(NewsNation) — A California woman made concerning comments to her family before she disappeared, leaving them wondering if she vanished by choice or went missing during a psychotic break.
Christina Bastian, missing for eight years, had bipolar disorder and her family wonders if she is living somewhere with a new identity, possibly unaware of who she really is.
Alicia Harper recalled the way her sister’s belongings were scattered by the side of the highway on Nov. 1, 2015.
“All of her most important, precious possessions, the ones that she would never want stolen,” Alicia said. “It was like she got out here and decided it wasn’t enough, that she needed to just get rid of everything that was her before and start fresh.”
Eight years later, there are still no clues as to what became of Bastian. Growing up the oldest of five girls, Bastian’s smile spread a lot of joy, said her sister Kim Coleman.
“Christina is just a blast to be around. She was just full of energy and the life of the party,” said Coleman.
At 35, Bastian was in her first year teaching English at Silverado High School in Victorville, California. But her family said she didn’t like the way her medication for bipolar disorder made her feel, so she recently stopped taking it.
“She was really struggling with feeling like she had lost who she was,” Coleman said. “Alongside all of the stresses of grading, everything was very overwhelming.”
Bastian’s brother-in-law, Chris Harper, remembered having a strange conversation with Bastian the night she disappeared.
“She was like, ‘I just wonder how far would people go? If I went missing, like if I just disappeared?’ Christina’s kind of weird sometimes,” Chris said.
But the next morning, Bastian was gone. A trail of her belongings was found spread over 80 miles and her beloved support dog, a maltipoo named Coco, was found wandering a few miles from home. Bastian’s most prized possessions were scattered at various locations and her brand-new pickup was found damaged, abandoned and empty along a remote desert road.
“I think that it was a purposeful I’m dumping everything,” Alicia said. “And the reason I think that is because we found journals where she had said that she wanted to just run away, she mentioned to a neighbor that she was wanting to run.”
Alicia said the neighbor had told Bastian she should just leave a note that she was live so her family wouldn’t worry about her.
What torments the family is the question of whether Bastian was making a decision to walk out of her own life or was she too deep in a mental crisis to know what she was doing.
“I don’t know if she could have been having any kind of logical thought, honestly. Because no logical person in their right state of mind could have done what she did,” Alicia said.
Just days before her disappearance, Bstian thought someone was following her and had tried to break into her apartment.
Her family is unsure if her suspicions were real or just a figment of her increasing paranoia. But her family helped her load her most valuable things in to her truck, which had a locking cover for the bed, so she could stay with friends temporarily.
The night she vanished, Bastian was staying with a friend but left abruptly before two in the morning, distraught and without her purse.
“She had no phone, no wallet, no ID, no glasses. So she’s blind,” Alicia said. “She’s technically, legally blind. She would have had to put her contacts in to put her makeup on.”
The family hopes someone will recognize her photos and tattoos and come forward. They want to know if, after all this time, the shoe prints moving away from Bastian’s truck led to a new life.
Chris and Alicia think she’s out there, hiding from her past.
“If she’s working under the table, she’s probably cleaning because one of her favorite jobs ever was cleaning new construction,” Alicia said.
With Bastian missing, Coco fills a small void for the family. Coleman, the youngest sister, wishes she could reach back in time to answer Bastian’s question the night she vanished and tell her how much she’d be missed.
“She was my friend, she’s such a blast,” Coleman said. “I just miss her so much, I just want to give her a big hug.”
NewsNation reached out to the Apple Valley Police Department about the case but has not heard back.