Picking up from where I left off, I had just decided to consult a psychic about my skin problems in a state of sheer desperation. I researched and found one who was thought of to be legitimate and then made my way north to go see her. After arriving, she greeted me at the door and led me inside. Once in, I got this horrible feeling and looking at portraits on her wall, I saw a strange, almost psychedelic portrait of Jesus Christ, which gave me horrible chills. She led me to a backroom and proceeded to shuffle and cut a deck of tarot cards. I sat there in shock. This went against everything I had been raised to believe, but my desperation to find out the root cause of my acne was so great I decided to go along with it all. After asking the big question to her, she gave an answer to me, which I prefer not to give here because I don’t believe in giving out any advice she told me. Afterwards, I left there elated, believing I had finally found my answer. It turns out that within two weeks after this visit, my skin cleared up perfectly. I felt on top of the world. I thought the nightmare was over. So I started classes on this high note and things went well for about a month. However, it didn’t stay this way. Before long, I started breaking out again. Very slowly at first, and the number of breakouts steadily grew for about two months until my skin was covered in zits completely. When I say completely, I mean it. My face was a dense sea of red and purple, cystic, pus filled lesions. My acne had never come even close to that severity. I remember looking in the mirror after avoiding my reflection for weeks and when I saw the face that was looking back at me, I am not kidding when I say I nearly passed out. I screamed out in agony and cried nonstop for at least half an hour. I had to sleep on my back because the zits were so tender it hurt to lay my face on a pillow. Despite crippling depression and embarrassment, however, I pushed myself to keep up with my studies. But this ordeal made me begin to question if life was even worth living anymore. That was how much my self-worth was tied into my skin. Basically, if I didn’t have clear skin, I didn’t want to live. These thoughts of giving up continued to increase until it all became too much to bear. On November 3rd, 2010, I realized I couldn’t keep living the way I was any longer and that I needed to get help soon because I was dangerously close to suicide. I asked my parents if they would admit me into an inpatient-treatment psychiatric facility where I could get the intensive care I needed. My father, mother and I went to a hospital one city over, and after being accepted into the program after an interview, I vividly remember seeing my mother sob quietly as she said goodbye. My subsequent stay there for the next week was eye opening and life changing. I was able to be around people who had it way worse than I did, which helped a little to put things in perspective. But most of all, I was able to remove myself from my problems and deeply reflect on what truly mattered. I left there with some new friends and with a whole new outlook on life. I wish I could say this is where my troubles over acne ended, but in fact, they were far from over. For a while after my hospital stay, things were okay, but after some time, I fell back into my old ways of placing all my self-worth in my skin and I eventually became more suicidal than I was before. I can say without a doubt that the month of March of 2011 was the worst period of my life. Everyday I struggled with thoughts of killing myself, and one night, in a fit of utter despair, I left my house around midnight and walked over to the nearby freeway overpass where I sat and watched the cars travel by below. For an hour, I contemplated my death, but thank God I found the strength to return home. But once I returned, I then struggled with thoughts of taking all of the medication my family and I take and attempting an overdose. I remember sitting on the floor of my room, sobbing and crying out to God to take my life. But again, God gave me the strength to keep on going. Two things kept me going. One of those reasons was that I was scared committing suicide would send me to hell and the other, probably bigger reason was that I knew my suicide would destroy my family. They would never fully recover from the tragedy and I just couldn’t do that to them. That summer, through God’s help, I realized that a medication I was taking was making my suicidal thoughts much worse. Once they got rid of it, things got a lot better. Things were still bad, but nothing like they were that last winter. However, despite being less suicidal now, a new hell was emerging. I was now suffering from crippling Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and anxiety related to the health of my skin. This anxiety centered on having to do everything perfectly so I wouldn’t break out. I had to apply my crèmes in a very careful and particular manner to avoid breaking out, I restricted my diet to exclude substances that are thought to cause acne, I had to take all the vitamins thought to help your skin, etc. etc. But above all, the OCD behavior that caused me the most anxiety was I had a horrible fear of anything touching my face. I thought that when something touched my face (my fingers, piece of food, tree branch etc.) that it would lead to a breakout. This caused me an insane amount of anxiety that never fully went away. I went everywhere with this fear of things touching my face. And when something did touch my face (which was quite often despite my best efforts), I would have a small panic attack. I was constantly miserable, but life continued to go on and I finished another year of college. But that summer of 2012 was when things finally began to turn around. Stay tuned for my final entry in my personal testimony!
Jamison
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