In the second blog in our Love God, Love Others series World Racer, Kristen Duguay shares about meeting a woman the night after she committed suicide in a hospital in Argentina. Kristen weeps with her over her pain and shares that Jesus fully knows us and STILL fully loves us and that he wants us to live.
One of our ministry days looked like our entire squad going to the hospital that is downtown. Everyone had gone once before and worshipped in the lobby and also prayed for people. This time was a bit different. They wouldn’t let us come up into the main part of the hospital until the afternoon, so we headed downstairs to urgent care. There was such a heaviness down there, that a lot of us could feel as we stepped inside. We all split up and I went with Alicia, who works with YWAM. We prayed for a few people, for one man’s family and for a woman with a massive migraine (that she has all the time). Then Alicia saw a young woman who was looking at us, kind of wondering what we were doing. From just looking at her, you couldn’t see that anything was physically wrong with her, but after talking with her I was in tears.
Alicia asked her if she needed prayer for anything and at first she was hesitant, but then said yes. She started by telling us why she was at the hospital. Three days prior she tried to kill herself by eating glass and razors. She has attempted self-harm other than trying to kill herself and she has many scars from this. Her family has abandoned her, her brother tried (don’t know all the details) raping her 6-year-old daughter, and her 3 kids are with the father because of her brother. He is a fugitive as well because he escaped from the cops and they’re looking for him for what he did or attempted to do. Halfway through this conversation and I’m trying so hard not to start crying right there. She also told us something I never thought I would hear someone say (at least while I was in conversation with them). She looked me in the eyes and told me that she wanted to kill herself. Never did I think I would find myself sitting on the floor of a hospital in urgent care, looking a 25 year old woman in the eyes while she said these words to me. My next question to her was if she wanted to kill herself and still wants to, then why was she sitting in the hospital trying to get help. She thought of her daughter and how much she would miss her.
One last thing that this woman was going through, had to do with a dark spirit. On her ankle she had a tattoo that represents a certain dark spirit. Her family told her about it. HER FAMILY. Now not only did they tell her what it was, they had her pray a prayer one time and she said she felt peace. She felt peace this ONE time. So she got a tattoo, as many people do, to resemble her dedication to this spirit. Tears definitely started falling as I sat on the floor in front of her. We asked her about her faith, other than in this spirit and she said she knows about Jesus, but is scared to go to church or have relationship with Him because of her past. I immediately started telling her about how He loves us. Not just loves us but truly loves us. He knows us fully, yet fully loves us. Jesus also gives us peace and not just once, but all of the time. God gave me the words to speak and the strength to do so in that moment. My heart was just so broken for her and without God I wouldn’t have been able to get the words out. We sat there for a moment in silence, both in tears.
After praying for her we said that it wasn’t just by chance that she was there and that we were there. God knew that she would try to kill herself. God knew that we wouldn’t be allowed upstairs and that we would go downstairs instead. God knew that we would pray for two people before seeing her. God knew that we would cross paths. God knew that I would be able to pray for this woman, speak life into her and tell her about how much God loves us, no matter the circumstance. God knows about her past and her present AND LOVES HER JUST AS MUCH. I sat with her for another half hour or so before walking out of the hospital and breaking down in more tears. **Also, my teammate, Anna, gave me a bracelet she had with a cross on it that we gave to her. Now when she looks down at her wrists, that are covered in scars, she will see the cross.
I may have ended the visit in tears, but I wouldn’t summarize it as a bad day because it actually was such a great day doing hospital ministry. It was just hard with what I heard. Never in my life have I sat with someone who had told me such painful things. My heart broke for the people we met at the hospital, especially her, and I felt the weight of what they were going through. Forever thankful to have met this woman, hear her story, and talk to her about how amazing our God is.
