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I was born in Buffalo, New York, on December 12, 1980, and complications from being born
three months premature led to my blindness. At age three my father died and my family
descended into chaos. Violent outbursts by my mother and her new boyfriend were the norm
and caused all types of abuse.
At age six I vividly remember the times I was kicked in the stomach, beaten with a belt, and
locked in my room all afternoon and night without dinner. So by age seven, I was out of
control and I was hospitalized. My life reflected the chaos that surrounded me, and a mental
illness known as schizophrenia had started.
Once on a family outing, to discipline me my mother's alcoholic boyfriend, in a fit of rage,
grabbed me to throw into a waterfall. I miraculously broke free of his grip. They then decided
to teach me a lesson by just walking away. I was a blind 9 year old kid left behind, alone in a
strange park without my cane to guide me. As I creep slowly forward attempting to feel my
way along the path they yelled "Watch out for the cliff!” I froze in fear as I had no way of
knowing where the edge was.
Later that day the boyfriend wanted to have dinner alone with me. He pointed a stake knife at
my chest, then said to feel how sharp it is with my hand then threatened that if I dared to say
or do one more stupid thing, he would kill me with that knife.
I was placed in foster care by age ten. Many foster homes took loads of children more for the
money than to love and help kids. I again endured physical and even sexual abuse, as well
as spoken threats to my life. This chaos of family experiences and increasing mental illness
compounded to worsen my behavior. I repeated this cycle of being placed in a foster home,
then hospitalized, then discharged, never to return to the previous foster home, over and
over again. I was subsequently in 13 foster homes
At age 14, I met Phil and Evelyn Reiter, a dedicated, supportive Christian couple who not only
believed in God but they believed in me. They knew that I could do whatever I put my mind to
with God's help.
I was still too angry to see this at first. Ironically, the idea of God's forgiveness is what
attracted me to Christianity. I realized that to harbor the bitterness and deep rooted rage
would only destroy me. So at age 16, at a Christian youth retreat I prayed for Christ to forgive
my mistakes and bitterness and become my guide in life.
Now my natural mother was dying. She was dying outwardly but I could tell she too had
turned to God and inwardly was at peace. I shared my new found faith. Mom said she was so
proud of me as a son and what I had become. What I said I knew needed to be said from the
bottom of my heart so it would reach to the bottom of her heart to comfort her. "Mom, you
say you're so proud of me as a son and what I've become, and now I am so proud of you as a
mother.” With God’s love and forgiveness we had the kind of relationship those last few
weeks of her life that I always dreamed of for us to have.
For many it’s a long process to release the feelings of rejection, hate, and anger from the
past and embrace a new life of being valued, loved and at peace. God and my new family
stood by me until I learned this. When I was hospitalized my new dad visited me twice a day
to remind me that I was still loved and would return to the same home and family when this
was over. Even so, with mental illness and emotional wounds, I struggled with totally trusting
anyone at all.
Through all this, I was still able to leave the special school for the blind to attend and
graduate from my hometown Croton Harmon High School with “High Honors” in June 2000. I
was accepted at Nyack College and moved into the dorm that September. All this time,
however, I had increasingly deep and dark struggles with schizophrenia.
The terms “schizophrenic” and “schizo” are misused and joked about to describe someone
acting like two people or they can’t make up there mind. Even “voices in your head” is on
everything from bumper stickers like “4 out of 5 voices in my head say go for it” to the name
of a guitar less alternative rock band in Lisbon, Portugal. But schizophrenia is no joke. Here
are a few points to explain the real illness schizophrenia.
First, “Schizo” does indeed mean “split,” but in this case it’s a “split from reality.” not a split
personality.
Second, it involves hearing voices, paranoia (unrealistic fears, and or suspicions), and
disorganized thoughts.
Third, this is an illness and it requires medical intervention. If your heart malfunctions it
could become a heart attack. If your brain malfunctions it could become schizophrenia. A
mere taste of this is not being able to think clearly during a high fever or illness.
All that said, 2001 was an extremely rough year for me. I had been mistakenly listening to the
misguided advice of a few people who said, "You would be healed if you would just step out
in faith and stop seeing your doctor and stop taking your medication." I know now that this
made about as much sense as if you step out in faith between two parked cars with out
looking.
I suffered through the harsh break-ups with a musical group I was with for three years and
then my girlfriend of two years. Because of the past separations with foster families and my
birth parents' death at an early age, any losses were extra difficult for me.
The tragedy of 9-11 and the constant reports of the horrific losses caused everyone to feel
more vulnerable and fearful but for me it also caused flashbacks of my own traumatic
experiences. Now I was sleeping less than two hours a week and that plus the schizophrenia
further amplified all of this to the breaking point.
Since I wasn't taking my medication my judgment was clouded, and I was no longer fully
aware of my actions or their consequences. It should be noted here that if I had been taking
my medicines regularly and telling my doctors and all the others that cared about me
everything that was going through my head I might have had to go to the hospital for a week
or two but the following would have never happened!
The voices never stopped and were screaming even louder and angrier and my very being
was in total agony. At 4:30 in the morning, on November 1, 2001, I made a decision. This
decision wasn't to hurt anyone, or even because I fully wanted it. It was simply to escape the
horrifying symptoms I was enduring. At that moment, perhaps my life's weakest, I uttered a
desperate and confused prayer to God: "Satan, I might be giving my body to you, but I'm not
giving my heart and soul to you". Even then, I still knew, to some degree, God loved me. I
took 220 pills without telling anyone and collapsed on to my bed in a coma.
Later that day, Phil my foster dad was at the college to meet me after class. When I didn't
show he drove over to my dorm and knocked on the door. Getting no response and thinking
I just forgot about his visit and was just hanging out somewhere he decided to leave. He
said later that he felt God prompted him to try and look in my bedroom window before he left,
at just the right moment.
Between the blinds on the window he just managed to see me face down on the bed. Now he
banged on the door and when I didn't answer he got the key and rushed in. He found me in a
coma, at the spot where I had collapsed over 12 hours before.
An ambulance was called and I was rushed to the hospital. The doctor told dad he should
start thinking about “final arrangements” meaning he didn't hold out much hope for
recovery. I regained consciousness after being comatose for well over 24 hours.
A key event happened a few weeks later while still recovering in a psychiatric hospital. The
news was still full of the events of 9-11 and the President saying that our country would fight
and win the "War on Terror no matter what and how long it took".
I awakened in the middle of the night in my hospital bed. For the first time in many weeks, I
was able to think clearly and realized that no matter who tried to hurt or kill me in the past,
no one had ever come as close as I did. If I wanted to live a life of hope in the future plans
that God had for me I had to release all that had happened in the past.
I made a promise right then and there to God, my loved ones, and myself that from this point
on, no matter what or how long it took, I would fight and win my mind's internal "War on
Terror". This meant an all-out war on schizophrenia. It also marked the beginning of an
astonishing and miraculous recovery from what once was a seriously devastating mental
illness.
What followed was a process of lots of prayer and hard work. I learn to follow the advice of
doctors, family and the wise Christian counsel of friends that really knew and loved me. After
much trial and many modifications, the right medication and other therapies have been
found. I'm at a place in my life where I always dreamed I would be but never knew what it
would feel like.
My mind is no longer filled with those hateful voices but now is filled, even flooded, with
positive, peaceful, life enhancing biblical images and songs of deliverance. The wind of the
Holy Spirit blows through and refreshes my entire being. Beautiful fountains of life heal and
purify my soul. This causes me to reflect upon this biblical passage.
You (God) will keep him in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on You,
because he trusts in You.
Isaiah 26:3
“New King James” translation
In the past, I've needed to go to the hospital for medication adjustments every 3 to 7 months.
Now, however, I have been out of the hospital for the longest stretch of time since 2000,
over 2 years.
I know from the progress I have made that God's plans for my life cannot be stopped.
Ironically, one chief thing that has brought about such marvelous healing in my life has been
the acceptance of the mental illness itself. To explain, I fully understand I still have
schizophrenia, which I hope is permanently in remission. In order to keep it that way,
however, I need to maintain extra vigilance in these areas of my life.
- Diet, exercise and proper sleep
- Listening to my doctor about therapy and medication
- Prayer and Worship
- Family and positive friendships to keep me on tract
In other words, I need to continuously live a lifestyle that opens the doors of holistic health
and closes the doors to unbalanced, detrimental living.
This, my friends, is how God has taken my life and transformed it from tragedy to triumph!
I have learned from personal experience that,
Whatever I have, where ever I am,
I can make it through anything in the one
who makes me who I am.
Philippians 4:13
“The Message” translation
This is what God's Mental Hope is all about.
Thank you very much and God bless.
Sincerely,
Juan "Israel" Torres
October 19, 2007
three months premature led to my blindness. At age three my father died and my family
descended into chaos. Violent outbursts by my mother and her new boyfriend were the norm
and caused all types of abuse.
At age six I vividly remember the times I was kicked in the stomach, beaten with a belt, and
locked in my room all afternoon and night without dinner. So by age seven, I was out of
control and I was hospitalized. My life reflected the chaos that surrounded me, and a mental
illness known as schizophrenia had started.
Once on a family outing, to discipline me my mother's alcoholic boyfriend, in a fit of rage,
grabbed me to throw into a waterfall. I miraculously broke free of his grip. They then decided
to teach me a lesson by just walking away. I was a blind 9 year old kid left behind, alone in a
strange park without my cane to guide me. As I creep slowly forward attempting to feel my
way along the path they yelled "Watch out for the cliff!” I froze in fear as I had no way of
knowing where the edge was.
Later that day the boyfriend wanted to have dinner alone with me. He pointed a stake knife at
my chest, then said to feel how sharp it is with my hand then threatened that if I dared to say
or do one more stupid thing, he would kill me with that knife.
I was placed in foster care by age ten. Many foster homes took loads of children more for the
money than to love and help kids. I again endured physical and even sexual abuse, as well
as spoken threats to my life. This chaos of family experiences and increasing mental illness
compounded to worsen my behavior. I repeated this cycle of being placed in a foster home,
then hospitalized, then discharged, never to return to the previous foster home, over and
over again. I was subsequently in 13 foster homes
At age 14, I met Phil and Evelyn Reiter, a dedicated, supportive Christian couple who not only
believed in God but they believed in me. They knew that I could do whatever I put my mind to
with God's help.
I was still too angry to see this at first. Ironically, the idea of God's forgiveness is what
attracted me to Christianity. I realized that to harbor the bitterness and deep rooted rage
would only destroy me. So at age 16, at a Christian youth retreat I prayed for Christ to forgive
my mistakes and bitterness and become my guide in life.
Now my natural mother was dying. She was dying outwardly but I could tell she too had
turned to God and inwardly was at peace. I shared my new found faith. Mom said she was so
proud of me as a son and what I had become. What I said I knew needed to be said from the
bottom of my heart so it would reach to the bottom of her heart to comfort her. "Mom, you
say you're so proud of me as a son and what I've become, and now I am so proud of you as a
mother.” With God’s love and forgiveness we had the kind of relationship those last few
weeks of her life that I always dreamed of for us to have.
For many it’s a long process to release the feelings of rejection, hate, and anger from the
past and embrace a new life of being valued, loved and at peace. God and my new family
stood by me until I learned this. When I was hospitalized my new dad visited me twice a day
to remind me that I was still loved and would return to the same home and family when this
was over. Even so, with mental illness and emotional wounds, I struggled with totally trusting
anyone at all.
Through all this, I was still able to leave the special school for the blind to attend and
graduate from my hometown Croton Harmon High School with “High Honors” in June 2000. I
was accepted at Nyack College and moved into the dorm that September. All this time,
however, I had increasingly deep and dark struggles with schizophrenia.
The terms “schizophrenic” and “schizo” are misused and joked about to describe someone
acting like two people or they can’t make up there mind. Even “voices in your head” is on
everything from bumper stickers like “4 out of 5 voices in my head say go for it” to the name
of a guitar less alternative rock band in Lisbon, Portugal. But schizophrenia is no joke. Here
are a few points to explain the real illness schizophrenia.
First, “Schizo” does indeed mean “split,” but in this case it’s a “split from reality.” not a split
personality.
Second, it involves hearing voices, paranoia (unrealistic fears, and or suspicions), and
disorganized thoughts.
Third, this is an illness and it requires medical intervention. If your heart malfunctions it
could become a heart attack. If your brain malfunctions it could become schizophrenia. A
mere taste of this is not being able to think clearly during a high fever or illness.
All that said, 2001 was an extremely rough year for me. I had been mistakenly listening to the
misguided advice of a few people who said, "You would be healed if you would just step out
in faith and stop seeing your doctor and stop taking your medication." I know now that this
made about as much sense as if you step out in faith between two parked cars with out
looking.
I suffered through the harsh break-ups with a musical group I was with for three years and
then my girlfriend of two years. Because of the past separations with foster families and my
birth parents' death at an early age, any losses were extra difficult for me.
The tragedy of 9-11 and the constant reports of the horrific losses caused everyone to feel
more vulnerable and fearful but for me it also caused flashbacks of my own traumatic
experiences. Now I was sleeping less than two hours a week and that plus the schizophrenia
further amplified all of this to the breaking point.
Since I wasn't taking my medication my judgment was clouded, and I was no longer fully
aware of my actions or their consequences. It should be noted here that if I had been taking
my medicines regularly and telling my doctors and all the others that cared about me
everything that was going through my head I might have had to go to the hospital for a week
or two but the following would have never happened!
The voices never stopped and were screaming even louder and angrier and my very being
was in total agony. At 4:30 in the morning, on November 1, 2001, I made a decision. This
decision wasn't to hurt anyone, or even because I fully wanted it. It was simply to escape the
horrifying symptoms I was enduring. At that moment, perhaps my life's weakest, I uttered a
desperate and confused prayer to God: "Satan, I might be giving my body to you, but I'm not
giving my heart and soul to you". Even then, I still knew, to some degree, God loved me. I
took 220 pills without telling anyone and collapsed on to my bed in a coma.
Later that day, Phil my foster dad was at the college to meet me after class. When I didn't
show he drove over to my dorm and knocked on the door. Getting no response and thinking
I just forgot about his visit and was just hanging out somewhere he decided to leave. He
said later that he felt God prompted him to try and look in my bedroom window before he left,
at just the right moment.
Between the blinds on the window he just managed to see me face down on the bed. Now he
banged on the door and when I didn't answer he got the key and rushed in. He found me in a
coma, at the spot where I had collapsed over 12 hours before.
An ambulance was called and I was rushed to the hospital. The doctor told dad he should
start thinking about “final arrangements” meaning he didn't hold out much hope for
recovery. I regained consciousness after being comatose for well over 24 hours.
A key event happened a few weeks later while still recovering in a psychiatric hospital. The
news was still full of the events of 9-11 and the President saying that our country would fight
and win the "War on Terror no matter what and how long it took".
I awakened in the middle of the night in my hospital bed. For the first time in many weeks, I
was able to think clearly and realized that no matter who tried to hurt or kill me in the past,
no one had ever come as close as I did. If I wanted to live a life of hope in the future plans
that God had for me I had to release all that had happened in the past.
I made a promise right then and there to God, my loved ones, and myself that from this point
on, no matter what or how long it took, I would fight and win my mind's internal "War on
Terror". This meant an all-out war on schizophrenia. It also marked the beginning of an
astonishing and miraculous recovery from what once was a seriously devastating mental
illness.
What followed was a process of lots of prayer and hard work. I learn to follow the advice of
doctors, family and the wise Christian counsel of friends that really knew and loved me. After
much trial and many modifications, the right medication and other therapies have been
found. I'm at a place in my life where I always dreamed I would be but never knew what it
would feel like.
My mind is no longer filled with those hateful voices but now is filled, even flooded, with
positive, peaceful, life enhancing biblical images and songs of deliverance. The wind of the
Holy Spirit blows through and refreshes my entire being. Beautiful fountains of life heal and
purify my soul. This causes me to reflect upon this biblical passage.
You (God) will keep him in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on You,
because he trusts in You.
Isaiah 26:3
“New King James” translation
In the past, I've needed to go to the hospital for medication adjustments every 3 to 7 months.
Now, however, I have been out of the hospital for the longest stretch of time since 2000,
over 2 years.
I know from the progress I have made that God's plans for my life cannot be stopped.
Ironically, one chief thing that has brought about such marvelous healing in my life has been
the acceptance of the mental illness itself. To explain, I fully understand I still have
schizophrenia, which I hope is permanently in remission. In order to keep it that way,
however, I need to maintain extra vigilance in these areas of my life.
- Diet, exercise and proper sleep
- Listening to my doctor about therapy and medication
- Prayer and Worship
- Family and positive friendships to keep me on tract
In other words, I need to continuously live a lifestyle that opens the doors of holistic health
and closes the doors to unbalanced, detrimental living.
This, my friends, is how God has taken my life and transformed it from tragedy to triumph!
I have learned from personal experience that,
Whatever I have, where ever I am,
I can make it through anything in the one
who makes me who I am.
Philippians 4:13
“The Message” translation
This is what God's Mental Hope is all about.
Thank you very much and God bless.
Sincerely,
Juan "Israel" Torres
October 19, 2007
| "My life is an example of how the darkest tragedy was transformed it to the brightest triumph." |
|
If you would like to email Israel you can use:
israel@godsmentalhope.net
Israel is currently a college student so you can
write him c/o Nyack College:
Juan "Israel" Torres
Nyack College
One South Boulevard
Nyack, NY 10960
israel@godsmentalhope.net
Israel is currently a college student so you can
write him c/o Nyack College:
Juan "Israel" Torres
Nyack College
One South Boulevard
Nyack, NY 10960
| Israel's Story |
|