Allie Marie Smith seemed to have it all. So why did she make plans to end it? Allie and Julie Lyles Carr talk about her story and the alarming statistics about young women and mental health today, and Allie shares what honesty, healing, and hope look like.
Interview Links:
Find Allie Online | Facebook | Instagram| YouTube
Book: Wonderfully Made
Sheila Walsh Episode #53 – Mental Health & Faith
Transcription:
Julie Lyles Carr: You’re listening to the AllMomDoes podcast where you’ll find encouragement, information, and inspiration for the life you’re living, the kids you’re raising, the romance you’re loving, and the faith you’re growing. I’m your host, Julie Lyles Carr. Let’s jump into this week’s episode.
Hey, quick programming note for you today, listener. I am so looking forward to this conversation that I’m going to be having with Allie Marie Smith. We are going to be talking about mental health and we’re going to be talking about a pretty dramatic episode in her life in which she kind of had a plan together, and what diverted that plan, what she learned as a result… but because that’s our topic, if you’re catching my drift here, I wanted to give you some time to maybe slip those earbuds in. If you’ve got kids in the car, if this is not necessarily a conversation that you want them to overhear, but I want to encourage you, make sure you listen to this very important conversation with Allie Marie Smith.
All right, Allie. Thanks so much for being on the podcast today. I so appreciate you being here.
Allie Marie Smith: Hi Julie. Thank you so much for having me. It’s an honor to be here.
Julie Lyles Carr: You have accomplished a whole lot of things in your life, my friend. You’ve been up to a whole lot when it comes to all kinds of great messages, different achievements, different things
you’ve been up to. Tell listeners where you live in the country and a little snapshot of your life and what you’re up to these days.
Allie Marie Smith: Sure. My husband and I, Paul, we live in north Santa Barbara County here on about kind of like the central coast, but sort of Southern as well here in California. We’re both surfers and loves outdoors. We both work with a lot of youth in our community. I am the founder and executive director of a national nonprofit ministry for teen girls and young women called Wonderfully Made. And our mission is to help girls and young women know their God given value and live spiritually, emotionally, and mentally healthy lives.
And my first trade book, I’ve written a couple of Bible studies and in my twenties and thirties, but my first trade book just came out, also by the same title Wonderfully Made. And we have a fun little dog Gidget and love adventuring, always outside doing fun things. So that’s a little bit about us.
Julie Lyles Carr: That’s awesome. Now I want to take listeners back because you, as a late high school, early college student, you were an athlete, you had felt like you were part of the popular crowd. People knew you at your all girls high school, and you really appeared to have it all together. So take me from that place to the day that you made a plan. You got in your vehicle, you headed for the San Francisco area, and you plan to jump from the golden gate bridge. How does a girl who seems to have it all together and what the public can understand, can understand, and see, how does that girl get from that place to making that kind of a plan? Walk us through that.
Allie Marie Smith: Well, appearances, as we know, can be very deceiving. On a June day, I walked across the stage with the smile across my freckled face, grabbing my diploma, and no one would have guessed the state of mind that I was in.
Really, it was a storm that had raged on for many years from the age of 12. I started to experience unexplained feelings of sadness, loneliness, and unworthiness, and they really escalated throughout high school. And though I was a high achiever and highly perfectionistic, I was really pushing back against what I now know was depression and mental illness. And so, two weeks after I graduated Summa cum laude from high school, I came undone, and I entered into deep and a dark and a very debilitating depression. I was unable to eat, sleep, talk. My body was alive, but really there was no life within me. And it was really the perfect storm. It was you know, genetic predisposition, mental illness, friends of my family also being highly perfectionistic.
I think the stress of going off to college or hormonal issues. So, for me, it was very spiritual issues. Of course, it was it was the perfect storm. And so, my parents had admitted me to the psychiatric hospital where I was put on antidepressant, and sent home three days later for outpatient therapy, and the depression hadn’t subsided, and I was very desperate, and I grabbed my car keys. I snuck out of our home in Silicon Valley and you’re right. I headed off with one destination in mind and that was the golden gate bridge with the intention to end my life by jumping off. I was an excruciating pain. I thought that was the only way I could escape the depression.
I believe the lie that the world was better off without me in it. And as I neared the bridge, I was driving somewhat recklessly, and my tire hit a curb and I got a flat tire. And I remember sitting in my Explorer, paralyzed and unsure what to do. And there was a knock on my window and a silver haired kindhearted man came to my rescue. He asked if he could call for roadside assistance for me. And I agreed. And after not talking to anyone for over a month, I engage in a real conversation with that kind of hearted man. And something about that encounter gave me hope. So, when my tire was fixed, I turned around and I went home to my family.
Now that was not the end of my battles with mental illness. I try to go to college all the way on the east coast. And, you know, trust your mother’s instinct. Go and tell that to, to your mothers listening, because there was a therapist who told my parents that it was probably good for me to move on with my life. And so I had been accepted prior to this, to a college in Pennsylvania. And so not knowing what to do, you know, I tried to pack up, I tried to start college and I came undone again. I entered into a very dark depression. I wasn’t thinking clearly. And I had to be flown home. I was readmitted to the hospital where I stayed for over three weeks. I actually watched the twin towers attacks from the hospital room, there in September 2001, and Christians in my parents’ life began praying for me. And one man wrote me the most beautiful prayer. And as I was starting to get the help that I needed and the medication was beginning to slowly lift the depression, I asked for a Bible, and I had never read the Bible on my own. I started to read it for myself, and I discovered that Jesus loved the broken and I was as broken as broken as a girl could be. And I found that Christ came to give us love and hope and belonging and healing. And one day in the hospital chapel, as a woman saying amazing grace, I surrendered my life to Christ there, and I’ve never been the same since.
I have had battles with my mental health since, but today by God’s grace, through professional help and by living a very clean and healthy lifestyle, I am now free from symptoms of mental illness and I’m thriving. And I pinch myself at the life I get to live today. And I’m so passionate about sharing this hope with other girls and other women who may have similar experiences.
Julie Lyles Carr: You know, it’s incredible to me to see some of the stats that we’re seeing, because there was a point in time in history where people would have heard your story and felt like it was very unusual. We usually think of young men, and we usually think of guys in that mid-life time period as being some of those who are most at risk for suicide.
And yet you have within the information that you send about out about what you do, you have information that says that there’s a rising suicide rate among teen girls, and that it’s risen 65% from 2010 to 2015. There seems to be a connection with smartphones and social media. Now that was not necessarily your case back in 2001, but what are you seeing in the ministry and work that you do with young women?
How social media, how that comparison, how elements are now influencing the statistics that we’re seeing when it comes to mental health, suicide rates and young women.
Allie Marie Smith: You’re right. Well, we did see a very steep increase from 2010 to 2015. And just recently with COVID the suicide rate among hospitalizations among teenage girls increased another 51%. So, there’s a lot of play here. You know, we’ve had suspicion for a long time that social media is not a healthy place for girls. And Facebook has conducted its own surveys and own studies these past three years, and may have found that their apps, specifically Instagram, is harmful for a sizable amount of youth, but especially teen girls.
So, our teen girls are especially sensitive. They, they process the social media experience in a very different way than boys do, and comparisons on social media change the way young woman view and describe themselves, most often in a very negative light. And so many girls feel like social media is destroying their lives, but they feel like they can’t go off of it or they’re not going to have a life. And so you’re right. And we do know that the overuse, that excessive use of social media, does definitely increase anxiety and depression. It makes eating disorders worse. Many girls go on looking for eating disorder content and to encourage them in their eating disorder. And they end up consuming even more and getting sucked into the app even more.
So it is not beneficial. You, you take a wider look at the culture, and you see that teen girls, young woman are living in a godless culture that tells them their identity and worth is found in their appearance and in their influence, which is often online. And so they’re contending with the toxicity of social media and the pressures of the culture and the pressures of everyday life. They are more hyper-connected than ever, but really more isolated, and feel more alone than they did prior to social media.
Julie Lyles Carr: Right. You know, Allie, help guide us through, because you ended up finding Christ at this really important moment and it became the way by which, in addition to the help you are receiving the counseling, the medication, it became that moment that you were able to exit this battle that had been so huge. Again, not that you haven’t had battles since then, but the one that almost took your life. And it was able to, you were able to move from that place. Now we’re going to have listeners, who’ve had experience with saying I was part of a robust faith community or someone I loved was part of a robust faith community and seemed to have a really deep and meaningful relationship with God, and yet their story turned out differently. How do you navigate that with the work you’re doing? Because we love these moments where we hear somebody where it feels like God intervenes, and it feels like there’s a guardian angel and, and it’s incredible. And it doesn’t minimize in any way, the experience that you had.
But we also have people that, that wasn’t their experience, and the outcome was different. What do you say to those people and to the very valid emotions and, and doubt and confusion that can arise from something like that?
Allie Marie Smith: Sure. Well, there’s so many things in this life that we just won’t have the answers for. And while this was a part of my story, another part of my story, which I write about in the book is, you know, when I was 18 and I came to faith in Christ, and I began to get treatment for my depression and start to get my, get my life back on track. You know, I thought like I would never struggle again. I thought that, you know, because I had God in my life and I was pursuing, pursuing
Christ that I wouldn’t have battles with my mental health. Well, what happened when I was 21 in college, the depression returned pretty severely. And I even had a suicide attempt at 21 as a Christian, as a person of faith. And so that was very hard for me to wrestle with. And I think as Christians, we, we just don’t understand, how can a person of faith who has the ultimate hope in their life, still come to a place of desperation and of that. And really, I think we have to educate ourselves on mental illness. It is biological, psychological, environmental factors at play, and there’s a physiology to, of the illness. And so just like, you know, we can break a break, a bone, or we can get cancer, have diabetes, our brain can get sick and be unwell also. And there are so many other factors at play. And so, it’s a very complex issue is saying even someone who has lived with a mental health condition for the last 20 years, I still don’t completely understand it. And so, I think for people who maybe have lost loved ones, there’s a lot of unanswered questions and there’s a lot of pain, and there’s a lot of grief because we just can’t understand. But we have a suffering savior who has suffered so profoundly and knows our suffering, and so this isn’t the end of this story. And so, I always just want to encourage anyone that, you know, just because we have our faith, it doesn’t mean that mental health struggles completely disappear. We may really have to wrestle that out in this, in this broken world. We might not have all the answers all the time.
Julie Lyles Carr: There seems to be. I hope, a growing understanding, and a growing transparency, about mental illness within our communities of faith. I think that I’m seeing some more openness to the reality and the necessity and the miracle that some of our medications can be when it comes to combating mental illness. And yet every now and then Allie, I got to tell you, there’ll be something that raises up where somebody is just, well, if somebody would just pray enough or believe big enough or do whatever the thing is that they think will eliminate this as a challenge in someone’s life, even though in the apostle Paul, we have somebody who’s, you know, very clear and direct about a thorn in the flesh that he wrestles with over and over, even though we have examples, for example Elijah, you know, who goes through a significant depression… jonah, who goes through a significant depression who stayed a God, I just want to, I want you to end my life.
I don’t want to live anymore, somehow, we’ve come to a place where at times we still have those pockets and our faith communities of people who think that mental illness should not be anything that someone who is a quote unquote, using air quotes, true Christian ever grapples with. How do you handle that when you come across that kind of resistance or that kind of narrative by people?
Allie Marie Smith: Yeah, you know, it’s, it’s not easy. I can remember being in Southern California at a large church here and a pastor’s wife was talking to me and asking about my testimony, and I had shared that I had struggled with depression. And she was interested in having me speak to the girls at their church. I’ve spoken a lot with, with girls and young women and, and then she asked, you know, do you take medication?
And I said, yes. And very matter of factly, she said, well, that can be fixed by your diet. And it was, it hurt me so much. Everyone knows me. I’m, I’m pretty a health nut. And I care about the, the foods that I consume, and I would have done anything to take that depression away. And, you know, there’s just some things that we just, we don’t understand.
And I think the power of telling our stories and really listening to one another and understanding one another and humility is so important. I have been so blessed by Sheila Walsh, who I’ve gotten to know personally through our podcasts, with the ministry. I know you’ve met Sheila as well.
She has made a significant impact on me because I actually went to a woman of faith conference right before I graduated high school. And I grabbed a copy of her book Honestly, and what she shares her personal story of being diagnosed with depression, having to leave the set of the 700 Club and be hospitalized.
And I think she was one of the first brave Christian voices to really speak out about her own experience. And so, I think the power of storytelling and telling your testimonies and really listening to one another is so important. And I agree with you. I think we have come a long way as, and there’s a lot more conversation, and we’re starting to normalize conversations about mental health in our homes and in our communities and with one another.
So, I am hopeful that we are making headway. And I want to say to that, you know, I’m always encouraged that mental health conditions, aren’t terminal conditions. They are often highly treatable conditions. I mean, when I look back at how sick I was, I mean, it is just a miracle. By God’s grace that I am here and I’m not only here,
I’m here flourishing and my life with the help of medication with the help of a clean, healthy lifestyle. And so, I just want to encourage people if you are struggling just sometimes one day at a time can be too overwhelming. So, I want to encourage you to take it one breath at a time and to stop isolating. To reach out for professional support, because there’s so much hope that is available.
Julie Lyles Carr: When we had Sheila on, and I adore Sheila, I’m always thankful for the times that our paths cross and that’s episode 53, we’ll see if Rebecca can put that link in the show notes. You’re right, Sheila has been a real trailblazer in her vulnerability, her transparency about her story and being willing to talk about it.
You know, she also has a situation that’s interesting because when we think about genetics and the things that also come into play here, her dad struggled and so, and struggled to the point that he ended his own life. So, that grace and that listenership that you’re talking about is so critical instead of spouting what can feel like really flip suggestions or tips. This is not really the kind of area that deserves, that sort of approach. So, I think the more that people are willing to talk about what they’ve wrestled with and the ways they’ve wrestled with it, it’s really important to see that. Distinguish for us, Allie, you know, in your situation, it looked like you had it together.
Then you go through this experience, and you recover. You seem like you’re doing a lot better, than it hits again. What are things that we can either be looking for in ourselves to go, okay, this could be a burgeoning sense of depression in my own life, or as we’re looking to our kids, as we’re looking to our daughters, as we’re looking to the young people that we’re mentoring, I think sometimes we can feel like we have a responsibility to see it in someone and to try to prevent what might happen.
And I think there’s, that’s got a toxicity of its own to some degree. It’s not to say we shouldn’t be aware, it’s not to say that we shouldn’t do what we can to advocate or to try to intercept someone who seems like they’re really going down a tough path. But sometimes the signals are just really not there. Are there things we should be looking for in ourselves and the people that we love?
And where’s the balance between understanding, you know, the guilt sometimes that people carry, when they feel like they should have intervened, but they just didn’t pick up on the signals?
Allie Marie Smith: Yeah. Well, I want to say that anyone who maybe has had a loved one who they’ve, who they’ve lost to suicide is have so much grace with yourself. It’s, it’s not your fault. You know, you, you don’t play the regret game, you know. It’s very complicated to understand what it’s really going through someone’s mind. And so, you know, I remember really believing that the world was better off without me in it, that I was a burden that, you know? Just the nature of the illness, it isolates someone, it makes them believe the worst lies imaginable, and it’s an illness, and it’s important to understand that. And I think when we’re trying to maybe have a pulse on someone, in our life who, you know, we’re not sure if they’re how they’re doing. Having open conversations is so important. You know, a lot of people think asking someone now, are you, are you thinking of ending your life or are you having thoughts of suicide?
We often think that that’s going to trigger them to want to do it, but actually research has found the opposite to be true. That it can actually open up the conversation. And so, you know, if you do have anyone in your life that you’re suspecting you know, to check in on them. To ask them that question can be really helpful and yeah, I think, you know, I dedicated my book to my family and I said, thank you for fighting for me when I couldn’t fight for myself. And again, unfortunately when we, when we have a loved one who is unwell mentally, sometimes it looks like us having to fight for them on their behalf because it can take away their desire to live their desire to go on. And, and so that can look like, you know, going, taking them to doctor’s appointments, or counseling appointments, or helping with their medication. But I think to have grace with ourselves and to know that, you know, just to do the best that we can and to have open conversations. To educate ourselves, our family on the warning signs, the symptoms and the treatment plans that are available, I think doing all of those things, and again, normalizing the conversation around mental health in your household can really be a beneficial thing.
Julie Lyles Carr: Allie, I still find with people, and I find this very interesting, a stigma attached with mental illness that is different than someone who has what would be considered a physiological illness.
You and I both understand that when it comes to the health of the brain, that is also a physiological state. Okay. So, so right there, I think people need to understand that your brain is not independent of your biology. It all works together. And when you are wrestling with mental illness, just because it’s expressed through that thing that feels a bit more ephemeral emotions, does not mean that it’s not a biologically based
experience, or that it doesn’t have biological things that are going on. However, it is interesting to me. I have people in my world that I think they would have grace all day long for somebody who has what is considered a physiological illness, an immune disorder, or type one diabetes or, you know, take your pick of what the thing would be, and yet struggle with giving grace to someone who’s wrestling with mental illness? Like why can’t they just snap out of it? Why can’t they just go for a long run? Why can’t, you know, whatever the thing is, how do we make sure, and what do we say to those people who are wrestling to access? That this is an illness it’s not necessary.
Are there decisions that can be made within mental illness? Sure, but it is far more complex sometimes than how we want to see it in the kind of grace that should be extended to someone in that way. What do you say to people who seem to be wrestling with the idea that it truly is an illness, and they are holding people with mental illness to a different standard than they would someone who had what we would call a medical physiological illness?
Allie Marie Smith: Yeah, I would say you know, to ask God to, to give you understanding, to give you compassion. Again, to educate yourself, he hears other people’s stories, you know. The more, especially people in the public eye, come out and share their mental health stories, the more normalized it will, it will become. Oh, that amazing star athletes struggled with anxiety and panic attacks, you know? Oh, she, you know, that movie stars struggled with depression. So, I think the power of telling our stories again is so important, but you’re right. I think some people, unfortunately just won’t understand until they’ve been through it themselves, or they’ve had a loved one go through it themselves. And, you know, Mental illness has been in my family, but my parents hadn’t experienced it, like, like they had with me until they had to walk me through it. And I remember my dad being very resistant at first to me going on medication. And then, you know, now I see that it’s a tool God has given me to help me live well. And so, I think it takes experience. It takes educating ourselves and it takes a lot of compassion. And to say, you know, it’s not my job to have it all figured out. This is a complex issue.
It’s not, you can’t just simplify it. And it’s different for every person. I mean, mental illness symptoms can range from mild to moderate, to severe. There are many different illnesses. It looks different in each person. And so, I think educating ourselves and having compassion and, and asking God to show us to have mercy and other people can really help us move forward.
Julie Lyles Carr: Allie, help us understand because you’re, you’re married, and there are certain classifications of certain mental illness diagnoses that often carry some kind of scary statistics when it comes to marriages staying together, and marriages blowing up…
How did you approach your marriage, knowing the diagnosis that you had? Knowing the ways in which you were working through that? How did you handle that and how do you handle that today? If there is a period of time, what are the rules in terms of your husband is seeing something that’s starting to concern him? Like, how do you guys manage that, because that to me feels like some of the uncharted territory to some degree, when we have conversations about mental illness. We’ve accepted these pretty bleak statistics when it comes to those who wrestle with certain forms of mental illness and marriage. But what are we doing pragmatically to walk forward, to create greater success and greater happiness and greater transparency in marriage, when someone is wrestling with mental illness?
Allie Marie Smith: Yeah, well, you know, I just say, I felt very blessed to have the husband. I have, I mean, he has just been a godsend in my life. He’s stood by me through a mental health episode in my early thirties and walked me through that just so faithfully, so, with such love and such grace and, you know, sadly, unfortunately that’s not the story for everyone. And you know, just like my husband, you know, prior to us being married, he had never experienced mental illness in, in his life or in a loved one’s life. And so, he learned a lot through my story, through my struggle. And you know what God has brought even more compassion and grace, and there are beautiful gifts that can come from mental illness. There can come a depth about you, and empathy and compassion, and I don’t believe God has wasted any of my pain. And you know, our lives, it looks different than the life that I thought that we would have when we first got married. You know God didn’t write a certain story for us.
We don’t have children and that door hasn’t opened and, and at this time, and so, you know, It’s, it’s been challenging. It hasn’t been the story that, you know, we thought we would be living as a married couple, but I think I just feel grateful, grateful. Again, I think understanding, and educating oneself and having grace at this is an illness.
You know, we’re committed to this person in sickness and in health. And this is just like a cancer. This is just like diabetes, and we’re going to get through this and we’re going to seek, we’re going to seek help and we’re going to pray and we’re going to, we’re going to walk through this together. And again, I just feel grateful that my husband has walked me through that road in my life. And I think God has used this struggle to refine both of us. And He’s used it for good. We’ve been able to help so many other people who have suffered, who are suffering currently. Several people right now in the throes of depression and the throes of an episode, and so you know, it’s become our part of our ministry. And you know, it might not be the story that we signed up for as a married couple, but it’s the story that God has for us. And, and we’re going to accept that and live it out.
Julie Lyles Carr: Allie Marie Smith, I’m just so thrilled that I got to have this conversation with you today. You can learn more about Allie’s story and what she’s walked through. Learn more about your identity, your worth. She has a new book out called Wonderfully Made. And Allie, where else can people go to find out more about you hear more about your story and find more of your resource?
Allie Marie Smith: Sure, the best place probably is at wonderfullymade.org where you can find more about the book. And I just want to extend an invitation. A lot of moms are going through the book with their teenage daughters, and many people already have even been taking a social media detox. We’ve talked a lot about social media, so it can be a great kind of action item. And I’ve seen a lot of people have just really amazing experiences through that. So, everything is at wonderfullymade.org or my website, alliemariesmith.com.
Julie Lyles Carr: Right. Thank you so much. We’ll have Rebecca get those links into the show notes. Rebecca puts those show notes together each and every week for you, so listener, be sure and check that out. And also go wherever you get podcasts and be sure and leave a five-star rating and review for this episode today. Help get the word out. Help us break down some of the stigma, some of the challenges, some of the things that are not being addressed when it comes to mental illness and people within the community of faith. Allie, we are so thankful for the work that you do for your honesty and transparency about the journey that you’ve been on, that you’re still on.
And I just thank you so much for being with me today.
Allie Marie Smith: Thank you, Julie, for having me. God bless.
Julie Lyles Carr: Check out the show notes for all the links, info and other goodness from this week’s episode; with a big thank you to our content coordinator, Rebecca. I’ve got a request, please go like, and leave a review wherever you get your podcasts. It really does make a difference in helping other people find the show. And I’ll see you next week here at the AllMomDoes podcast.
