When We Let Go We See God

“In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength …the Lord longs to be gracious to you; he rises to show compassion…Blessed are all those who wait for him!” Isaiah 30:15a and 18

For nearly seven years now I've been at a keyboard typing about the sufficiency of God---His power to fill us and complete us, even heal our brokenness. 

But only this year have I come to terms with my own brokenness. 

For years I said my mother was a "problem drinker", if I said anything at all. Alcoholism was too shameful to admit about one's family--so I never even admitted it to myself. She never drank every day and I guessed that was part of the definition--someone who was perpetually drunk. 

My denial kept me in the dark about my own brokenness--and my whole growing-up nuclear-family dynamic and the brokenness surrounding it. 

If only.

If only.

If only I had known. If only I had known and had gotten counseling as a young single girl just out of the house.

I had so much emptiness and so much hurt and so much crying out for love, and I never knew it wasn't normal. I never knew what normal was and I still don't.

The children's director at our new church--the one who got me to teach the four year olds every other week, which is too much--invited me to the Monday Night Ladies Bible Study. She said we could sit together there and maybe have coffee--reaching out in love maybe because we're both about the same age in a church full of young women, and we both have four children, though her youngest is 13. 

But I don't know how to relate to anyone anymore. My situation is hard to explain and I don't want to let people into it in case they might pity me, and yet I wouldn't feel right listening and being stingy with sharing back either--that isn't true friendship, but more condescending. 

Being gone every Monday night would be a big stretch and would probably just add stress anyway, since the kids' anxiety is worse at night. It's hard to tell people that you don't have any time because your kids have so many mental problems that you're overwhelmed coaching them, and overwhelmed by their doctor's appointments and their learning disabilities and your husband's and son's ADHD and your headaches and brokenness and money troubles.

My husband ran into an old pastor of ours who shared that his twenty-something daughter is living at home temporarily and she's a serious alcoholic. The whole family is trying very hard to keep her away from alcohol until she can get into a treatment center soon, but somehow she keeps finding alcohol. She married young to someone addicted to drugs, and it ended badly, with her addicted to alcohol. He was nearly crying as he told my husband his burden. He said he was always busy with the ministry and wasn't the best dad. He partly blames himself for her situation. 

When husband came home and told me this story, I was devastated for this pastor. It struck an arrow through my heart, this man thinking he was choosing something good but all along, the enemy was attacking his home. It saddened me for quite a while, and I don't want to sadden someone else with my own brand of heaviness, so I feel like I have to keep it all in and avoid getting into new friendships--because who could understand anyway and so many might judge and just say, "Why don't you just go to work and put the kids in school to ease the financial burden?"

We are praying for the pastor and his family and I am glad he shared, don't get me wrong, even though it felt so heavy. We should collectively try to share the sin curse and hold one another up in the Lord.

The bottom line is, relating to people and sustaining intimate relationships, having normal self-esteem, and even having fun, is hard for people from alcoholic families. Normalcy is a mystery. I'm broken and alone and it feels safer and easier to be alone. Staying alone has been my modus operandi for years.

And yet that isn't what God designed for the Body of Christ. I finally get that I'm not living out my faith properly. My safe way is the wrong way.

I read some Ann Voskamp today. A man, Gordon, sat down to lunch with her and asked her how she sees God. She had trouble answering and told him she really doesn't have any answers, just questions, herself.

She thought about his question for days, and an answer came to her out in nature, as she and her daughter picked Chinese lanterns out in a field. She wrote:

I am not thinking of how to see God when I untangle the vines, snapping off a long string of dangling brilliance. I am not thinking of revelation as I peel back the orange sheath to the blazing seed sphere inside. The seed is soft.

It’s when I pick up a vine of browning lanterns and the flaming bead of orange inside a necklace of lanterns rattle. That’s when I think of it. That’s when I think of it only. That’s when I want to stammer out something to Gordon, something about this here.

I kneel down into the grass. The ground is cold. I finger one lantern hanging. It’s this: a delicate skeleton. It’s this: I can see right into the lantern.

It’s in the filigree of fracturing that I can see His flame. That I can see the light.

I remember Guatemala. I remember kids scrapping at the table. I remember, know, all my ugliness.

We see God when we let go. When we let go of the visible, papery skin that surrounds our moments, then we see the sacred jewel gleaming just underneath everything. I want to tell Gordon this.

We see God when we let go. So will I see God redeem my brokenness when I let go of my shame? When, like the broken pastor, I can talk about my burdens whenever they feel heavy--and not just anonymously here? When I stop denying that I'm such a mess and that I need a Redeemer and friend?

Fear stops me. Pride stops me. I want to hide, like Adam and Eve with their fig leaves in the Garden of Eden. Vulnerability is too scary and who can I trust and what if they judge me and their judgement hurts for days and weeks and just adds to my burdens?

Seven years I've written it...that God redeems our brokenness, that he heals and makes us whole. Can he make me the same as an adult who grew up in a home where no addiction existed? Can he give me the ability to have fun, grow a fulfilling friendship, and not be ashamed of my life in all its messiness?

He makes all things new. I must trust that and give him my newly acknowledged brokenness on a platter, served up with humility and hope.

My goal in wanting wholeness is to pass it on to my children. For I fear I'm passing on, without any addiction being present, the brokenness of my upbringing. The alienation, the shame, the extreme seriousness. 

I'm fairly certain my children will leave us knowing the Lord Jesus. Hallelujah. That is enough in itself. That is a triumph over previous generations. But dare I ask even more for them? I want personal wholeness for them as well. The ability to laugh often and well, the ability to trust and experience intimacy without shame, the wisdom to draw boundaries, the courage to take risks---the fullness that allows them to change the world for Christ.

“In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength …the Lord longs to be gracious to you; he rises to show compassion…Blessed are all those who wait for him!” Isaiah 30:15a and 18

Expectations as a Root of Anxiety

Today I want to discuss the roots of anxiety, and how mothers can naturally combat it by changing their expectations.

After trying Celexa (anti-anxiety med) for one day and feeling an overwhelming nausea, I left a message to have the doctor call in an alternative antidepressant. The office never responded and I was too busy to call back.

It was God's will. I don't need a medication; I need a shift in focus.

Yesterday the Lord revealed a better way to combat stress and anxiety--specifically my brand of stress. As a perfectionist there's always more I'd like to accomplish in a day than there are hours to do it. Thus, I'm never completely satisfied and when interruptions and curve balls are thrown at me, the stress piles on.

Here are my present problem areas and what the Lord is teaching me:

1. Stress About Homeschooling 

Most other homeschoolers have started school and I feel left behind in the dust, which is pretty silly because when most homeschoolers stop for the summer, we're still going. The benefit of homeschooling is that you can fit education into your life seamlessly, in ways that uniquely fit your family. You can teach children how to live a one-piece life with God as the center, with all other priorities centered around honoring and serving Him.

My mistake 

I was rushing my preparations for school, and stressing about the fall clothing switch and the delay it's causing, and stressing about my son's concussion brain rest and the delays it's causing...all because I felt I wasn't measuring up to other homeschoolers. The desire to return to routine was part of my stress, but when I was honest with myself, it was more the feeling of not being able to measure up.

So what if we start school in October instead of September? We have 12 months to complete a school year, and I aim to please God only, in gratitude for entrusting me with these precious children.

2. Stress About The House

The house is rarely tidy because I still have a five year old who actively plays with toys in imaginative ways--and not just in one room. Her things scatter about and of course she doesn't put away one thing before moving to another, or before going outside.

Both the boys' room and the girls' room get cluttered with clothes they've taken off or tried on, and that drives me batty. As I walk around the house, not a single room is in order and I feel like a failure, especially right now. Without the routine of school I don't remember the 5-minute pick-ups, which are so central to a tidy house. I spend all day tidying up, in addition to the laundry, cooking and dishes. All the other things I have to accomplish, like school planning, bills, paperwork, etc. get pushed back to late nights or not at all, and there is never time to rest and always the feeling of being behind.

My mistake

I resent my family because I'm overworked and stressed, and so I raise my voice and try to guilt them into doing more--such as, "Don't you see that I already have enough to do? Why is it so hard for you to pick up after yourselves?" As a result of my crankiness, they don't understand the depth of my love for them, or the depth of my satisfaction in being their mommy and their teacher. I have to change so that my love shows.

And of course, lecturing them about responsibility doesn't make them behave more responsibly. I have to give them responsibilities and hold them accountable. When routine is lax, I can expect them to irritate me. It's the very occasional child who is a neat freak. Most others will be sloppy if they can get away with it. I must either have a chore system and 5-minute pick-ups in place all the time, or I shut my mouth about a messy house and try to serve my family in love. There's really no other choice.

And am I really a failure for having a messy house? I have four children with whom I stay home, and we use our house all the time. We prepare and eat three meals a day plus snacks; the kids play outside and get dirty, generating a lot of laundry--even bringing in their dirt often. They use their art things, their toys and their books, and they don't always put them away promptly. It's no wonder our walls and our floors and our carpets are nothing to look at, and why they don't stay nice for long, even after I clean them. It's no wonder I feel embarrassed when someone comes to the door, unless I've invited them and I've thoroughly cleaned the house.

We are all gifted in different ways, and we all have a choice in what we spend the bulk of our time on. A messy house rattles nerves so trying to be a good manager is important, but measuring my worth by the look of my house is not a healthy thing, and will continually contribute to my anxiety if I let it. Other moms can certainly do better than me, either because they have fewer children, a larger house with better storage, they're away from home more, or their children are away at school and don't interrupt their cleaning efforts. Or because they're just better at organization.

3. Stress About Interruptions

It isn't unusual for me to experience four interruptions while doing the dishes or hanging clothes from the dryer. I get irritated that my agenda has to be put on the back burner--the tyranny of the present, so to speak. Most every day my goal is to have a nice looking home by the end of the day, but rarely do interruptions allow that to happen.

Medical appointments further interrupt us and get to me as well, but I'm getting better at accepting that God has a purpose for us to be out visiting doctors frequently, instead of signing up for other things. We didn't do anything to cause juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, or asthma, or excessive ear wax, or OCD, or poor vision, or ADHD, or speech articulation issues.

My mistake

The reason I stay at home with my children is to nurture them and disciple them and to cherish these years with them. So then, why am I stressing when they interrupt me for a band-aid or a drink or help with their shoes or the snap on their pants--or to read them a book? Aren't I missing the boat when I look upon all these things as interruptions? Instead, aren't they the point?

Who cares if I go to bed with a house still messy? Some stranger who came to the door and got a peek--how long will that stranger even remember my house? Where will that stranger be ten years from now when my children are remembering not a loving mother who always had time for them, but a stressed-out one who complained about all she had to do?

The Big Fix: 

1. Know Your Core Values - What are your goals? What are you living for? What is worth spending the bulk of your time on? List these things and review them whenever anxiety plagues you. Chances are, you aren't being true to them, and that is the root of your anxiety.

2. Stay in the Word - We please an audience of one. Truly, this is key to our peace. The Word keeps us centered on what is important to God. Without the powerful exhortation of the Word, through the influence of the Holy Spirit, we will continue to follow our own agenda and experience stress and failure.

2. Pray for yourself - We remember to pray for many people, but so often we forget to pray for ourselves. As we pray for ourselves, the Holy Spirit will bring our weaknesses to our mind. As we bring them before the Lord, we humble ourselves in the process. A humble heart moves toward Christlikeness.

And Christlikeness = Peace

I Have Hope: Simple Woman's Daybook

Outside my window:

Cloudy and cool, like fall. Thoughts of fall and winter make me so happy.

Two days ago we had a tornado warning, stemming partly from an actual tornado sighting in a neighboring town, albeit only a 30-mile-an-hour one. Having no basement here, I put the kids in the hallway with pillows for 45 minutes while I continued to check our PC computer for updates and peek outside. It missed us, but since then there's been a worsening of Mary's anxiety. Her anxiety started with the first tornado warning of spring, and I have to admit it's discouraging to have a setback now. Cold weather can't come soon enough for me this year; thunder and lightning will cease, and the bees will hibernate and with them some of Paul's anxiety too.

On my mind:

We got off track with the anxiety-therapy appointments due to the tree-climbing accident, and I'm eager to get back to them in another week. I've met with the psychologist twice now, and so far we've accomplished intake appointments for the two boys, and a fear hierarchy appointment for Peter. The next appointment will include a fear hierarchy for Paul, and an intact appointment for Mary, followed by the first therapy appointment for all three children, which will entail 40 minutes of therapy each, back to back.

Peter has responded best to my attempts at home therapy using OCD books, such as Talking Back to OCD. Mary and Paul have more resistant cases of anxiety and definitely need professional help. Paul doesn't always recognize which thoughts are real and which are OCD-related, and his vomit phobia (emetophobia) is fairly problematic. Mary claims challenging her fears with logic doesn't help because the fear is too powerful.

For my part, I'm exhausted and overwhelmed with their issues and Mary's problematic sleep, so yesterday I went for help of my own so I could continue to help them and take them to their appointments without being overwhelmed by my own anxiety and workload.

I don't meet the criteria for depression (they asked several questions to ascertain this), but the doctor indicated that feeling overwhelmed can be a symptom of depression. I mostly fit the criteria for anxiety, so she prescribed Celexa, which is an antidepressant noted for combating anxiety pretty well. However, it made me extremely nauseous and very anxious. (And I didn't sleep a wink because of the anxiousness, so insomnia was a problem too.) The first common side effect is nausea, as opposed to Prozac, which has abnormal dreams as the first common side effect, with nausea being far down the list. As a busy mother who must be able to drive four children to appointments and homeschool them, nausea for even two weeks as my body adjusts just isn't going to work. I called and requested they call in some Prozac for me instead, explaining my situation.

My doctor also prescribed the Topamax again for migraines, but this time a 50 mg dose rather than 3 months of the 25 mg dose. I decided not to take that again tonight, but to hold off until I find an antidepressant that works. Trying to adjust to two medications at once isn't wise because I won't know what side effect is from which medicine.

I have come to the conclusion that I need a therapist too, but that there just isn't time right now or anyone to watch the kids while I go. I have thought back to the time last February when I got that terribly upsetting email from my mother after she had been drinking. A few days after that I decided it was time to break ties with her. Her upsetting emails after drinking had been going on too many years and affecting my life too much. Following that decision I was sad and depressed for about two months, and both boys reacted to that--Peter with behavior problems and Paul with depression and sadness (he tends to take on the weight of other people's problems). And although Mary claims now she never noticed me being sad, she may have reacted to the stress caused by Peter's behavior issues, which, along with the mid-spring tornado warning, sent her into an anxiety tailspin that is still going on.

I still have had no contact with my mother and don't plan to, but I have more anger than I did before. I see the effects her drinking and denial had on my life and my siblings' lives, and it makes me angry, which isn't healthy. Since I got married and started a family, her behavior never affected just me, but my family as well--my innocent children particularly. Surely deep down she knew that if she upset me, it would affect my family as well?

Still, I understand the sin curse and all that it entails, so being angry is fruitless. I would benefit from help to get through the stages of grief over my upbringing, and the lack of support system I experience now due to my upbringing. I realize what I'm feeling is just the stages of grief, after having denied the seriousness of her problem for so many years, and its impact on my life.

While counseling would be good, I'm sure the Lord will get me through this fine as well, it just may take longer and require the antidepressant, since it also coincides with perimenopause and upheaval in my kiddos.

I realize too that it's hard for readers to have a peek into so personal a struggle, but one thing it does do is help people realize that we all have difficult paths, for whatever reason. I am not alone...you are not alone. We all struggle, and the Lord is there for each of us...intimately available to us in our sorrow.

I have hope. I believe the kids will get better. I believe I will get better. I know this season of life will seem like just a glitch some day. I know somehow the Lord will use it for his glory, and I pray with hope that He will both save and take care of my mom and extended family in ways only He could.

The reason for my hope is the Lord.

Psalm 38:15 LORD, I wait for you; you will answer, Lord my God.

My Blessings:

~ God's love and mercy

~ A qualified psychologist

~ hope

~ modern medicine 

~ that Beth is not anxious

~ the hope of more cold weather soon

~ comfort soups and breads soon

~ colorful leafs coming

~ the hope of routine soon

~ the curriculum we need on the shelves

~ that with heaven comes our perfect bodies and minds

~ support from online friends

Thank you for your prayers and for your friendship! Both have meant so much to me since starting this blog back in 2009. You have encouraged my heart so many times! Writing helps me so much so I am going to make a better effort to write at least 3 times a week, despite the craziness around here.

Calm Parenting Secrets: Christian and Mainstream

A concussion follow-up appointment yesterday revealed some bad news, most of which we expected, based upon my son's on-going symptoms. He cannot concentrate on anything, either academic or in play, without getting a headache behind his eyes, often accompanied by blurred vision. Even being read to requires a concentration that gives him a headache. He loves to read and be read to, so without that in his life he feels a sense of hopelessness, as do I. His condition requires a nerve-wracking and depressing brain rest. Only complete boredom is available, for even playing Lincoln Logs right now bothers him, as does painting a simple watercolor picture.

The Children's Hospital neurosurgery department revealed that most children have no symptoms two weeks after their concussion accidents, and we're beyond the two weeks. Not all concussion patients lose consciousness, but if that does happen, the concussion tends to be worse. My son did lose consciousness for less than a minute, so his concussion is probably between mild and moderate, but patients with pre-existing health conditions, such as anxiety disorders, can take longer to heal and can suffer from Post-Concussion Syndrome, with some symptoms lasting up to a year or more.

I knew all this from my research, but I was thinking positively, hoping for some miraculous reason they would take off his neck brace and give him an okay to do an hour of school a day, or say something resembling hope.

But no, in addition to all our other appointments, I have to take him back for an MRI to check for a sprained neck (requiring either surgery or extended time in the neck brace), and I have to take him for a two-hour appointment at the Traumatic Brain Injury clinic to have him checked for lingering signs of concussion (concussion is labeled Traumatic Brain Injury). If there are no lingering signs, he would probably then be referred for a vision evaluation with a pediatric ophthalmologist.

He no longer confuses time and place and his long- and short-term memory seem completely intact. The day after the concussion he underwent cognitive testing and could not repeat five random numbers. I tested him briefly yesterday and he could repeat up to seven random numbers, so I don't expect them to find lingering signs of concussion, except for the headaches, trouble concentrating, and blurred vision.

I don't have to tell you that I left that appointment yesterday in a sorry state of mind. My son is driving all of us crazy with his boredom, and we all wish we could go back in time and keep him out of that tree. Never have any of us felt so desperate to erase something.

After purchasing The Total Transformation by James Lehman, I became the fortunate receiver of regular and excellent parenting emails delivered as a newsletter to my inbox. I learn something valuable every time I click on them.

Guess what I learned today? A calm parent raises calm children. Yes, the stress around here is all my fault (being facetious), even though my frame of mind is normal under the circumstances. I don't know what we're about to face or how long the discomfort will last. I do know that speech appointments, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis appointments, excessive ear-wax appointments, eye appointments, anxiety-disorder therapy appointments, ADHD/OCD medicine follow-up appointments, and your standard dental and winter-illness doctor appointments, fall just short of doing me in as a homeschooling mother.

In case you also deal with that overburdened feeling, I want to go over a couple Christian calmness techniques, as well as some standard psychology techniques for controlling our emotions and reactions.

First, the Christian perspective:

Think Purpose and Plan: God's ways are not our ways. When circumstances like excessive appointments, or a tough diagnosis, or seasons of life overwhelm us, we need to get over ourselves and keep our eyes on God and his plan.

Occasionally I'm blessed with comments from strangers, such as "Your children are so polite and well behaved. What is your secret?" The other day a lady followed me out of a consignment shop and said the above to me, smiled at my children, and then offered me a large bag of clothes her teenage son outgrew. She was as sweet as could be. Paul smiled and joked with her over the "what is your secret" question with "Mommy gives us a lot of milk."

These encounters occur in doctor's offices or thrift stores or grocery stores, but always, they surprise me because my children can drive me nuts in doctor's offices, grocery stores, and thrift stores. These are not calm outings for me--my kids being the creative, overactive types. But somehow, passersby see something that I miss. We are God-followers and that makes us different than about 75% to 80% of America. When God is the center of the family, it shows, even when we're overwhelmed and overburdened.

All our appointments get us out into the world and when Christians are out, they shine. God makes them shine--it has nothing to do with what we've done right, but everything to do with God's power and grace.

So the first Christian technique for remaining calm is to remember that God has a plan. While that plan may make us uncomfortable, it serves a greater purpose and we need to trust in that.

Think Servant of Christ:  Not only do we have to trust in God's plan, but we need to be a willing servant, or instrument in his plan. We live to serve God, not the other way around. He saves us and loves us and sustains us, and much is required of those who call him Father. We have been given salvation instead of endless suffering; in gratitude for that we give up our lives for the Lord. Whoever loses his life will gain it. Our best life comes from serving our Father, not ourselves.

Luke 12:48 ESV But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more.

Luke 17:33 ESV Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will keep it.

I want to save my life by getting back to routine, starting school, getting a chore and errand chart going, having fewer appointments, etc. I want to restore sanity, but God wants me to learn to smile amidst the unknown and unchartered.

Think Psalms: Need I say more? Psalms sooth and remind and teach, and give us a divine hug.

I also find it helpful to use standard psychological helps, such as:

knowing our triggers
knowing what we can and can't control
distinguishing between fear and facts
digging for the root of anxiety
staying in the present
finding better ways to communicate
practice calming strategies
choosing our battles
using calm language
apologizing
finding support
being forgiving of ourselves

See these two articles for explanations on the above strategies:

Parenting Anxiety? 5 Ways to Relieve the Worry

Losing Your Temper With Your Child? 8 Steps to Help You Stay in Control

I often turn to Psalm 46 when I feel overwhelmed. It contains so many soothing truths. On your worst days, you can start there:

Psalm 46

God is our refuge and strength,
    an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
    and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam
    and the mountains quake with their surging.

4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
    the holy place where the Most High dwells.
5 God is within her, she will not fall;
    God will help her at break of day.
6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
    he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

7 The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress.

8 Come and see what the Lord has done,
    the desolations he has brought on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease
    to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
    he burns the shields with fire.
10 He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
    I will be exalted among the nations,
    I will be exalted in the earth.”

11 The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress.

scenes

Surviving This ADHD Life: Helpful Links

Helpful links for those impacted by ADHD through marriage or parenting:

Is Adult ADHD Hurting Your Marriage? How to Diagnose

9 Tips for Non-ADHD Parents to Motivate Your Whole Family

The "Secret Sauce" to Parenting "Complex" Kids

The Biggest "Aha" for the ADHD Parent: What You Must Remember When Parenting ADHD

Bless Her Heart - She Just Doesn't Understand ADHD

Get Back to Basics: 3 Ways to Live Better With ADHD



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