I was in my husband's bathrobe. I have one of my own, but I refuse to wear it. His is better. It's over-sized and breathable, large enough to cover my legs as I curl on the couch with a pre-chaos cup of coffee. I'd gotten up for a refill and in my stumbling blindness, rammed my pinky toe into the table leg and was mouthing mother fucker under my breath in the otherwise silent house when... I saw it. Brilliant light seeped under the crack of the living room door. I stepped closer to observe, spent a few moments pondering the source of such luminescence, then flung open the door, revealing a sunrise sky so brilliant it hurt my eyes to look upon.

But I kept looking, anyway.

As I stared at the hues of red and gold and orange, I felt something creaking in the back of my mind. There was a swelling just behind my temples, a pressure ever building only to release with a violent, audible click. My heart felt swollen and bruised and unable to comprehend the beauty that greeted my eyes. A sound of awe emanated from the heart of me in a quiet exhale. The words drifted across my tongue and out with my breath. I sang in a voice foreign to my own ears. I sang in the voice of angels, a hymn I hadn't remembered the words to until that moment,

Oh God, you are my God,

and I will ever praise you.

Oh God, you are my God,

and I will ever praise you.

And I will seek you in the morning,

and I will learn to walk in your ways

and step by step you'll lead me...

and I will follow you all of my days.

In the following ringing silence, every hair on my body rose. I hadn't meant to sing. It had been entirely out of my control. The sunrise stretched on for what seemed like hours as I stood frozen in my husband's bathrobe, arms outstretched to greet the morning, with my hair floating on ends around my head in a golden halo. I drank and drank in the beauty of the morning, mind racing to try and explain away what had just happened, but falling woefully short. I couldn't explain the voice that had echoed out of my throat, so rich and deep and clear it sounded more like the babbling of a brook than the song of a meager human. I couldn't explain the fact that I was seeing colors in spectrums unknown. I couldn't explain why, as I stood pondering all of this, my hair was still floating around my head in a fiery crown... why my arms had been outstretched for all of this time, but I didn't feel the weight of them. I couldn't explain it. So I decided then and there to stop trying. I had been given a gift. The only appropriate reaction was to greet the gift in good faith.

Once more in control of my body, I chose to sing the words in my own voice.

It was a watery, pitiful thing, compared with the angelic refrain of moments gone by, but I choked the words out:

Oh God, you are my God,

and I will ever praise you.

Oh God, you are my God,

and I will ever praise you.

And I will seek you in the morning,

and I will learn to walk in your ways

and step by step you'll lead me...

and I will follow you all of my days.

The last note rang in the hollow quiet of my empty living room and just when the sight of the sunrise became too much for my meek eyes to bear, a voice of ethereal thunder quietly called, "I am with you."

My hair fell limply down my back and my arms snapped to my sides, the sky turned from brilliance to dusty grey-blue in an instant.

But the beauty of the sunrise lived on, tucked away in my heart as I turned to go back inside.

"Good morning, angel mama," my little daughter greeted from the doorway. I took her hand and she smiled up at me. "Good morning," I whispered. She just looked at me knowingly and gave my hand a gentle squeeze. The reflection of sunrise flashed in her eyes, and I saw the face of God for the second time that morning.

I had the worst month possible. I had borrowed from all of my resources and I was still drained out. Some of my resources needed their money back at a certain time and I had no idea where I was going to get it. I prayed on it, and I let it fly. It flew all the way to God's listening ear. That night I wasn't paying any attention to the lottery but I had put a number in for seven days. At eleven o'clock that night that one ticket, I had in for only five days with two more to go, came out. 8888 came out paying 2500 dollars. I was able to pay back what I borrowed and bless my mom with groceries. Only God did that for me. I have the proper faith. Amen

The pill bottle was in the console of my car in the driveway, and I was walking outside to get it. I was so weak and so tired and so very thin. I only made it as far as where the sidewalk meets the porch when my cat ran up, made a small sound, and rubbed his cheeks against my legs furiously. His fur was warm and the sun was low in the sky when I sat down and scratched behind his small ears and then hot tears came falling. I was the kind of sad that doesn’t make tears, and I was ready for it to end. Then the affection of a gray cat broke me. That’s how I knew I was going to be okay. That’s when I knew God wanted me.

3 attempts, from 13 to 16, with three bottles.

The first time I tasted death, I was 13, and had a supply of antidepressants to my name that I couldnt pronounce. All I knew was they were meant to fill the darkness in my head, but they weren't doing it fast enough. I read online the quickest way to go was with pills. So, I let them fill my belly until I was uncomfortably full and fell asleep to some tinny suicide playlist on YouTube.

But I woke up, sick, but alive, to the sight of my childhood tree billowing beautifully through cut beams of a clear day outside my window.

The second time, I took an entire bottle of extra strength Tylenol, bereaved for my innocence so cruelly taken. The cherry-sugar coating stained my tongue for days, and all my mother could see when I came into her room in tears was red on my lips and a tremor to my body. I begged her to take me to the hospital, because I was stricken by fear. I shook, and shook, until I was placed into the scratchy cot and knew I was safe.

I had never felt so afraid before. I didn't want to leave my brothers without their baby sister, or my mother- clutching my hand with her jaw working to still the tears- alone.

The third and last time, I was at school. I laid on the bench in the change room, my head lolling, I think maybe seizing since I couldn't still my violently jolting body. I don't remember anything, beside my best friends bursting in with matching haunted looks tattooed on their faces. I don't recollect ever telling them I was in there, nor would they have any reason to be in the desolate gym wing when there weren't any classes near. The only thing I ever said, was that the perfectly nice nurse was a fucking bitch as she forced the drip IV of activated charcoal down my nose and doctors came rushing into the ER. But I survived that too.

I shouldn't have survived any of those. Maybe the first, it hadn't been enough of a dosage. The second time I didn't allow the pills time to work. The third time, I was ready. I took the whole bottle, and planned it so no one would find me. But I was found. I survived that one too.

That isn't luck. That can't be.