Shifting

A year ago (or so) I was staring at a huge mountain that I needed to climb before we could leave on our time at the lake. And here I am again staring at a huge pile of packing, errands, laundry and tidying that needs to happen in the next 24 hours.  However, things have changed in this past year. If you know me well, or have read my blog, you probably know that I cope with depression and have for many, many years. It is hard to admit this because it makes me feel like a broken human. That there is something wrong with me that makes me ‘less than’ all those well adjusted people out there.

 

In the last year, however, I have learned a few things. About 18 months ago I started weaning off my medication. I wanted to test and try some of the stuff I had been reading about…and there is a LOT of information out there on how to overcome depression. At first, those types of things worked, but slowly my body and my mind sank down…and this time I went lower than I ever remember going. 

 

New aspects of depression, which I had never before dealt with were my nemesis.  I stopped being able to nap during the day. This was a way that I could turn off my brain for an hour and truly rest…most people have a way of doing this…mine may not have been the healthiest choice but it’s better than some. However, I became increasingly angry that I couldn’t sleep to escape.

 

And I became anxious. I had dealt with anxiety before, after my accident, but this was worse in a way. Worse because I didn’t seem to know why…there seemed to be no reason for my anxiety.  More disturbing to me, I couldn’t control my thoughts, they had a life of their own and they were dragging me deeper and deeper…if I couldn’t control my thoughts how would I change my thinking to be less ‘depressive’?  

 

I was deeply afraid and two things were driving my fear. One was my sense of failure in parenting. I felt most anxious when I didn’t know what to do with an issue and of course, until you learn how to deal with something, life keeps dishing it up for you to try again.  Knowing this, I kept searching for understanding…but felt as though my wheels were just spinning in the mud.

 

The other thing was that I was going through a paradigm shift in my faith. Ever since my accident, and my ‘near-death’ experience I had been seeking to understand more fully and more deeply who this God was that I believe I met in the garden…tangled in a tiller. This God who blew open my head and my heart with a blast of Love that was more powerful than a hurricane, more beautiful than creation, more gentle than a feather floating down into my being. This God was so much bigger and more real than anything I had ever imagined. And since that event my paradigm has been shifting and changing as I saw more and more how I can’t put God in a box. And I desperately wanted a manageable God, a cozy God, an understandable and comprehensible God. I was on a hunt for truth…still am…but Mystery won’t reveal itself so easily…that’s part of what makes God so, well, God like…that our Creator is mysterious, unmanageable, unboxable.  And that made me really mad, too!

 

So I was working hard on two things that I felt no progress in…and felt a failure…and things were dark. And so, I went back on medication. And it took many months to start to feel normal again. Looking back on this year I can see I’ve learned oh. So. Much. One of the most important things I think I learned is that, for whatever reason, my body chemistry needs some help. It is, in a way, broken. With advances in science and technology I can see how, one day, my chemistry may be improved without medication…but for now this is my best option and I am grateful for it.  However, it seems I needed to learn this lesson the hard way, by living through the consequences.

 

In spite of this, there are things I have learned about my faith, my God, my world view that I don’t think I would have learned if I had been on medication.  But those things don’t really reveal themselves while we are deep in depression…they reveal themselves as you emerge into light…on the edges of the forest as you walk towards the open light of better well-being you can begin to learn the lessons from the dark of the forest. In that forest, it is too dark to see, to understand. For that you need some light filtering through the trees, lighting the path.

 

The parenting journey has begun to lighten as well. For that issue I can again say that the lessons learned in the dark were very, very hard. I stumbled and fell over and over. And when you are only doing this to yourself it’s not so bad, but it is so scary when you feel that you are dragging your children with you as you fall. Again, the lessons came slowly, and my children have been my loving and patient teachers. Giving me the same lessons over and over until I finally started to learn what they are here to teach me. Miracles have happened along the way that I am so grateful for. I feel the light on my face as I walk out of that forest also…and I know that there is lots left to learn and I am so grateful for my children and all they have taught me and continue to teach me…and I’m sure will teach me all my life.

 

And so here I am, at the bottom of a mountain of tasks. I’ll make it up there…I always do. But last year the top of the mountain was shrouded, and cold. And this year the sun is out, and the view will be fantastic, and I am so looking forward to this family adventure that we are about to embark on.

 

Things may look similar from the outside. I still have procrastinated like crazy as the picture shows my jumbled mess of a staging area. I still have so much to do before we leave. But inside things look so different. I have learned so much. I have so much more hope. Life is good.

~ by joannek on June 26, 2009.