LayGuy

I chose the above picture deliberately as eleven years ago I experienced an event which has scarred me since. This was a long time ago in my mind. Before I knew Jesus, before I knew my wife, before I knew what my children would look like.

In 1995, I went clubbing with a group of 6 friends. We weren’t trouble makers. We just went for a good time. On this particular night, there were a lot of guys at the club - not many girls at all. Because my friends and I weren’t the sleazy type, we had a group of girls with us on the dance floor and we were just having a good time.

I was drinking on the night - as I did quite often back then. But I wasn’t a trouble maker and neither were my friends. At the end of one song, I went to the bar as I was thirsty from all the dancing. I asked for some water only - I had enough to drink already.I was given a glass of water and I remember leaning on the bar looking onto the dance floor and having a laugh as I watched my friends on the dance floor. Little was I to know that that was going to be a defining moment in my life.

The next thing I experience is screaming. Yelling. Bright lights. Pain. Confusion. In what seemed like a split second since I was at the bar laughing at my friends, I open my eyes and see a bouncer yelling at me in a toilet cubicle. The anger on his face is burnt into my memory. One second I am laughing at my friends, the next I see this stranger swearing at me.

I feel pain on my left eye and lift my hand to touch it. It was warm and moist and as I lowered my hand I see blood on my fingers. My eyes then dart to my torso and I find that my shirt is covered in blood. My jeans are the same. I start freaking out as I register what is going on.

The bouncer is still screaming at me and telling me to get up and get out. “What’s happened to me?” I ask. “Just get out of here!” he yells. I realise that I am soaking wet. Has someone urinated on me? I smell my clothes and am relieved to register no urine smell. But I did notice I had large pieces of mud on me. Strange, I thought, to get this in a night club.

After refusing my pleading to at least wash all the blood off my face and hands before I leave the toilets, the bouncer kicked me out of the night club. The stares I got from the crowds as I was escorted from the toilets to the entrance of the club was sickening. My head was spinning, my mind was freaked out, my body was weak from the loss of blood, and everyone got to witness this.

As I was thrown out the front door, I heard my name called out. I turned to see my friends walking up the street. When they saw my face, they freaked! “What just happened?” I asked. “Where were you?” they responded. They then informed me as to what had happened in the last few hours.

Yes, I did say hours.

They had realised after a while that I had been missing. They searched the club we were in. They searched the toilets on three seperate occasions. I wasn’t there. They concluded that I must have hooked up with someone else and moved on to another night club. So they went to look for me. They had searched the clubs in the area and were walking back when they saw me being booted out. This happened 3 hours later.

Anyway, they drove me home and then I made my next discovery. My underwear was blood soaked. I had a shower, and went to bed. The next day I went to my doctor for a check up. I had X-Rays for a fractured skull. But all was clear. My mum saw me a week later and fainted when she saw what I still looked like. It took me 9 months to get the courage to get an AIDS and Hep test. Thank God, I was clear.

This was my assault twelve years ago. To this day, I have no idea what happened during the three hours I was missing. All I have is years of side effects. These have worsened to the point where now my doctors are saying that I may have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Depression and/or Anxiety Disorder.

That night left me with missing time, an assault, wet clothes, mud stains, bloodied underwear and I don’t know what happened at all. Some of my doctors say that I respond physiologically as one who has been raped. Others have tested to see if I am delusional. Some have scratched their heads in confusion while others have medicated the daylights out of me. But confusion reigns.

There is an urban myth I think about sometimes. It goes like this. People are drugged in night clubs. They are targeted for body parts. Cocaine or heroin is put up their backsides. This is to numb the muscles so extraction of body parts can take place. They are taken off site, placed into a bath tub full of ice. This is to prevent shock to the body. Small incisions are made for the extraction of kidneys, other body parts are extracted through the anus - which has been numbed by drugs. Problem is that the drugs burst the capillaries - causing excessive bleeding.

The person is then left in the bathtub with a phone placed next to them when they come to to be able to call for help. Trouble is, that with excessive blood loss and missing body parts, once extracted from the bath tub, the person soon dies.This is a horrific story and doesn’t make sense on a number of medical fronts. But it is one which offers an explanation to what happened to me that night eleven years ago…..

• My drink may have been spiked at the bar - I remember drinking from a glass - not a bottle.

• I was missing for three hours - my friends checked the toilets on three occasions the and I wasn’t there.

• The mud would be explained by the fact I was taken off site.

• The wet clothes would be explained by the bath tub.

• The blood soaked underwear was caused by the drugs - this was confirmed later by a doctor saying that I had a lot of scar tissue.

As far as I know, I have all my body parts. If this urban myth is what happened to me, and I do say if, then something happened to prevent these people from carrying out what they had intended to do. Maybe they were stopped by an angel. Maybe they were just confused. Maybe, being over six feet tall, I just didn’t fit into the bath tub :), whatever it was, I am still here to tell of the story and I praise my God because it was soon after this event that I became a Christian.

But like King David, I live to experience the consequences of my sin. I have an assaulted mind. Hence the picture. It is an on going experience for me. My wife supports me greatly as we come to understand what happened so long ago. A psychologist confirmed with me that she has heard this story a number of times before.My request to those who have read this post…if you are a prayer warrior, please pray for my healing. I need it and my family deserves my healing.

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