Salvation

I never consciously purchased the plane ticket. It was just handed to me when the answers were vague and the pain was severe.  A one-way ticket to potential destruction.  Had more been known at the time, perhaps I would have been told to drive or take a train; there are numerous ways to get from point A to point B.  But I boarded the opiate flight and buckled myself in well; the open-ended flight meant to rescue me, but ultimately would lead to destruction. There was no destination in sight except less pain.  I thought I was going somewhere safe.  I didn't know the terror that lay ahead.

Of everything I've lived through in history, September 11, 2001 is easily the most traumatic event of my generation.  Watching the planes hit, the people jumping from windows to escape the flames, the horror on the faces of witnesses, the first responders running into the buildings without a second thought, the buildings crumbling and people running from the tidal wave of ash... I could go on and on. I remember sitting and sobbing, wondering how our World had arrived at such a horrific event.  

I will never forget that day.  None of us should.  As with anything, there is the potential to turn a bad day into a good one.  Last September 11th, I made a choice that will forever impact my life, much like the impact of the original horror left on the hearts of most Americans.  I had just returned from a beach vacation where I encountered the spirit of the aware and free-spirited Jessica on Topsail Island.  I decided then and there that I wanted to BE that Jessica again, which would entail getting off my Fentanyl patches and oxycodone.  

That day, I liberated myself of the Fentanyl by ripping off my Duragesic patch for the last time.  It sent me into a turbine of withdrawal symptoms, but I would walk through that fire all over again to arrive where I am today.  I am free of the narcotics, I am free of the overwhelming numbness, and I am free to be who I want to be, not who the narcotics dictate I am.

For 19 years, I'd been prescribed opioids to deal with my chronic pain, and they had all but vaporized the Jessica that had been with their powerful numbing, sedating and paralyzing effects.  I had become a ghost of my former self, and my life had crumbled under the force of the narcotics.  The ticket to that one-way nightmare was given out readily, and I recall being handed prescription after prescription for things like Percocet, Oxycontin, and Fentanyl without a second thought.  There ARE other ways to deal with pain.  There are trains, boats, automobiles.  You don't have to get on the one-way plane ride to hell.  

I did not write this on September 11th out of respect for those who died in the tragic way they did.  I did not die, but I came close.  I saw the building coming into view, and I knew that I would be vaporized in seconds.  Instead, I pushed the imaginary "EJECT" button, and I parachuted into the unknown abyss of self-awareness.   I did not hit the Tower.  I did not die in the inferno.  I am alive because I chose to be.  And every day I am grateful, for the foresight and the hope; for the small amount of self-love that still existed on that day over a year ago. It has multiplied over and over again, and I find myself worthy now more than I ever have.

I was not vaporized that tragic day.  I did not become part of the rubble.  I am, brick by brick, rebuilding who I was before the tragedy.  I am, brick by brick, becoming who I am meant to be, and not because of a ticket I was given over 19 years ago.  I weep for those who are stuck in the destruction, unknown and unidentified because their bodies are blown to bits over years of pain.  There are no words for the destruction caused by opioids.  It can be permanent and severe.  I escaped by the skin of my teeth.

September 11th is a tragic day, and yet I found salvation on it.  There are no words for what was lost, but I have words for what I found.  Somehow, I came through the wreckage to find wellness.  I came through the trauma to find joy.  And somehow, God has allowed me the ability to save myself on a day when I couldn't save anyone else.  I am no one's savior but my own.