319: What if you couldn’t find your way home?
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This Is Actually Happening features real experiences that often include traumatic events. Please consult the show notes for specific content warnings on each episode and for more information about support services. Hi listeners, today we bring you the second of two episodes featuring Billy Macy and Misty Watterson, two sisters who both had life-altering experiences that stem from a shared childhood and weave together in parallel storylines. Last week we heard from Misty in episode 318 with the story of her missing daughter.

In her story, she talks about her sister Billie, her mental health crisis, and her subsequent involvement in the search for Allison. Today, we hear from Billie and what happened as she descended into a world of chaos. So here it is, the second of this two-part series, the story of Billie Macy. For today's episode, what if you couldn't find your way home? It is almost like this is the afterlife. The afterlife that we all are trying to avoid.

You are kicked out of every single place. You are nuisance. You are a liability. There's no contact with the actual world. And you're stripped of everything. From Wondery, I'm Witt Misseldein. You are listening to This Is Actually Happening. Episode 319. What if you couldn't find your way home?

Today's episode is brought to you by Audible. Listening on Audible helps your imagination soar. Whether you listen to stories, motivation, or expert advice, you can be inspired to new ways of thinking. And there's more to imagine when you listen. As an Audible member, you can choose one title a month to keep from their entire catalog. Currently, I'm listening to Daring Greatly by Brene Brown, a wonderful audio title that challenges us to imagine a new way to lead a

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Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customers surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. When my mother became pregnant with me, my father passed away from a heart attack. Our mother was very young, under 20, and extremely overwhelmed.

It was a lot of stress and it wasn't anything that she could manage. So my mother had taken us over to the neighbor's house for them to look after us. And they claimed that she just never returned. So those two people became our adopted parents. We were adopted when I was one and my sister was three. Our adopted mother was often very drunk and very abusive and very neglectful.

She would actually lock us in basements. We wouldn't eat. The food instability for my sister and myself was extreme. I was very sick because of how malnutritioned I was. And my sister developed an eating disorder at the age of, I think, five years old. It was so bad that my father's new girlfriend convinced my father to flee her abuse. She said, there isn't any way to get out of this unless we leave.

And so they did. They packed me and my sister up and we moved to Oregon. We never saw our adopted mother again. My father then got married. Then that was our family. She asked us to call her mother and she was very good to us. She was very, very much a mother figure teaching us how to exist in the world and how to look out for ourselves and take care of ourselves. We had a very comfortable life.

But then she had one of my siblings. And then right after that, she had another sibling. Right after that, she had four in a very quick concession. Life just changed very much. She was a very unhappy person. She was overwhelmed. And for her, her escape was nicotine and marijuana from the minute she woke up to the minute she'd go to bed.

I think she suffered from a lot of post-traumatic stress plus the addiction and she became very cruel, very demeaning. She separated my sister and myself from our siblings. We became their caregivers. And then my sister found her way out. She was able to go to a college in Washington. And so she was able to get away from the abuse and all of the riffraff of the family.

And then I was there with my siblings and my parents. I was about 10 years old and my parents had had like a bottle of alcohol. I just went in and I just kind of created what I had seen and I just drank it. And that was it. I knew that very moment that this was going to be a problem.

Because I just thought, this is it. This is how I get out of this place, this stress, this overwhelming amount of pressure. Because this made me feel good. Then I just kind of carried on pretty slowly. 11, I might have a beer with one of my friends. And 12, I might have four beers with one of my friends. And then each year seemed to just be coming more and more. My parents went out of town.

This boy that I'd had a crush on, he was not a good person, came over and shortly after I found out I was pregnant. I was 15. My mother was less than pleased. She was very much for abortion, adoption. I think there was this thought in my head that I'm going to show her. I can do this right. I can do this well. Once my son was born, I was 16 years old and I was still living at home.

It was becoming more and more challenging to take care of him well and myself and also take care of my brothers and sisters and deal with the stress my mother was putting me under. So my sister, she invited me to come live with her. Like we were going to get an apartment together and we were going to raise Bradley together. And that's what we did. And it was amazing to not live at home anymore. Everything was better and so different.

I went back to school, so I would take him with me to school. And then in evenings, my sister would take care of him often. And I would just drink and party all the time. I think there were moments where my sister, you know, she would express her concern about it. But that is definitely during the time when I was choosing alcohol over him.

He was about four years old when my sister and I decided that she was going to move out and start her life, and then I was going to move on to my next step in life. And I was about 20 years old. I was extremely proud of myself. I worked two jobs. I saved up for an apartment. I cut back my drinking, and it was just me and my son.

My sister, she got married and she had my nephew and then my niece, Allison. And she was a wonderful mother and wife and they lived their lives pretty well. As I got a little bit older, I was definitely leaning on that alcohol again much, much more. I went to a party with my son who was eight at this point and I met a man that was really incredible.

He was funny and smart and stable and responsible. We ended up spending quite a bit of time together, and he was just extremely supportive of me as a mother. He asked me to marry him shortly after we met, and then one year later, we were married. And it was really great, except for my drinking. When Bradley was about 12 years old, we moved to the suburbs and we bought a home.

We wanted to have another baby, and so we tried and we did. We had another baby. This gave me a huge break off of drinking, and it made me think to myself, oh, I can do this. This isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. As soon as I had her, though, the drinking just picked right back up. And then we had another child, and it was the exact same pattern. And then we had another child, and the drinking at that point was dangerous. I got in a DUI.

was very sick to the point where my doctor, unknowing that I was an alcoholic, prescribed me Klonopin in a very high dose. And so I would use that as a piggyback to feel better when I drank. Being that's not a very good combo, you know, there was often times where my breathing was shallow and my husband was very, very concerned and it started to cause a wedge in our relationship.

One night, after so much reflection, knowing how terrible things had become when I would drink, and yet I kept doing it despite the life I had was so wonderful, I just thought, well, there's no other way. There just is no other way. So I took a handful of the Klonopin after I'd been heavily intoxicated. I alerted my husband, and I was taken by ambulance to the hospital. I basically woke up in the morning, and I was alone,

And it was the perfect recipe for me because I realized that this was, you know, kind of what I might consider a chance. Like this is my chance. And I took it. And when I finally was able to get home,

started going to AA and I was able to quit drinking for six years. And during that time, I absolutely just flourished. I grew into this wonderful, very present mother and wife. I started running. I really felt like I had found the answer. This was 2018 and I turned 40.

My husband and I took a trip to Amsterdam and it was just an absolute, I mean, it was such a gift. It was such a gift. I chose Amsterdam because I had started smoking marijuana. I took advantage of the fact that it had become legal in Oregon. So to go to Amsterdam and still have that available was perfect. And we had just the best time.

But during that time we were in Amsterdam, I started to notice that people that I didn't know were starting to look familiar. They were famous. So if I saw maybe a female with dark hair, in my head, I saw her and she looked like Angelina Jolene. And I was convinced of it. I was like, oh yeah, that's her. Uh-huh. Definitely.

My husband, he said, okay, well, are you all right? Like, maybe you should not be smoking any more pot. Like, maybe you should take a break. You should probably take a break. I didn't take a break. When we got home from Amsterdam, I started to lose weight. I was smoking so much marijuana that I think this may have been what triggered like a depression inside of me.

So I made a doctor's appointment because the depression was affecting me in the way of not being able to get out of bed. It was a struggle. I was dragging. I just kind of went on for a minute and I had kids to take care of. So this nurse practitioner, after about 40 minutes of knowing me, prescribed me a antidepressant. I started taking the antidepressant immediately and my weight plummeted. I wasn't able to sleep. I became fixated on everything.

Everything was so beautiful to me. I felt as though we were living in a piece of art. Everything just became just heightened in beauty. I started projects all over my home that I just really never finished, like cement planters and backyard renovations and bathroom. And I'd be up till four or five o'clock in the morning. And I just felt like I wanted to drive fast all the time.

And I really could not be inside. I just, I couldn't, everything was stifling. So that's what I would do is I would just be outside. At the time, I saw myself as a active mother, a present mother, a great mother. I did not look at the marijuana smoking and all of the things, the losing weight, the not sleeping, the inability to finish projects.

wild spending that I was doing. I looked at that as just my personality. And I can tell you my husband's resentment was becoming greater and greater. I found it very hard to be around him. I was convinced he was destroying me. So I would often sleep outside in my hammock and I would stay with my friends. And that went on for a couple months. Then there was this moment where I ran into a friend and he was an old friend of mine. And he said, you can stay with me actually.

And so I did. I packed up my belongings and I went to stay with him. My husband was really pissed. I didn't understand why. I just, I thought it was another move for him to like, you know, kind of push me away or fight against what I wanted. So I was at this friend's house and he invited me to a party. I didn't know anybody there. And we go to this party and I actually smoked a dangerous amount of marijuana. I mean, it was, I don't even know what I was thinking. I really don't.

My brain and my body were becoming less and less of an entity. They were peeling apart. So there was this guy that was at the party. And I believe I just kind of thought he was cute. And I was very impulsive. So I followed him home next door. And when he walked through the door, I opened the door behind him and stepped in. He said, leave. You need to leave. I'm calling the police. So I left.

He had already, he called the police. Of course I would have done the same thing. And I took off running, not in a way of like fleeing, but I was like, I'll just run over here and they won't see me. And I didn't have shoes and I saw these shoes on this patio. So I took them and I put them on and I could hear the cops getting closer. And so I walked into the street. I still wasn't making those connections though of like severity. It just felt like maybe I was in some sort of simulation situation.

And this giant police officer came and tackled me in the middle of the street. I am 5'1". I weighed not much more than 100 pounds. And with all of his force, he tackled me to the ground. And it was really awful. And it happened really quickly. And he stood me up. He put handcuffs on me. He put me in the back of a police car. While I was in the back of the police car, I was in and out of reality.

like deciding whether this was real or not. So I was able to get out of my handcuffs. And so I showed the police officers my hand. They threw me on the ground, stepped on my head, tased me, hogtied me. From my perspective, I had nothing to just defend myself. So when they actually lifted me from the ground, I just spat at the police officer in his face. And that was not good. That was not a good idea. I spent nine days in county jail.

I wasn't getting better mentally. I wasn't being treated. I did go to court arraignment, I guess. And they said, you have to come back at this date for this, but you can go home. So my husband picked me up and took me home. And I just wanted to resume as normal, but he was done.

I just, I didn't know how to make it better for him and myself at that time. And I just, it was 4th of July. My niece had come over, Allison, to be with me. And we had a celebration the next day. And then once all the kids went to bed and my husband went to bed,

I packed all my belongings. I called many friends. Eventually, somebody was able to pick me up. And I made my way to downtown Portland. And I got myself this very nice hotel on the water. I just thought, okay, he's wrong. He is having a problem. It is not me. He needs time to realize his problem. And so I'm going to stay here.

I went out dancing that night alone. And remember, I'm 40 years old. You know, I do not have the mindset of a 20-year-old most of the time, but at this point I did. The next morning I woke up, I got some coffee and I was walking down the waterfront and I saw this very attractive man sitting with his friend on the steps. And we just started talking. The talking led to making a date. So we were going to go for coffee.

So then Mike and I ended up spending the next night or two at my hotel room. And not at any point did I think this is not the best idea. I think I had this combination of narcissism, juvenile behavior for sure, but my moral compass was it was just not working.

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It was time to go. We leave. It's a beautiful day. We're walking on the sand of the shoreline in Portland. I feel pretty happy. However, this overwhelming feeling of paranoia for him came over me. I thought my husband is going to show up and then be very hurt by my actions. It was just this flood of paranoia.

As we're walking, I saw a very large drainage pipe, you know, that was cut off so you could enter it. And there was like water kind of trickling out. So I stopped, I handed this man all my belongings and I started walking through this drain pipe to where he couldn't even like see me anymore. I stripped off all my clothes, literally everything. And I saw a ladder, a

steel ladder and I climbed the ladder and there was a manhole at the top. So I used my back to push the manhole up. And then I came out of the manhole completely naked, broad daylight. There were quite a few employees off to the side in this parking lot. And so they threw over a pair of pants and a jacket and I put those on and they were like kind of, um, stunned.

I don't know if it's because it's Portland they weren't that stunned, but they kept saying, okay, go, go. It wasn't too long. I was just wandering around. I felt content, though. I felt like I did it. I escaped. Whatever was about to happen, I got out of it. Okay, we're going to be okay. But then the police came, and they were not very kind or gentle people.

I told them, I'm fine. You don't have to bother with me. I'm fine. And they grabbed me. But what was a little bit different was that they had brought a gurney and I went on the gurney to a hospital. Each event that occurred with the manhole, the clothing, the police, the gurney, I felt like somebody had mapped the situation that was so crazy out for me and I was just going through the map.

That somehow I was just a part of this script. I think that's how I summed it up in my head. Okay, so what's the next thing that's going to happen? What's my next line? What's my next experience? I hung on to, I hope the next thing is what gets me home. I just kept wanting to go home. So I was on a gurney and they took me up the hill to the hospital. They were very gentle. They were very kind.

It was an experience that did not scare me. It actually intrigued me. It actually made me feel like there was somewhere I could go. And then I was tied down and given medication through a needle without my consent.

I still had intuition and I was feeling like things were copacetic until that moment when I was on a mattress. I had no clothes, just a gown and two men came in and another nurse and held my legs and held my arms. You know, that was paralyzing. Then I really don't have much of a memory after that.

I just woke up in an actual like mental health facility. I don't even know how I got there. I was told that you're here, you know, you're going to get on some medication. You're going to talk to a psychiatrist and we're just kind of here to watch over you while you get better. And I was okay with that. My son was just devastated. It was extremely hard on him.

Other friends came to see me and the time kept extending because I would not be cooperative with the medication. So people stopped coming to see me. And then my court date came up and my lawyer called and she started out kind and nice, but I was not nice and kind or cooperative. And she said, you're going to regret not taking this seriously.

So I missed the court and then they gave me a failure to appear, which was a warrant. And then a few days later I said, I can't be here anymore. I'm leaving. And I'd kind of like stayed past my time. You know, it was 24 days. I called everybody. I called my husband. I called my friends. And there's nobody, nobody picked up. Nobody took my call. Not one person, not my sister, nobody, not my son.

I gathered all my belongings. I stepped out of the facility and there was a cab waiting for me. I still don't know why it was there. I just got in the cab. I had this bag and it was quite a few things from my niece. Really, she was the only one that had been spending time with me. And I found this bag of cookies that she had made.

You know, I think I believed that there was just signs, that there were things that were put into place as signs of something else. I didn't entirely understand what those things were, but that was at that moment a sign that I was going to see my niece. But he actually took me to the pharmacy to get my medication. He pulled up front and I went inside. I didn't have insurance. I didn't have ID. I had no money.

It was just impossible for me to obtain anything. I left and the cab was gone with all of my belongings, including my phone. I borrowed phones occasionally to try to call people and I called my husband and he never picked up time and time again. It was many hours later, well into the next day, it was very early in the morning, I came to the realization I needed to make my way back to Portland.

And I was walking and this was the beginning of where I made sure I always had company with me. So I saw this guy, he was young-ish, younger than me. And he was kind of standing by the bus stop and he just looked a little lost. And I said, hello. He was like, hello. I said, what are you doing? He said, I'm just waiting for the bus, I believe. And then I said, do you want to go to Starbucks? And he goes, okay, I have no money. And I said,

And I said, I don't have any money either. I said, but they give out samples. So we did that. We went into Starbucks. We got samples. And this man, he walked with me all the way to Portland. It was about 15 miles. He never left me. He stayed with me. He's just such a good person. And along the way, we would run into people. And I would ask to use their phones. And I would try to reach out to family members.

I got to Portland and then he, you know, of course he had to go. He had to be somewhere else. I decided I needed to rest a little bit and I took my shoes off and I just laid down and I woke up and my shoes were gone. I felt determined to get back to my kids. Like, okay, this is where I'm going. So I began walking and it was two days, no sleep, no shoes, just walking.

I walked up this beautiful hill and I saw a person sitting on this bench, just calm, just kind of having a snack. It was in the evening. And as I got closer, I realized that it was that man that I had left on the waterfront. And my head was already spinning about these signs. And then this felt like the biggest serendipity, like this was exactly what is supposed to happen.

And I sat next to him and he shared that sentiment. He actually shared that sentiment and I needed that really bad. Also, he was eating and so he shared his cheese and crackers. And I hadn't eaten in a few days and it didn't bother me until I was actually eating. And so he had this, I guess, kind of a traveler's backpack bag.

And he had a pair of shoes. They were way too large for me, but he offered them to me. And then he said, let's go somewhere where we can sleep. So we walked for a long, long time. And we made our way to this wonderful little park in this really clean, safe part of Portland. And he set up this small pop tent. We went to sleep.

So the days to follow, they were better. I wasn't alone. I was with somebody that I felt like they wanted me there. So I needed shoes. So I called my husband and he came down to meet me and I wanted to go home, but he didn't want me to come home and he gave me money and he went in and he bought me shoes. And I just thought that was really kind of him.

And also I thought it was very cruel of him to give his wife money. I was with another man. Just leave me there. So I was able to buy a few things. Obviously my mind still wasn't making connections. This is the thing you should do. Instead I bought sushi. I went to H&M and I bought underwear. I don't know.

That's kind of how the next few weeks went. We would walk, eat, try to get a hold of people that could pick me up. He never seemed like he was trying to get anywhere. He would always wait for me when I was taking too long. He was just, he was a very memorable, delightful companion. And then one night, you know, we would go our separate ways occasionally and meet back up. One night, I went to the park to sleep to meet him and he wasn't there anymore.

So I went to sleep next to these two guys. I definitely felt like I shouldn't be falling asleep next to them. And the next day I woke up and my shoes were gone again. I left that park and I went back one other time to see if I could find him. But I didn't stay in the park. And then that is when I was on my own for a long time.

I have very little clothing and I have zero belongings. It is August, so it is very hot outside. It is really difficult to find a place to use the restroom. It is almost as impossible to find fresh drinking water. And I fell pretty ill.

I had gone into the mission where I would go to brush my teeth and wash my feet. And then this one time I was walking around and this man pulled up and he said, what are you doing? You have no shoes. Like, what are you doing? He said, please get in. So I did. I just didn't even, I did. He was so kind. He was so good to me. Took me to his house. I took a bath. He gave me food. We talked. And then he gave me $5.00.

And he dropped me off at the bus stop and he said, go to your family. And I did. And I probably regret that more than I regret many things. When I finally walked to my home, I saw my son look out the window to me and just great to see his face.

My husband came out. He made me walk up the street to where there was these benches. And we sat down and he brought me a backpack with a few items of clothing. And he just wouldn't let me in my house. I never have ever wanted anything. I could feel myself in my home. I just wanted it so bad. He just would not let me. And so I punched him in the face and he called the cops and then left. The police were very kind to me, though.

They were like, can we take you to a shelter? Can we take you somewhere that you can be safe? You know, you obviously can't be there, but it's my house. Why can't I be there? I didn't want anybody to be scared of me. I just wanted to be accepted. I didn't know that there was something wrong. I didn't. I just didn't. Why would I be away from my kids? Why would I want to be sleeping on cardboard on the streets? It was very confusing.

Everybody is castigating me. The fact that my sister had always been able to deal with my crazy. I mean, you know, being too drunk or just being upset. And she was no longer able to deal with my crazy. She looked at me like I was a monster. It was go to the hospital, get help, or don't call us.

For me, if I had any contact with friends during this time, I was just left feeling like what I was going through was my fault and that I was no good and I felt cast out. I had no money. I still had no shoes. I had nothing. And it still wasn't clicking. Sleeping, I would say, was one of the top things that were very difficult for

It's so difficult to even find somewhere to sleep, let alone a safe place to sleep. And a safe place to sleep would include not getting all of your belongings taken from you, not waking up to a man sexually assaulting you.

There was a time where I just so desperately wanted to be warm. I wanted to take a bath. I wanted to be in water. I went to a man's house and he gave me that opportunity, but he was insistent that his sexual needs would be met because he was granted that. And you're just not left with a choice. That was terrible.

This one person right on a main road in a parking lot, he wanted my backpack. So I gave him my backpack. After I gave him my backpack, he grabbed my body as hard as he possibly could squeeze me.

And he just squeezed me and he pulled my hair. He put a cigarette out of my hand and he head-butted me in the mouth. He just wouldn't stop. And nobody stopped to help. It is almost like this is the afterlife. The afterlife that we all are trying to avoid. You are kicked out of every single place. You are nuisance. You are a liability. There's no contact.

with the actual world and you're stripped of everything. But I do, I mean, I mean this when I say this, um, I have many, many, many healing moments and memories. There was this moment I was so hungry, like different level hunger.

And this lady, she's just a lady going to work. And she had a bag full of muffins, these big, beautiful blueberry muffins. And she just turns around and she just hands them to me. And she says, would you have these? Would you eat these? And she's almost speechless.

And you just want to ravish, like devour. And your thought though, and this is very, this happens. First thought is I need to go to where I've been spending time with people and share, you know, share this. So that's what happens is that if people, you know, feel inclined, which a lot of people in need do, they will share what they were given. This one particular, it was definitely getting cold outside.

And I was sitting on a bench in Portland. There was a tiny bit of rain and a raindrop like landed on my shoulder. And it was quite literally as if somebody turned my brain back on. Just click. I just was very lucid. Not well. I was not well, but I was aware of

I could feel the chilliness and the dewyness of pre-rain. I could feel all of those senses waking up. I could feel myself worrying and caring again. I hadn't really had that feeling in quite some time. It just started flooding back in.

And then action. I was able to take action because I had almost given up on reaching out to family. I lost my ability to even need or want to contact anybody. And I was so grateful for that moment.

I got up and I hurried over to this person and he was reluctant, but he let me use his phone. And I called my son and I said to Bradley, I am ready. I just please come get me. And he was surprisingly very nice. And he sent my sister and a friend of mine.

I really was convinced these two people hated me. They hated my behavior. They hated me. I just knew it, and I just didn't care. But they immediately put me in the car like they were taking me home, and they drove me to a hospital that I'd already been in. I had been in three. This particular hospital had also tied me down, and I just had a lot of trauma about that. I got out of the car, and I said, I'm not going in there.

And she called the police to say, here, this is where she is. She has a warrant, which I'm sure it was very hard for her. And then they picked me up. And that was the last time I was on the streets. So I went to jail. And then when I got to jail, the next day at court and the judge said, I don't know if you're well enough. And I was not. We're going to have you go to the state hospital and have a mental health evaluation done on you.

So I went and I was there for 30 days and I was taking my medication and I was getting more aware of my actions and just feeling a little better. So they said that I passed the test and I was competent and that I could go home. It was the day before Thanksgiving. My husband picked me up. We drove to my house. It was a bit of a drive and I walked through the door.

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I think I just needed something to blame. It was just so hard to believe that I had lost control of everything. You know, just walking through the front door was really terrifying and crushing. Homelessness strips you completely of your comforts, your nourishment, your safety, your trust. It's a punishment.

And I think you become conditioned to think that you don't deserve those comforts or safety. And when they're presented back to you, it takes time to accept them. I immediately couldn't sleep in my bed. I slept by the back door and the couch with the television on for a long time. I was very claustrophobic.

The noise was stressful. I was on guard. You know, I was not in fear anymore, but I was living with fear. And all of the intrusive thoughts and memories of the violence and the hardships, it took a long time.

But it was the beginning of the good things that I missed so deeply and so desperately. I felt the blood back in my veins. I felt like my heart was beating again. The deepest wounds were from not being with my kids. I am like many, many parents and my favorite thing to do, honestly, is to be with them.

be at their school, to adventure with them, camping, swimming, just reading, just existing with them. But that was taken or I took it for myself. My adult son, he always has a way of making me feel normal, just at ease. There was no drama. There was no questions. He just made me feel like I belonged there and I was okay. But dealing with all of what occurred in my marriage,

It was a long road. I felt like he was such a bad guy in all these months that I was in such a terrible place. And I had to stop resenting and I had to start understanding because it was getting in the way. They had no idea. Nobody had any clue. And I had to become understanding of that.

But I was very punishing and very much about guilting everybody about how I was the victim and they made it worse. For a very long time, we just could not communicate about anything. We were on such different pages. He was very angry with me and he was very resentful.

I began to understand that if I put myself in his shoes, if I just tried to stand in his shoes and try to figure what I may do, hypothesize on what I may do if it was him that was suffering. And so I started to approach him with more understanding.

I started to see that I was a maniac. I was off the rails. I was saying and doing things that were just so complicated and traumatizing to my children. And it wasn't about controlling me. It was about keeping them safe. And with that, he started to open up a little bit about the things that he was so fearful of, what he worried about every night when he wasn't sleeping.

I was here and I was definitely wanting to be better, but I was still not myself. I didn't know how. Over time, they gave me a diagnosis of bipolar 1 and post-traumatic stress. I don't think there was one single thing about post-traumatic stress that wasn't severely difficult.

There was this like vibration in my body, in my blood that was present for a very long time. My doctor had told me that that was just physical symptoms. That was just like a physical manifestation of all the things that you're trying to come back from. The post-traumatic stress healing was work, work, work. It was a lot of work.

Every day just was that step in that direction. And over time, with therapy and medication, I feel so much better. So we're getting through these hard times. My grandson was born. My sister is just raising her son and my niece. But things started to become worrisome about my niece, Allison.

Her physical anxiety was something that was debilitating to her, unable to work. And there was a lot of support from her family to try to help her through that time. But just a month later, December 22nd, my sister told me that Allison was out with this guy that she'd been seeing. And she said, I have not heard from Allison in 24 hours.

I reached out to this man's mom to ask if she had seen the kids. And this mother said, no, we have not seen Allison. By that evening, his family had called and filed a police report, a missing persons police report.

My sister and I assembled with family and we made our way out to the area where he claims he last saw her. And there's brambleberry bushes everywhere. This is not an attainable place. This is not right. This is bad. This is very bad. The sheriff's department, they assembled a search and rescue team.

So for five days, hundreds if not thousands of flyers with her face on it went out all over the community and beyond. People came from all over Oregon to come search for her.

After five days, Search and Rescue suspended the search and we were on our own. And my sister and her amazing group of friends, we started doing our own searches. We bought walkie-talkies. We wrote letters to property owners. I mean, there was just a group of people that would meet. And we just walked acres and miles and searched and searched. I mean, it was weeks and then it was months and then it was COVID.

COVID definitely tried to stop my sister and it just, she would not allow it. So I had just come home from being not home for so long. And now I am not home again, almost every day for seven months. It was search, rest, repeat. And then late June, my son and his fiance got married.

in a beautiful park and they had a small group of people that loved them very much. And their little baby son was there. And it was just, it was definitely the first time that we all just smiled at the same time. My sister still looked breathless, but she smiled, you know, and she just seemed like it was a moment where she could just like live forever.

After the wedding, my family and I made our way home. My sister went home. We had hired a private investigator and he was calling. He said that her remains had been found by a property owner in the very next property where she had last been seen.

The proper donor was using her tractor to try to, like, you know, get through and clear out blackberry bushes and cranberry bushes. And she came upon a shoe. I mean, we were searching. How did we miss her? She had been there for so long that she was just her bones, her little bones. There was two moments that I saw Allison when I was homeless.

There was one time during the day on the waterfront that she was just hanging out with a bunch of friends and I walked by. She's just this like sweet, tiny, vulnerable human being in my mind. So I just didn't feel the best about her being out there. You know, I just really didn't. But I moved on and then further into my experience, it was really late one night and there was a parking lot with some people.

And one of them is Allison with her friend sitting in this parking lot. It's so late at night. It is not a pleasing part of Portland. It's not a forgiving part of Portland. And she was intoxicated. And I said, Allison, this is just not safe. I just feel like there is only bad things that can come from this, you know, and she got so upset.

And so then as we're searching, I just keep thinking to myself, I feel like I just didn't do enough or I made this happen. And did I manifest this? I have like guilt or shame. I came out standing from my experience and she is no longer with us. That saying, your mental health is not your fault, but it is your responsibility is kind of my mantra.

I know kind of what could have triggered the manic episode. And for that, it's about sobriety. And I mean, complete and total sobriety. I know that antidepressants could have also been a trigger and most likely were. So that is something I completely stay away from.

I also know that if I'm missing out on sleep, I have to be diligent. I have to be careful when there is just too much stress. I have to recognize if I'm not having an appetite regularly.

You know, there's definitely a handful of things that are first and foremost, staying in therapy, you know, taking care of my body and working out and exercising. But medication is number one. Number one, the most important thing. I take lithium and I don't love it. I don't love the side effects.

It's still challenging for me to completely accept that this is something I will have to, you know, take for the rest of my life, but I'm so grateful I have it.

I have this incredible invention. It's a timer bottle cap for medication. It's been 22 hours since you've taken your medication. And my husband will often just kind of peek in and make sure. And for a long time, that was control for me. And now I'm at the point where I'm extremely grateful that I have him in my life.

My kids at this point, they will see these moments in me. Mom, did you sleep well last night? You know, I don't want them to be responsible for me. I think they've just taken it upon themselves to say, oh, you know, mom, you're talking very fast. You don't seem to be making a lot of sense at this moment. You know, is that something we need to concern about? And, you know, various little things that they are paying attention to as well, which I find endearing.

I don't put it on them. You know, this is not their responsibility. It's mine. But on the other side of this too, this is something that runs in the bloodline. Knowing and being, you know, thoughtful of the fact that their mother is an addict and also has bipolar and suffered from bipolar disorder. If they have that awareness, perhaps, that maybe they can avoid on some level that occurring in their lives.

At this point, it just has become myself and my family's second nature for all of us to be looking after what keeps me, their mom and their wife, from slipping into a mental crisis again. It's a family effort and also a family affair. I'm really, really grateful and we just try to keep it like brushing your teeth. It's just something that we do because it keeps us well.

I never, ever, ever thought I could be homeless. And then I was homeless. That was a really big surprise for me. My experience changed the way that I talk about the world as a whole and people. I really struggled to trust the world again.

You have this moment where at night you have this terrible situation happening to you, right? Like there was an incident where there was this man and he had this butcher knife. Okay, that experience was really standout. The next day, however, there was a man that gave me a backpack. There was two younger kids that helped me get water.

It was quite some time in between that horrible incident with the guy that had the butcher knife to the next bad thing. There was just all this space and I just filled it in with humanity, the things that were good. Before I was living amongst strangers, I knew that there were bad people. There's always been people with bad intentions. There always have been. But now I know that there are more good people around.

There are more people that worry about people. There are more people that want to make this world a good place. I came out of my experience surprised by what people that you don't even know will do for you to feel better. We discovered that there are so many good strangers that will lend a hand, that are willing to help, and that actively care for

For me now, the way I see people is with so much more compassion, so much more empathy. I can now relate. And now I see the good so deeply.

Today's episode featured Billy Macy. If you'd like to reach out to her, you can email at bmacy78 at gmail.com. That's B-M-A-C-Y, the number 78, at gmail.com. This episode is the second of a two-part series featuring Billy Macy and Misty Watterson. To hear her sister Misty's story, check out last week's episode, 318, What If Your Daughter Went Missing? ♪

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Hey, I'm Mike Corey, the host of Wondery's podcast, Against the Odds. In each episode, we share thrilling true stories of survival, putting you in the shoes of the people who live to tell the tale. In our next season, it's July 6th, 1988, and workers are settling into the night shift aboard Piper Alpha, the world's largest offshore oil rig.

Home to 226 men, the rig is stationed in the stormy North Sea off the coast of Scotland. At around 10 p.m., workers accidentally trigger a gas leak that leads to an explosion and a fire. As they wait to be rescued, the workers soon realize that Piper Alpha has transformed into a death trap. Follow Against the Odds wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad-free on Amazon Music or the Wondery app.