I don't like mountain dew, but that's neither here nor there.
I've often asked God that He would let me feel. You see, I've lived much of my life kinda disconnected from myself, on account of childhood pain and abuse. I've been pretty committed at hard-to-get-at depths to not feeling the loss and betrayal of my early years. And why, you might ask, would I want to touch those feelings? I have to say that is the question I've wrestled with over these last 20 years of counseling. The thing I keep coming to is that when I move toward connecting to the beautiful, good things that God has offered me in my life, BAM--I hit the wall of sadness and grief that seems to be filling my soul until I might choke on it.
So far my approach to this has been to shut down emotionally. I have a litany of methods for this. Not eating, denying myself things I enjoy, hurting myself physically, to name a few of my recent paths. All to keep myself enough of an emotional zombie that I avoid the pain. You can imagine that this doesn't make me the mother, wife or friend that I could be if I were willing to really live. And I have to say, it's a miserable way to exist.
So, a few years ago, my counselor reached in and touched the deepest moment of betrayal in my childhood abuse. The moment in my life that solidified my belief that I was completely devoid of value. My purpose in life was to be misused by the people around me. My hopes and longings were stupid and I was a fool to look for anything more than the crap that was dished out to me. So, I spent two years of counseling with this woman, trying to sort out the lies from that moment that have served as foundations for my life since. It's been quite unsettling to say the least. On the other hand, I am coming to believe that I have exerted more energy below the surface trying to keep this pain from surfacing.
Mostly, I've not been aware of what I do to shut things down. So this last year I've been praying that God would let me feel and make me aware of when I make choices to shut it down. A couple of weeks ago, God began to open my pandora's box of emotion. As I was holding Ashton at Vespers, I could see myself at three. My dad has been dead a year. My grief-stricken, depressed, 27-year-old mom is sleeping all the time because of the sleeping pills and psych meds they're giving her to get through. My older sisters head back to school and I'm alone.
So then I have more memory-deepening experiences on that same day. Like watching my daughter interact with her brother with the standard level of awe that a 5 year-old ascribes to a 9 year-old. And I think no wonder at 6 I did what my 10 year-old step-brother suggested. And when he told me I had no value when I was 10 and he was 14, I believed him. It all seemed to make sense: of course I had no value. He was the only one pursuing me, so he should know. I thought we were friends, but that was just foolish.
So then mid-week, after starting to feel--a direct answer to prayer, I have to admit--I started not eating again. That wasn't sufficient because I live in community and there were just too many times I had to eat because I was with people. So I started causing myself physical pain to try to make this soul pain go away. I lied to my friends. I manipulated conversations to avoid being found out.
When I confessed to Keith Tuesday night, I still wasn't even sure I was willing to repent--that is, turn the other way and head back down the path of healing God is inviting me on. So he prayed for me. And I prayed and confessed to God and asked God to give me a heart of repentance. And, you know, I think He did.
We went camping Thursday and while Keith was putting the kids to bed, I sat out by the camp fire and looked up at the stars and let some tears roll as I talked to God out loud (both of which I haven't been able to do in a long while). It feels rich to move again toward life.
So, those of you who are so inclined could ask God to let me feel and to give me the courage to stand firm when He does. |
