Tag Archives: Love

by

Friends..


Things to ponder, I received an email from a friend last night, (getting mentioned in the blog is a hazard of being my friend – my friend)  This friend was very encouraging and brought up some things I have not thought about, and reminded me of somethings I need to remember.

I will get to that in a minute, but here is the great things about friends especially christian friends.  I was saying in my last blog about how good and bad people treat you if you suffer from depression, and how I was feeling a little overwhelmed by it all.  My dear friend brought up some good points to remember and I want to share them.   The other thing about friends is when your mind misfires, you don’t know what is right or wrong.  I can get very confused about things and I am unsure of what reality is or is not.  The voices and darkness can take you off in a direction you would never think of, and the good things about friends are they can gently remind you what is right, wrong, and redirect you from wrong thinking.  Its like being really sick with the flu and not knowing what to do, because you are too busy being sick with the flu.  You forget to drink water so you don’t become dehydrated and you go to work because you can’t decide if you are too sick to be there.   You need someone to take care of you, remind you. 

I have mentioned that I have rules to follow when I am not right.  Things I have to do to keep my husband in the loop.  I don’t shop some places by myself,  I call when I take my anxiety meds, and there are more, however my friend also reminded me that as I head in to the season of  summer parties and family get together it would be wise to make some additional rules and talk to some of my family members  and prepare them for when things are not good for me.   Someone who is suffering from any other illness would do this so why wouldn’t you do this for the unseen illness of depression.   My husband and I need to sit down and decide as we go through this season what I can do and not do.  Direction will come from me, but there may be times where I can not be all things to all people.  The more I thought about this last night it was like hey silly girl — everyone illness or not, should have a guide line for this.  This is where women and mom’s get into trouble because we forget about ourselves in looking after the world.

Another thing to keep in mind is to remember that other people do not have E.S.P.  When I was first married I thought if I was cleaning the house my husband would pick up on what I was doing and help.  When that didn’t happen I thought if I do this loudly he will get the hint, I mean can he not see what is going on- its his house too, get off the couch and do something.  My man isn’t gifted with E.S.P.- darn it! so he didn’t catch on, and because he didn’t I got angry – dumb I know.  Well as I go through the ups and downs and the pulling back from people and then being out there,  I need to communicate that to people because everyone is like my husband. 🙂 

The most important thing my friend said to me was to  “give grace to us clumsy people all around you”    Ka Boom!  Oh my!   Grace – I forgot totally about Grace.    That slip of the mind Here is the thing about Grace we hope all people and God will grant it to us.   We seldom think of granting it to others.   I have not been thinking much about God lately.  I have been trying more to just cope.  I have not felt the darkness but more a intolerance and anger towards people and a need for quiet and being alone.   Grace trumps intolerance.  Love trumps being alone.   God has me in his hand, never to be grasped away.   As I meditated on God’s Grace, Love, and being his child and trusting that He does have my back.  It changed my thoughts.  I felt so hard done by, that grace was not an option.  I was tormented that Love was not a consideration.  Being a child of God was forgotten because I was felt defensive to my Mothers words.

God is great and his Grace endless as is his Love and his faithfulness to his children is also endless patience and kindness.  When I pondered these things and prayed about them I soon released my intolerance, defensiveness, and my forgiveness and humbleness and love for those around me began to flow.   This unseen illness is a hard row to hoe, (don’t you love country references — sorry farmers daughter!!) but truly it is a hard thing.  It can turn you so inward that you forget there are those who love you and want the best for you. It can create a vacuum where you see nothing but the pain.  The pain can be overwhelming and sometimes you can’t get past it,  but it comes in waves,  always remember and never forget who has your back.  God, family, friends. Amen!

till next time……………

by

Trying to Sing in the Dark


Lord are you there, Sometimes I can’t sence Your Presence.  This is the hard thing. The crushing darkness, the true test of faith. David spoke long about not feeling God‘s presence.  Many a Psalm starts out with a plea to God not to leave him. But many a Psalm also starts with a rejoice to the Lord.

This blasted thing, this depression has taken me to the depths I could not ever imagine and a darkness I never knew existed.  It has also shown me Love and Kindness from others and I have been; when I am having good days, to show gentleness to others I have never been able.  It is all opposites.  Last evening I didn’t want to be around people but my heart cried out in darkness and loneliness.  Today I don’t want to be around people – I took a sick day,  but I can’t wait to have my husband come home from work.  It has separated me from God yet brought me closer. I have been frightened out of my wits, and I have seen the end of life, or thought of the end of life, and yet given me so much more to live for.  Paths I have never considered, thoughts I have never thought, pain I never knew, and shame I have never known before, weakness I never knew could ever exist, weakness I never considered myself to possess and strength I never knew I could tapped into.

The thing I have to remember is that in the darkest of dark, in the loneliness of lonely, in the depths of my heart hurting that I need to ignore the feelings no mater how strong and crushing they are, I chose to trust in God.  Sometimes I utter it weakly, unbelievingly. Sometimes I say it in a loud bold voice.  sometimes I say it in fear.  But I say it and that is the point, I chose to trust in God

At times God puts us through the discipline of darkness to teach us to heed Him.  Song birds are taugh to sing in the dark, and we are put into the shadow of God’s hand untill we learn to hear Him…. Watch where God puts you into darkness, and when you are there keep your mouth shut. Are you in the dark just now in your circumstances, or in your life with God? Then remain quiet….When you are in the dark, listen,and God will give you a very precious message to give to someone else when you get into the light………………Oswald Chambers

till next time…………………

by

Oh Heart


Oh tired heart, why do you cry, don’t you know of love.

Heart of mine, you feel you will die, it is the dark of dust that makes it cry.

The dust makes the heart not see. The darkness makes the heart not feel.

Stuck in paralyzing shock.  Coated in its rotting grape soaked lot.

The light will cure the sickly heart. If only it will start.

To feel the warmth of heat from the son of the Love.

Dust and dark  clouds kills the  warm heat, and covers the mind of the heart.

Restless in a desperate search of sleep, only to lay awake in a heap.

by

Sitting on the ledge swinging my feet


March break is over and its Monday uck! Oh to be retired, I am nowhere near that age, I have lots of years of work yet, but I imagine what it would be like, Hmmmmmmm, nice.  It’s hard to come back to work when the weather is so warm and sunny.  It’s freaky that the weather is so hot when it is still winter.  I went to work with a sweater instead of a winter coat which would be normal.  I have been feeling ok the past week or so a moment of pulling back  moment of sadness, but it doesn’t last long and I am glad for that.  I am still having concentration issues.  I am not the multi tasker I used to be but that is a side effect of depression and its medication so it will one day disapate – I hope.  So I guess I am still sitting on my ledge,  with my feet over the side swinging in the breeze and I am listening to the birds of spring and seeing the flowers of rebirth all around me.  I went to church this Sunday and it was a great service.  I felt no attacks, no distraction, no problems.  I got to worship and enjoy the service, it gave me great peace.

I’m cured!  No, I know I am not.  I still have a strong desire to pull away and close off.  I still have a great desire to be alone and go away for a weekend somewhere by myself.  I fight those desires,  I try to take some time for me to enjoy some quiet time.  I run and that is good for an hour, I meditate and do yoga so that gets me some time too.  I need that time to sort my brain.  That seems to be the norm right now, that I need time to get my mind in order to do things.  Its small steps at a time.  I have found that my aggravation threshold is low, not a good thing for work, but I am getting by.

Positives.  Positives. Positives.  I am alive.  I walk everyday and pray, and see Gods creation in the birds that are singing their spring songs, seeing the earth give forth its colours and rebirth of nature.  I am here! I am not in the darkness, or despair of my life hanging in the balance.  I am working out.  I have managed for 4 weeks to work out on a regular basis, finally.  I have been enjoying most of it too.  I am eating, and eating right.   No junk food, cutting out caffeine, no drinking unless with a good meal on the weekends only.  I have been reading my bible more, and I have been attending church and enjoying the service.  It is nice to feel almost normal, or as close to normal as I have been for a while. So I guess you can say I am hanging my feet over the edge of the ledge kicking my feet in the breeze like a little girl would sit on a swing in the park.  Looking up to heaven and soaking in the sun, the warmth of God‘s Love and the promise of spring in the earth. Praise be to God.

Till Next time……………….

by

Friday TGIF


Well here I am at Friday.  I have been through a lot this week.  My apt with the therapist was hard and emotional.  I haven’t eaten since Sunday night, really – I did manage an egg on Wednesday I think, I am not sure what day it was.  I was sliding into sadness and loneliness again.  I could feel the darkness around me not as thick as before but for a few days it was following me.  Wednesday and Thursday I could not stop shaking, it was bad. It came from the centre of my being and radiated through my body.  My heart would beat fast, and I was having trouble catching my breath.  I was a mess.  There was a reason I was under attack.  My pastor, my best friend (his wife,) and my husband and I had planned a prayer session for me.  In my depression I have seen evil and darkness.  I have felt it rush me, circle me, follow me, engulf me.  Thursday, we covered me over with prayer.  We held hands and they prayed for a while, then they laid hands on me and prayed for me.  I shook like crazy, it was emotional and draining.  God was with me you could feel him.  We asked the Holy Spirit to come to us, we prayed protection not only for me but for them too, our collective children our marriages, it was a very very powerful prayer session.  When it was done we sat and huddled for a bit talked about depression the lies, our relationship with each other, the things I have been through, my therapy appointments.  We went to our respective homes and duties that needed to be done for the rest of the evening.  I went home to an empty house and stared at the ceiling for a while, collected my thoughts, till I had to pick up my daughter from field hockey. Got home, went to bed.

The next day- I tossed and turned a bit through the night but got up in the morning and had my coffee went to work and let the day sink in.  No shaking.  I felt calm, dare I say happy.  The last thing my friend prayed was that the peace that passes all understanding rest on me and there was peace.  Peace that I haven’t felt in quite a while.  I felt God near me, I felt Love well up in my heart where  days before loneliness dwelled. I felt happiness where I had felt sadness.  I went on my lunch break and caught a glimpse of my face in the mirror in the bathroom.  To be honest I had to take a second look. Who was that girl!  There was a gleam in her eye. A happiness in her face. It was wonderful.

So what happened – this is not hocus pocus!  A spell, a trickery, an illusion.    This is real life. This is real God. This is real Love.  If you suffer from depression then you know there is darkness there.  If you suffer from depression you know its a fight to try to trust your mind.  If you suffer from depression you know there are lies that try to steal everything away from you including your life. If you do not suffer you must believe that depression is not sadness it is a fight between good and evil.  When you are suffering you are wounded you are vulnerable. The devil senses that and attacks.  He lies, he misleads,  he tricks. You don’t know what thoughts to trust you don’t know what is truth.  You end up feeling like you are a burden to everyone, and that no one loves you, you isolate, you push away, you hurt yourself for allowing this illness to take all that was solid from you. I stop eating as my punishment.  I hide in my room. I allow the lies to convince myself I have no love and no one has love for me.  I can’t trust people cause they lie, they cheat, they don’t mean what they say.

God is Love he covered me over with his Love and tonight my heart is busting, I am crying at this moment.  Crying has been hard for me I have not been able to cry sad tears.  But these are happy tears.  God is the power of the universe.  He is the creator of the world of you of me.  Jesus is our brother who finds the lost children of God and brings them back. If they want to.  I want to.   Jesus died on the cross to break the bonds of sin.  We prayed in the name of Jesus to break the ropes of lies and darkness that in my weakness attached themselves to me.  Jesus set me free last night. He has wrapped his arms around me as my friends wrapped their loving arms around me last night.  I can still feel it today. God is near and I am drinking from my saucer cause my cup over flows from his Love. How good is God!

Am I cured!  No probably not. But in my weakness God has shown me his strength. In my weakness he has shown me a safe haven. In my weakness God has shown me his great Love, Grace, and  Forgiveness.  Could I have seen this in my strength.  I knew these things before my depression, then did I know them as deeply as I do now? No.  I have a chemical imbalance I am going through a change, that is caused by environment, DNA, hormones, or a combination of all of the above.  God takes these things and uses them to his good.  If you are reading this testimony – it would not be here if I have not been through the darkness of depression and felt a need to express my thoughts.

I pray for you that God may open the eyes of your heart and show you His great power and love.  God Bless you.

by

A week later


Well its a week later since my doctor’s apt and 7 days into the new drugs.  I take one in the morning one at night.  Its been an adjustment.  Like when I started with the first one, things happen, the side effects come about and you deal with them.  I have had terrible shakes,then nothing, my heart at times pounds when I am doing nothing, gripping anxiety and ready to crawl out of my skin, I take my anti anxiety med and it calms down and I adventually stop wringing my hands and settle.  This morning I felt a little anxious on the way to church I did really well on the way to church and talked myself down.  The band was playing and I was looking forward to it, good songs, beautiful day.  I was great till I walked into the church.  It hit me like a attack.  I just felt like darkness rushed at me.  It was the strangest thing.  I started to shake, I could feel myself start to panic, I was dizzy, I was having trouble keeping my train of thought – which seems to be happening more these days.  I kept breathing deeply trying to feel calm, I was loosing it.  I took a anxiety med, it calmed a bit, but they were there. We played the first song warm up and then I insisted the band pray.  I asked the Holy Spirit to come to us and protect us I asked for God‘s blessing on us,  then we turned around and played.  The darkness tried to pull in close.  I just sang God’s words in the song and when I was not singing I kept saying ” I lift my eyes to the hills from where does my help come from, the maker of Heaven and Earth.”  By the end of the service I had pushed off the darkness that was taunting me.  I felt better and calmer and back on my game.  My daughter couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me she came up to me after church and wanted to know what was happening with me  her words”you were really bent out of shape what was with you” Can you hear the love.  I told her what was happening I got a hug and a” well your over it now.”  Such sympathy  😉

Its Sunday afternoon I am sitting in my back yard on a beautiful sunny day I am calm now.  I don’t know what happened this morning. What does all this mean? If this is a part of depression it is new to me.  I don’t feel sad, or down, or falling in a hole, I feel relatively ok.  a little closer to what me feels like- at this moment.  The swings of side effects, like before should level off as I get used to the new drug.  I still have no desire to eat and some of that is not wanting to eat either.  I like the weight I have lost, to be honest. And if I was really honest with you, its the darkness I don’t want to leave, which makes me confused. I am involved with helping with fund raising for the starving people in the horn of Africa and I am doing it on purpose to myself.  God is talking to me about this I am not listening all the time, but he is talking to me.

What concerned me the most about today is the rush of the darkness when I walked into the church.  These are things I felt when I was really down in a hole, its things I felt and saw when I was deep in the darkness. I am not in those places right now, I am not sad or hurting or in darkness, it did not engulf me, but the darkness at church it surrounded me, it taunted me, it rushed me and circled, it threw me off.   It is one thing for the darkness to try to push its thorns into yourself when you are down and venerable but when you are feeling mostly ok, maybe a little anxious, that threw me off.  Its hard to fight what is in your mind day after day.  I fell like maybe the depression, or the drugs, or what ever is happening is has opened something I don’t what to be around, or maybe God is allowing it to show me how to trust him completely.  A lutheran pastor I am reading about stated that in trouble God gets the opportunities to show his power and we learn how to trust that power. Maybe today was God’s opportunity to show me his power and wants me to let go of the darkness I am holding onto. Another instant of God talking.  I have not in the past three years remembered my envelope that I get from the church for my offering.  It has the date and a bible vs on it.  I spoke last weekend about the fruits of the spirit and it is kindness, patience, self control, the vs on the envelope was the same one.  God has been calling me to John 15 for the past week and Paul’s talk on the fruits of the spirit.  I need to spend some time with this to where God it leading me.

In the mean time– I am trying to eat- I say that but I will try this week. I do trust God he is Love and loves me dearly  I need to study the fruits of the spirit, and learn to love me a little better.  And I need start working out and get some exercise, maybe it will make me eat.  Maybe switch to decaf coffee as maybe that is not helping my anxiety esp. since I am taking the old anti depressant at night and the new one I take in the morning and I am sure coffee full strength doesn’t help. God continues to take me on this journey and I am holding on.  I need to think what this depression is now- it has changed. I need to think about what is happening and pray.  Till next time. Peace