My Experience with Depression and Suicide in 2001

I was a year one student in school and by God’s grace, together with some wonderful people, I had just started a campus fellowship. The inaugural program was very successful and about 30 people came out to receive Christ into their lives.

But very strangely, immediately after the program a very strong negative feeling came on me. I began to feel like I had bitten more than I could chew and that I was going to disgrace myself and let God down. It was like I was hearing a voice say to me “what have you gotten yourself into”?

With all these negative feelings weighing down on me a terrible fear just filled my heart and I could not do anything any longer.Then one day I decided to end it all.

I was wearing a white shirt and a black trouser and I had all the money I had at the time in my pocket. I took a bus and travelled down to Sapele town and after highlighting from the car I decided to linger around for a while so that it could get dark before I walk towards the bridge and from there jump into the river.

When it was getting a bit dark I began walking towards the bridge and when I got there I went to the center of the bridge and stood there for a moment looking down into the water. I was trying to summon enough courage to jump in but I just could not do it. So I came up with an idea. I decided to lay down at the edge of the bridge and wait till I was ready so I could just roll into the water.

At that time, there was no concrete pavement by the side of the bridge as it is now. It was just a metal railing that had some space at the bottom so I was lying down on the floor of the bridge and there was nothing between me and the water at that moment.

When large vehicles passed the bridge I would feel the bridge shake and vibrate under me. And all of a sudden it started drizzling and as the drops of water started falling on my face, it was like my eyes got opened and I felt so bad and started asking myself what I was doing there. I got up and walked down to my parent’s house and my family was shocked to see me. When I eventually told them why I was there at that moment, they felt very bad.

They tried to encourage me and I went back to school but even at school I was still feeling down. It was time for exams and I just managed to write my papers. Because of my state, I was not able to read and prepare very well for my exams and one day a lecturer saw me and said “Ifo, what did you write in my exam yesterday”? He went on and said “or are you now following bad gangs”? I did not answer him because I knew I did not write well.

After all my exams, I went back home. Now I had an earlier agreement with my parents that if my results were not good I would have to leave the school. Now, I had not written my exams well and it was very likely that my results would not be good. So I prayed a prayer and I said to God: “Lord I have messed up by not doing well in my exams, but if you want me to stay in this school and do your work, then you have to show up and manifest yourself right now”.

My results came out and at that time the school sent results home to parents during the holiday. When my result came out, in the course where the lecturer was asking me why I wrote rubbish, I was given an “A”. My result was generally good and I did not fail or have a bad result.

At that moment, I went to repent before God. I said “God, I am sorry for not trusting you”. From that moment, I decided to give myself to prayer, study of God’s Word and to prepare myself for the work God had for me in my school. This was in August/ September 2001.

That was the first time I went for a 7 day All Night Prayer Program.

During that whole period, whenever we were asked in a church meeting to pray for one thing we needed from God, I prayed for my school fellowship and for God to use me there to do His work.

Whenever we were asked to give or sow a seed for one thing, I gave for my school fellowship at school.

In that period, God laid a lot of vision and direction in my heart for the fellowship.

When the new school session began around October 2001, to the glory of God, our fellowship took a new turn and dimension.

We had so many testimonies of changed lives and great impact and influence upon our campus. There was a time that people came to always ask if we were having a program that weekend; because they knew that if they fixed their own in that same time, nobody will go for their program. I am not talking about Christians. I mean people who wanted to organize parties and shows of various kinds.

I remember a program organized by our dance group that was led by my vice president at the time Pst Joyce Uzochukwu. The program was tagged “Beyond the Veil” and it had a gate fee of N200 (Two Hundred Naira). The program had about 7 different dance groups featured including SOD (Spirit of David) and the dance groups from the chapter of our fellowship in Ekpoma and Uniben. We had about a thousand people in attendance at that program.

The guest speaker was Bishop Wale Ajayi who was then Rev. Wale Ajayi. God’s power moved mightily in the program and many souls were saved. I clearly remember the message he preached that day. He said the first thing you will see beyond the veil is the mercy seat. When God was giving Moses the dimensions for the mercy seat, He only gave Moses length and breadth. No height. Because it was supposed to be placed on top of the ark. He said the mercy seat of God is flat because in His mercy, God comes down to our level. He said a judgment seat is high so the person can look down on you and judge you, but a mercy seat is flat so the person can stay on your level and help you. He said Jesus is God’s mercy seat.

He said if we ignore God’s mercy seat (which is God’s salvations freely provided for us by Jesus Christ) we will have to face God’s judgment seat.

When he was done, he sat down on the floor and gave an altar call. Inviting people to come and meet God on the mercy seat…and people ran out to get saved.       

After the program people did not want to go home and some people came to meet us and said the gate fee was too cheap – that it should have been N1,500 (One Thousand Five Hundred Naira). That they pay that for shows that they go for but in those shows they do not get as much as they got from our program.

God did so many other things but I will like to stop here for now and I hope that you were blessed in one way or the other by this story and testimony.

It is from my experience that I came up with these two quotes below:

Thank you for reading.

God Bless you greatly.

Ifoghale Efeturi        

iefeturi@gmail.com