R.I.P Louise

On 03/01/2012 my sister was found dead in her house. She'd taken an overdose of sleeping pills and washed them down with alcohol. Losing someone you love is the worst way to imagine starting a new year, it's the most painful thing i've had to face.

One of the hardest things is thinking about the waste, what a waste of a life. She was 31, the mother of two young children, a talented artist, yet she never made anything of herself. Louise suffered from an eating disorder and constantly felt like people were staring at her, consequently she never held down a job. She had low self esteem as a result of an abusive marriage so she never made anything of her talent with art. She was ill so she pushed away everyone who loved her, there will only be 20 people at the funeral: all family, most only knew her when she was young.

Late last year her two sons were taken off her and on friday the 30th of December she was told she would never get them back. She felt like her life was worthless without them, that she had no hope and no one to depend on. That there was no way out of the pit.

There are many things i wish i could have said to her. I wish i could have told her that there is always hope, there is always a way out, death is not the answer. I should have told her that God was watching over her and holding her in his arms. That he wanted to tell her she was beautiful and precious and perfectly made. That he had always been there through the crap life had thrown her way and that all she had to do was turn to him. That he was reaching down into the pit to pull her out.

She used to talk about working for a women's shelter or some other organisation to help other women who had been through domestic violence. She wanted to help others but she was unable to accept the help for herself. I don't want her life to go unnoticed and unremembered. My sister was a strong beautiful woman who had more pain thrown her way than most people will have over their whole lives. She had courage and empathy and love but she was trapped in her illness and she never received the help she needed.

There may not be many people at her funeral, there may not be many people who will notice that there is one less woman struggling to survive. But my sister has impacted my life in ways she will never know. I wish that her death wasn't one of the ways that she changed me but i will not let her have died for nothing.

No girl should ever feel that death is the only way out. I want you to learn from my sister's life. Tell your friends, sisters, mothers. No matter how much you are hurting there is always hope. It might be hard to find but it is worth searching for, like an uncut diamond inside a rock. I never said what i should have to my sister but i'm saying it to you.

God loves you. He has always loved you and he always will. He died for you and he has never left your side. When you feel alone and lost and buried under painful experiences, he is just waiting for you to ask him. He is holding you in his arms. The God who made the heaven and the earth, who brought the dead back to life, healed the lame, died on a cross for the world is holding you. You are more valuable than anything else. You are precious. Your life was made for a purpose and God wants to use you for great things. If you give God your pain he will give you back a way to use it, a direction. Your life will impact the world in ways you will never know. God wants to use you to change the world. Don't doubt yourself, your own abilities aren't important, it's how God uses you that matters.

You have such potential, such promise and you are so loved. Please do not let it go to waste.

Tell your sisters, tell your mother, tell your daughters: you are God's perfect, precious creation, his cherished daughter, his greatest love. You are worth so much more than you could imagine. You are beyond compare.