When I woke up in a panic from what I thought was an episode of sleep paralysis filled with shadow-like images of demons hovering above me, the nurses and guard thought I was trying to escape. They were not kind.
“I have to go to the bathroom,” I pleaded.
“Go, you have a catheter.”
I didn’t know what that meant. She explained, and it hurt to hear.
Where am I and why am I chained to the bed?
“You’re at Cooper Green Hospital, and you’re in custody. You died last night.
We revived you. We pumped your stomach and fed you charcoal.”
“When can I go home?”
“You have to go to jail first.”
I was 21 years old. For most people that’s way past rock bottom: legally dead and revived, handcuffed to the bed at the indigent hospital.
For me, at that time, it was just poetry. It was part of the myth I had concocted to convince myself I was special, that I was a tragedy and all the world would discover my brilliance after my death—because I was too insecure to actually live.
For most people that would be a sign that something should change.
I went on like this for another two decades until my adulterous affair drove me to—at the very least—seriously consider suicide in a drunken rage.
Hey Friends. Mike Shaner here. Last week I posted a video about a question someone asked me on social media: “Be Honest Has Prayer Ever Worked For You.”
I told you all that as soon as I read it I felt compelled to share my story over the next few episodes of AntiState Content.
The one thing I don’t want to do here is glamorize or romanticize any of this. That’s how I embraced my demons. I felt drawn to Hank Williams and Jim Morrison and every artist the world loved and immortalized for wasting their life.
I believe by the end of this series you’ll at least understand why.
Today I am truly happy. Our house is filled with laughter. We laugh so much. We have a family farm with babies running everywhere.
My far-away, in-a-perfect-world dream that only happens to other people was to have a cattle farm.
I didn’t think I would get married and I didn’t think I could make babies. And business trips, expense accounts, trust, value, honest relationships that take honest effort and provide honest rewards?
When my story is over you will have to really be scared of God to hide from his presence in my life.
And I’m not special. I didn’t do anything but finally hurt so bad that I asked the Lord to make it stop and show me a better way.
If you’re reading, watching, or listening to this and you feel broken, isolated, insecure, like a misfit, or undeserving, please stay with me across the next few episodes.
I’m not here to preach. I’m just going to tell my story and you might relate. You can draw your own conclusions.
Subscribe and follow along live on Sunday night’s with the recording posted soon after on Substack & Youtube
