I got a second chance at life thanks to my wife, and I'm taking it
I'm not the most romantic person on earth, but I know this much: I've found something very special in my life. At the age of just twenty four, I'm married and have a beautiful three year old daughter. For a man who attempted suicide, it's very good going, and I owe it all to a beautiful woman and the amazing little girl she has given me... as if she needed to give me anything else.
My parents split when I was ten years old. Both were raging alcoholics. My Dad was a decent man, but was driven to drink by my mother. He's alive today, and I still visit him regularly... when he's at home and not at the pub. I cling on to what I knew of him, but he's unrecognisable from the man I knew when I was eight (when he had his accident).
I don't like my mother, and don't talk to her. She lost her job, had the cheek to sue for unfair dismissal (in spite of showing up to work drunk on countless occasions), and won. She crashed her car into ditches, and drove into dykes, causing me serious humiliation. She took out a restraining order against my Dad, and prevented me from seeing him.
My only brother commited suicide when I was twelve. He was 16. My eldest sister found herself running the house from age twenty and had to drop out of college, was 22 when my brother died and in an abusive relationship. My second sister was clinically depressed (but thankfully has beaten it). And my third sister (two years my senior) was abusing drugs. By sixteen, she had died too. I was the youngest, the quietest, the ignored one. But my head was in bits.
Needless to say, our lives were a complete mess. By the time I was fourteen, I had turned to alcohol myself & abused it for two years. I was severely depressed, and attempted suicide. I took a bottle of brandy into the shower one day, locked the bathroom, and took tablets. I sent a text message to my only friend and neighbour, Diane, saying I couldn't take it any more. Not realising she was at home, she ran down the road. She couldn't find me, and saw the bathroom was locked. She went outside and found a brick, threw it in the window along with a few rocks, climbed in (cutting herself badly in the process) and forced me to get sick. It hit me: she had saved me. She was crying. She cared about me. Somebody cared about me...
People stayed away from my family as we were 'bad news' (I wonder where they got that idea from...). She was different though to most people. We had been best friends from around age five, and while most kids distanced themselves from me through their parents direction, she was always so nice and understanding. She was a gem. When life was getting me down, she was always there for me when I needed to cry. A few minutes with her always made me feel better... all she had to do was smile at me. Her parents never approved of our friendship, but they do now. Because she improved me as a person, and gave me something I'd never felt before and cried out for all my life: love.
After my attempt at suicide, she did everything for me. She arranged counselling for me. She couldn't get me out of my home as our local guards were a joke, but she called me up to her house where she would have a meal prepared for me before her parents got home. She met up with me so she could help me with my homework. She put me before herself every time. In short, she was amazing.
When we were eighteen, she broke up with her boyfriend. I asked her why... "because... there's someone else". Who, I asked. "Well..... he's looking at me right now..... do you want to give it a try?" She held my hand. I had never felt this way about a girl before, I had never found a girl who would be allowed go with me due to my family's background. I squeezed her hand back, and we kissed. The rest is history.
By this time, I didn't drink at all. I had found something that made me much happier, and it was a happiness that lasted, and didn't come with downsides.
It was strange doing 'normal' things out in the 'real' world. We went to the cinema, held hands, kissed... doing normal things, but things that made me incredibly happy. She introduced me to things like 'television'... something I never had growing up. She tought me to cook, and found out I was actually gifted at carpentry. She pointed out my 'strengths'... a word that was totally alien to me. She made me feel good about myself. By this time, I was making great strides, and her parents were acknowleding our relationship. Just as well, because by age twenty, we found out we were going to be parents ourselves.
Our little girl Gemma was born in April 2007, and is the most beautiful little light in our lives. I've vowed to never raise my voice with her, never scare her in any way, just give her all the love my parents never gave us. She's such a beautiful little angel, even little things like helping her put on her little pink raincoat, reading her stories until she dozes off to sleep and pretending to chase her make me feel like the luckiest man on earth. And I am... because not only do I have that, but I have a woman with whom I can share this all with. The only woman to say the words 'I love you' to me, and the only woman I've said those words back to. We married last February. She saved my life... and what a life it's turning out to be.
