The Return

We moved, and we are here.  The move itself was long and hard and is blessedly already fading into memory and the edges of it are becoming fuzzy.  We arrived in the city, and stayed about 6 weeks with David's mother, which was also very challenging for everyone.  And then we signed a lease for a very tiny apartment, and we moved here.  Some of our stuff is here.  Much of it is not here and I still feel like we're camping out a bit with mattresses on the floor and such.  It's slow.

I've been at my job for about 2 months now.  It's fine - I don't love it but I don't hate it with a passion or anything.  I do my work, I come home, I get paid.  

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A few years ago I had a bout with agoraphobia.  For a few months it was almost impossible to leave my house, and even within my home I felt unsteady, unsafe and uncertain.  It was a deeply unhappy time for our whole family, and although I got better, it left its mark on me.

I feel that same unsteady, uncertain, unsafe feeling these days as well.  To some extent, this makes sense; after all everything in my life is completely different than it used to be a short time ago, and the pressures on me are fairly intense.  Especially intense for someone who lives with an anxiety disorder.  I have had brief, fleeting moments of wanting to hide, wanting to run away, wanting to curl up and not answer the phone or the door or the emails.  They have passed, but they might return.  I've also been very sad and depressed and overwhelmed these past two months - feelings that have been increasing as time goes on.  Some of this is likely my over-extending myself, some of it is my own perfectionism, some of it is probably forgetting to take medications on time, the extreme heat and humidity that make sleeping almost impossible, the lack of access to my counsellor, my current convenience-food-based diet, and any number of other factors.  

I've lived with my anxiety and depression for decades, and I know my brain and body very well by this point.  I don't **think** I'm heading for another downward spiral, but I know the signs to look for if I am.  Some days I feel like I have some space, some margin still there on the edges, and some days I feel like I'm moving around covered by a wet wool blanket.  It will pass, but it will pass like a glacier, leaving lots of potholes behind it.

What does a Christian do in this sort of situation, you wonder?  It's probably easier to say what a Christian SHOULDN'T do.  Or perhaps what I shouldn't do.  I shouldn't berate myself for a prayer life that has been stripped to the bare bones of "Lord, help, help, help".  I shouldn't refuse the small, insignificant step towards the light because it isn't the big, impressive one.  I shouldn't feel guilty for realizing that in every relationship, even one with the divine, a time comes when one party is completely coasting.  I am coasting.  God knows this, and I know this, and it is okay.  Eat the food, even if the food is a spoonful of cheez whiz.  Drink the liquid, even if the liquid is flat diet coke.  Sleep, even if you sleep in the clothes you wore all day.  Live the next day, the next step, the next breath - and do so, if necessary, cranky, unshowered, ignorant and tearful.  Coast, dear friend - it's okay.

All the same, I'm not quite so mired in shadow at the moment that I can't feel a desire for joy.  I've been trying to grasp tiny slivers of it as I see them.  I've been walking the dog, because exercise and sunshine are good for me, and walking down all the hidden slices of the city.  Today I found a secret garden, and this evening I went to it as well.  I have no idea if it's allowed, but I dug my hands in the dirt and weeded the beds and straightened the vines.  We'll go back tomorrow and do it again, breathing in the dirt smell, until someone tells us not to.  Considering the neglected state the vegetables were in, I think it's more likely they'll return to clear the beds in October and discover with amazement that 'fairies' were there before.  I might even hang up a bird feeder.

And I find joy in writing, so there may very well be more blogging around here for the next little while, as I process all the changes and come to a new equilibrium.  

Sabbath, City Thoughts,

I love Sunday, and do you know why?  No, it's not because of church or brunch...it's because Sunday is the one day of the week when my children are allowed to play video games, and they are silent.  It's so silent in my house right now, while we wait for David to finish recording and uploading his sermon.  Then we drive to a nearby church that offers a parking lot service, and we sit in our car and listen.  And afterwards we let the dog run wild in the field.  

Sunday isn't my sabbath day of rest, I'm afraid.  Never has been.  If you work 40+ hours a week and DON'T have a wife at home to do all the home stuff, then you come home and collapse in exhaustion and then the days you do things are Saturday and Sunday.  That's just reality.  It was a bit easier when I was a student, because there were often long gaps in between classes when one could run to the grocery store, or do a load of laundry.  But, of course, now I'm at home with three children and I'm homeschooling them, and going to school myself, and all the other things.  So, no, Sunday isn't restful.  It's a workday - a day when my husband is off to church to work, and a day when I am herding people through reality.  

But that's okay!  While I think the concept of Sabbath is critically important, I also think the idea of everyone sitting silently in a front parlour as a family is incredibly outdated.  The video games give ME a sabbath from listening to people clamour for my attention and services.  Here I am, in silence.  I will take my sabbaths as a dozen little moments of peace throughout the week.

Prayers For Those Who Bring Fear

I recently had a minor medical procedure done.  Very minor, really, and nothing worth commenting on, except that it hurt.  And in the human mind, pain is a memory maker, which is right and good because otherwise a whole lot of us would be touching the still-hot stovetop even more than we already do.

I had spoken to another woman before the procedure, who had had it done as well in the past, and she had warned me about the pain.  I'm sure she meant well in telling me.  And I had laughed a bit in a nervous way and made the comment I always make, which essentially goes something like "I've had three children.  I'll be fine."

And I was.  I was fine.  And I knew I would be fine.  I knew it would hurt and then it would hurt a bit more, and then it would hurt less and eventually it wouldn't hurt at all anymore and everything would go back to normal.  I knew this, because I am an adult and I've had many medical indignities done to me in the *mumble mumble* years I've been on the Earth.  And unlike a child, the thought of pain is an okay thought for me; not a pleasant thought, by any means, but sort of a resigned, okay thought.

When I was very little the thought of having a needle could cause me to panic.  I didn't have the vocabulary to express that, but I knew that if I thought about the upcoming needle, I would get this sick 'run away' feeling and start to feel my thoughts spin out of control and my body break out in a sweat.  None of the things anyone would say to me about not being afraid would help.  None of the techniques, none of the reassurance would make me want to walk into that room, would make me not feel a flushed, dizzy feeling come over me.

I remember when I was newly married, and pregnant, and I had to go to a clinic for one of the innumerable blood draws a pregnant woman is subjected to.  My husband was working, and I was as afraid of that needle as I had ever been of any needle, perhaps more so because this was a needle from a complete stranger, in a strange clinic, for a strange, new reason, and I was by myself; as I sat in the chair I felt lightheaded and like crying.  I want very much to tell you that I did not collapse, all *mumble mumble* pounds of Scots-Canadian pregnant lass that I was, on the tiny Asian nurse...but that would be a lie.  I went down like a tonne of bricks.

That remains the only time I've ever fainted, and I have no desire to repeat the experience, thank you very much.  Maybe it was the heat, or the build up of tension, or my blood pressure or any number of other reasonable factors - but in my memory it is burned in as The Time Fear Won.

I assure you, that was not the last time fear of pain won with me.  The difference between the me of that first pregnancy and the me who dealt with the recent pain and fear was as simple as exposure - I have felt a lot of pain, and I have not died.  This most recent little pain can't scare me like it could before because I've met its cousin, Big Pain, and I have won.

When the tunnel vision recedes, there is an unexpected benefit - suddenly the pain makers swim into focus.  With the overwhelmed and fearful, they blur into 'the person to avoid', but with the eventual submission of a more fearful part of yourself, the people behind the needles appear once more.

Dr. T was slender, with tired eyes and greying hair, and after our unpleasant time together (I'm sure she's lovely at parties)  we talked for a few minutes about follow-up sorts of things, as one does.  And I asked her if I could pray for her - for her work, which must contribute to those eyes, for her patients, and whatever other unspoken sorts of things weigh on all of us.  There was a time I would never have been so bold as to ask that, and it is still a very infrequent offer of mine, but this...was the right time.  When we got home, the pastor and I did pray for her, but I will continue to remember her in my own prayers, and here is what I will say:

Thank you, Lord, for bravely allowing your children to feel pain and fear, so that we may one day not be ruled by those things.  Thank you for clearing our minds and steadying our steps and hands.  Thank you, Lord, for those who cause pain for good purpose, and give them the strength to bear their work, as you give us the strength to endure it. 

World without end.
Amen.