Picture it. Me. Treading water in the ocean. Holding a beach ball under the surface. Not too hard.
But now picture me holding seven, eight, nine .... ten?! beachballs under the surface.
You may be thinking: that's not possible.
And I would say: Of course it isn't. But man I was going to try as hard as I could.
Recently, I've been plagued by a wave of the old-Wendi-thinking. I'm so much more aware of these patterns of thinking that have been my worst enemy for most of my life.
Sometimes, I wish I could just put all of my awareness back in the box I unpacked. But my counselor reminds me that it is hard to change 45 years of poor thinking patterns. Instead, when those thinking patterns plague me, I need to have COMPASSION for myself. I need to have GRACE for myself. What would I say to myself if I was my own best friend? I would say, "Wendi, you are doing okay. Look at all the work you have done! You have come so far! Don't be so hard on yourself, sweetie."
And I would remind myself that my brain thinks it is protecting me. Cara reminds me to open up my scalp, pat my brain on the head, and say, "Bless her little heart. She's trying really hard."
The thing is, my brain thinks it is protecting me. It's a jet fighter that has locked in on its target and thinks that keeping it in range, ready to fire upon, is in its best interest. Only, it's locking in on something that isn't really a threat. Because I'm learning, I am able to say, "Wendi. Silly. That isn't really a threat." But the fear screams LOUDLY!
I have become absolutely intertwined in the world of mental health. I want so badly to free everyone the way I have been freed. Why won't people do this?
Well, the answer is simple really. Looking this beast in the face is really, horribly, scary and hard. It's a big beast. And it requires you to see your past and see things that hurt GREATLY. It would be easier to stick your head in the sand and pretend those things didn't exist.
The problem is, when I was ten, I would float in the ocean and only hold ONE beachball under the water. That was easy to do.
When I was twenty, I was pushing TWO down. A little harder. But totally manageable.
At thirty, I had three. And at forty, four.
But now I am closing in on fifty. I have a fifth beachball now, and I cannot hold them all down. They are squirting out every which way. I'm trying to hold them down so hard. But it's just not possible. They are coming out somewhere, somehow.
Maybe they come out in drugs. Or alcohol. Or pornography. Or promiscuous behavior. Or anger. Or lack of sleep. Or obsession. Or in my case: depression and anxiety and some anger too.
But they WILL come out.
This is why you meet some little old people who are very cranky. Do you blame them? They are trying to hold 8 or 9 beach balls under water. That's almost IMPOSSIBLE!
Kim paid me a great compliment during our weekly therapy on Tuesday. She told me that when she first met me (ten years ago when we first hired her to help Sidge with some anxiety he was having from moving back to America from Portugal), she would have never guessed I had the stuff in my past that I did. I looked like I had it altogether. I was highly functioning.
I had learned to be strong, determined, focused, tough.
But I was breaking.
And didn't even know it.
No wonder people in our world are involved in the types of behaviors we are witnessing. I have no confusions as to why people drink or do drugs or run away or kill themselves. I know exactly why. And I don't blame that at all. They have found a way to cope with whatever the demon is that they need to run away from. They are doing what they can to stay alive.
So was I.
Until the beach balls wouldn't stay under the waves any more.
And so now, I work to heal. And I battle. And I grieve. And I am sad. And sometimes I feel okay. And I work as hard as I can for this pain to go away. And for peace to come in the morning.
And I pray. And talk to Jesus. And some days, I can only put my head on his lap and cry … and know that he has felt what I am feeling intimately.
This life is hard. But we know the end of the story so we press onward!
