April 28th, 2010: Sarra Foggarty

Second Life has helped me become the person I am today.  After my combat service in Iraq I cut myself off from humanity.  I was a barely functioning alcoholic who was afraid to get close to people or go out in a crowd.  I stopped making friends because I was afraid to lose them.  One night as I was drinking myself to sleep as I did every night, I saw Second Life in an episode of CSI:NY.  I saw a place that had no death, no hatred, and no limits.  I saw a place where I could exist without my fears.

I signed up that night and right away I began to make friends.  I started to feel human again, not so cut off from the world.  Second Life got me over my fears and back out into the real world again.  I stopped having panic attacks when I was out in a crowd thanks to the club scene in Second Life.  That night was the first night of the rest of my life.  That was the night I stepped back from the brink and started living two lives.

Opening up with my friends has helped me to face the things that have been haunting me for years.  Finally having someone to talk to unafraid and unashamed is a great relief.  The anonymity of talking through an avatar has helped me to tell people things I was worried to tell my own mother without being judged, things I won’t share here because I still don’t like discussing them 7 years after the fact.  Second Life is the best thing that could have happened to me at the time.  The progress I have made there has allowed me to be a better friend, a better wife, a better person, and a better mother.

To everyone who has been there for me along the way, all I can say is Thank You for being my friend and seeing the person I was hiding inside.

____________________

Sarra Foggarty lives in Illinois.  She is a mother, a wife, a police officer, and a soldier.  In her spare time she loves to take her daughter to the zoo and ride horses.  In second life she is a part-time bunny herder, a sometimes blogger, and a full-time friend.