medicine had started kicking in, I called my friend, Sydney, and I told her about how I’d been cutting myself. I knew Sydney from Chrysalis, and though she hadn’t heard my talk, I had told her about it. She told me she was proud of me for telling someone about the cutting and that she supported me, no matter what. Telling one person gave me the courage to stop myself, and whenever the urge to hurt myself began again, I had Sydney to call and talk to. Sydney and I had never been super close, and I honestly think it was a God thing that I called her. I called Sydney because I didn’t want to hurt the people who were closest to me, but I know that  I would not have been able to stop cutting had it not been for her.

Soon after that, around summertime, I was back to my happy-go-lucky, obnoxious self. I had been taking my medication daily, and I realized that I actually had handful of people in my life who I knew I could count on in my times of struggle. In August, I started back at KSU. I turned 20, and the day after, I started working at Barbecue Street, a restaurant near my house. I still work here, and I really do love my job. Barbecue Street is a great place to work, and I work with some fabulous people. I quickly became friends with a girl there. (I’m not going to bash this girl all over the internet, but those of you reading this are probably going to know who I’m talking about anyway. For the sake of being considerate, though, let’s call her Lydia.) Lydia and I started hanging out and sleeping over at eachother’s houses. We would go places together multiple times a week. I was really growing close to this girl. In September, she started dating this guy named Jordan that had recently started working at Barbecue Street with us. A few weeks into their relationship, Lydia called me and started telling me how she and Jordan were having problems because she was talking to her ex named (let’s call him…) Travis, who told Lydia that he was going to propose to her when he got back from his mission (He’s Mormon. They go on missions. Look it up). Jordan told Lydia that she had to choose, and I told her the same thing. I told her, “Look, Lydia, it’s not fair to either of these boys to avoid making a decision, but you can’t have both.” Jordan and Lydia broke up.

Within a few days, Lydia began telling me that she’d made a mistake, and not long after that, she and Jordan were back together. Except, now that Jordan knew about this Travis guy, he was more aware of things Lydia would do. (For example, she would have hundreds of text messages from Travis saved in her phone.) On October 19, 2011, Jordan texted me and asked me if he could call me. I called him, and he told me how he cared about Lydia, but he felt like she didn’t necessarily feel the same way and he didn’t know what to do. That night, I gained the best friend I have ever had in my entire life.

A few weeks later, Jordan and Lydia broke up again. Lydia called me in tears that night because she knew things were over. Jordan also called me, telling me that as hard as he’d tried, he knew they just weren’t going to work out. Then, the next day at work, Lydia told me that she and Jordan hadn’t broken up. Jordan said to me, and I quote, “What the stupid?” That pretty much summed that situation up. They had broken up again, for good, within a week or so. The day after they broke up, I found out that Lydia had kissed someone at a church event while she and Jordan were dating, and I told him, even though I didn’t want to, because that’s what best friends do. Later we found out that there were other guys, which I won’t go into right now. Lydia just didn’t treat Jordan right; let’s leave it at that.

After Lydia and Jordan broke up, Lydia was way over-dramatic, showing her true colors, and trying to blame Jordan for everything. Jordan tried to remain friends with her, but Lydia made it impossible, bashing Jordan to anyone who would listen and telling Jordan that they broke up because he stopped trusting her. Lydia eventually came to me and basically forced me to choose sides. I told her, “Look, Lydia, I’m here for you, but if you make me choose sides, you’re going to lose me. That’s just how it is.” She and I tried to remain friends, but we both always knew that she was in the wrong and that my loyalties lay with Jordan.

During the weeks and months that followed, Jordan remained my best friend. He and I tell each other everything. I’ve told him things about myself that no one else knows. I told him about my cutting and my depression, and the first words out of his mouth were, “I love you, Maggie, you know that? I won’t ever let you get to that point again, I promise you.”

At the end of this past semester, my first one back at KSU, I failed to raise my GPA and KSU told me that I have to wait a full year before I can re-apply again. My parents weren’t happy, but eventually they told me that it’s my life and I need to decide if school is what I want.

This past January, I told Jordan that I had stopped taking my anti-depressant. He asked me why, and I explained to him that I didn’t want to be on pills for the rest of my life and that I wanted to try going off of them. I hadn’t told anyone that I had stopped. In fact, I had stopped taking them around Thanksgiving, which had probably contributed to my academic downward spiral. Jordan was worried about me, but he understood where I was coming from. A few weeks later, I started wanting to cut again. I called Jordan to talk to him about it, but he started talking to me about things that he had going on in his life and I decided not to tell him. That night, for the first time in a long time, I had another panic attack. I was afraid to call Jordan because I knew he had stuff he was going through. I texted Sydney and I told Ashlie, a friend from work, but I was afraid to tell Jordan because of the fact that he was dealing with his own problems. However, I completely suck at hiding things from him, and I told him the next night.

“Maggie, why didn’t you call me?”

“Because I knew you had stuff you were going through, and I didn’t want to add my burdens to your load.”

“That’s what I’m here for, though! You lean on me, and I lean on you! That’s what best friends do.”

After telling Jordan, I told my mom that I wanted to go back on my medicine, and she told me again, “I really wish you would see a psychologist.” I replied, “I’m thinking it’s time to. I’m willing to try anything to fix myself this time.”

I went to the doctor on February 2, got back on my medicine, and I’ve been feeling pretty good the past week. I have an appointment with a psychologist on the 27th, and I go back to my physician on the 29th. I’ll keep you posted on that.

I love you all, I truly do. If any of you ever needs someone, I’m here for you. Seriously. I’ve been there.

But, I think what I would like to leave you all with is this: You need to find the people in your life who keep you sane. (Literally.) Jordan Paul Hopkins is that person in my life. I love him more than I love anything or anyone else on the planet. He is the salt to my pepper, the milk to my Oreo. He is the one person that I can tell anything to without fear of being judged, and I always know that he’s going to support me as well as give me the best advice and point-of-view he possibly can. I sincerely hope that all of you have a best friend out there like that. You can’t have mine, though. I don’t like to share. (;

Infinite X’s and O’s,

MagWils

I haven’t in a right state of mind. I’ve been really lacking in my self-confidence lately. And that completely SUCKS because I used to never doubt myself. I was in a really good place where I was just happy with who I was, no matter what anyone else thought. It’s not that I want to change anything about myself, but recently, I’ve started caring more about what other people think, which just makes me depressed because I know I can’t please everyone. I have flaws, and I need to accept them and forget about trying to make other people see me as this perfect person. From now on, I’m going to be happy in my own skin. The way I’ve been these past couple of weeks is not me, and I need to get back to being the girl I was. MagWils is back, ladies and gentlemen. No more harping over things I can’t change about myself; no more trying to be the person anyone else wants me to be. The way I am is something for God to help me with. God and no one else.

“Phantom of the Opera”

by Emmy Rossum & Gerard Butler (Phantom of the Opera)

So I have this best friend. And he’s great. Unfortunately, he’s at least just as sensitive as I am, if not more so. And me? Well, I don’t know if any of you know this about me, but I can be sarcastic…It’s a problem. I say stupid things that I don’t mean sometimes, and Jordan and I have misunderstandings, which I feel really badly about even after we talk it out (and thank God for a best friend who will talk something out instead of just letting it stew! So refreshing…). Maybe I’m just ridiculous or maybe I’m harping over it too much, but I just love the guy and want him to be happy. So, I dedicate this blog post to you, Jordan Hopkins. I hope that you’re content with your life, despite the fact that your best friend is a crazy person. And if you’re ever discontent, please come to me and we’ll figure out how to make it better. I love you!

And to the rest of you reading this, I love you, also, too, as well. (Credit where credit is due: I stole that phrase from Darcy)

“Hide and Seek”

by Imogen Heap