Faith refers to strong belief or confidence in a person, thing, or concept, often without complete proof or evidence. It also describes loyalty and commitment to a cause or person and can mean a specific system of religious belief, such as the Christian or Jewish faith. In religious contexts, faith is the conviction of the truth of doctrines, the trust in God, or the attitude of inner certainty that responds to a supreme being.
When Depression Challenges Your Faith
Your world, which was once full of brightness and hope, turned into something dark and terrifying.
You assumed the dark clouds would pass and that the storm in your mind would drift away after weeks of rest.
The days passed by and the feelings stayed, leaving traces of past memories and traumatic experiences. The sadness became worse as it covered the times when you knew you should be happy. You were in the middle of the party, but felt left out and alone. You were surrounded by friends, but sleepless nights remained. The chill and fear in your spine haunted you in your dreams. This was not about being “too emotional.” You prayed every single day as melancholy crept through you. You prayed harder; you visited the church often, prayed longer, confessed everything and surrendered all that you had. Yet these things were not enough. You knew it would never be enough.
Depression is a tough battle to conquer, even when faith is present. The mind is wise and can lead a person to think dark thoughts until the renewal of one’s spiritual life becomes less and less important. Depression can leave people feeling so different and isolated that no amount of words can ease their worries. The hands of people who are willing to help them may not matter; thick clouds of hopelessness may blind them from seeing hope and optimism. Sometimes, even faith will not help them to overcome it easily.
These negative thoughts eat up your daily routines. You’re no longer the lively person others used to know. Your church mates convinced you that these feelings were all in your mind; you can conquer it by praying and drawing yourself closer to God. You tried and keep on trying, but still, it comes and it goes and comes back again stronger than before. You became tired, but people should know that your faith is there. You love God and you know he can help you. But depression may never listen to your heart’s desires. The prayers may help you overcome the sadness, but at the end of the day, depression seems to be taking your faith away from you. It is not easy. It will never be.
But like any other darkness, peace will surely come. You realize that depression may challenge your faith and devotion. But the grace of God will come knocking at your door to save you from the pit helplessness. It may not make you feel stronger at the start, but from my experience, embracing your faith can help you conquer the hardest and toughest battle of mind and spirit. I believe there is no love stronger than the love of Jesus. This love can be a stepping stone to finding the light you keep looking for. Faith cannot heal depression alone, but trust in the Lord and yourself and surely, it will gradually go away.
I am a survivor of depression and indeed, faith helped me gain more weapons and shields to fight it, along with the people who helped me get through it. Hope and healing are always there; we just have to find it in our hearts. You can conquer it, because I believe you are God’s greatest warrior. You will always be.
Thoughts About Faith and Mental Health
A healthy mind is a healthy soul.
Mental health and faith can feel like two separate worlds. For many people, they look at life as either spiritual or physical/mental. Mixing the two is like trying to mix steak and Kraft Dinner. They just don’t seem to fit. But this is not healthy, because a healthy mind is a healthy soul.The phrase “mental health” does not appear in the Bible. Yet to ignore our mental health would be a huge mistake in our development as a person.
Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul and your mind. Jesus, Matthew 22:37.
Why did Jesus say it this way? He didn’t say, “Love God with your body, your brain, your hand and your foot…” These are body parts and on their own, they are empty of life. By saying “Love God with your heart, soul and mind” he asked each one of us to love God with our very emotions, our thoughts, our dreams and our passions.
Your faith can help you cope with your stress and your pain.
Did you know you can also use your faith to avoid? There are times when I have prayed about my situation rather than talked about it or took the action that I needed to take. Sometimes, our spiritual life can be a way to avoid what we need to do. Rather than taking action, we pray, or we read, or we journal. I highly recommend the book, “Emotionally Healthy Spirituality” by Peter Scazzero. You can find the book at Amazon or at any bookstore. I became a Christian in my teens and some time after I remember having a medical checkup. I don’t remember why I was seeing the doctor, but during the check up he asked me if I was depressed. I lied. I told him I was fine. I lied because I did not want to be a bad example and I thought it was unspiritual to be depressed. I didn’t understand you can’t pray away your mental health.
Yes, I should practice spirituality, but being too spiritual may not be a good thing.
It’s easy to overly spiritualize something like health. Some of us have no difficulty wearing glasses or taking an aspirin, but we draw the line at taking an antidepressant. Sometimes we conclude that if you take a pill for your mind you won’t be yourself anymore. Taking an antidepressant or any other medication won’t make you less of a Christian.
I believe God wants us to love Him with all our heart, mind and soul, but sometimes this can be difficult.
When your mind races, when you are chronically anxious or depressed, or when you hear voices, or when you find yourself continuously focused on your pain or trauma – it makes loving him very, very difficult; maybe even impossible. I believe God won’t judge you for getting the help you need. A healthy mind is a healthy soul. I have experienced depression since I was young. Some seasons of my depression have been particularly crushing and others were not as dark. But each season of depression has taught me more about myself, my family and about life. When someone you know is in the middle of a dark season, please don’t say to them, “Just think of what you are learning.” That’s just not what they need. It can take a while before a person is ready to learn from your experience. Imagine if a friend of yours were facing surgery. It would be unwise to say to them, “Just think of what you are learning!” Be sensitive.
Talking and being vulnerable can change your life.
Sometimes you need your friends, other times you need the help of a professional. Your pastor can be a fantastic resource, but there are times when you need a different kind of help. Should you go to a counselor who might not be a Christian? I have gone to both Christian and non-Christian therapists and I’ve had good and bad experiences with both. Remember that counselors and psychologists have an ethical obligation to respect and give space to our spiritual and religious traditions. It is a personal decision and getting the kind of help that fits who you are is what you want.
Your baggage is not any worse than the next person.
Your baggage is not worse, it’s just different. But if you are hard on yourself about your mistakes and your stuff, you heap shame onto your soul. Shame is toxic to your depression, your anxiety, your trauma or your emotions. Shame is like a set of lenses that become superglued to your soul. They color your world, making it so difficult to speak up, open up and just talk. You sense judgment everywhere and you have no freedom. I believe God wants you to love Him and to love yourself. Don’t ignore your baggage, acknowledge it. But hold onto hope rather than shame. For more about shame, I highly recommend watching this video by Brenee Brown on “Listening to Shame.”
Let yourself be loved – by people, by God and perhaps even by yourself.
Let yourself be loved, despite your pain. Despite your trust issues. And despite your trauma. When we internalize an image of a loving God, that love heals. If we sense a load of punishment, judgment and unworthiness, it will eat away at our mental health and create a negative emotional life filled with shame. If you find it a challenge to experience love, you can pray about it. But if it persists, this is where professional help may be needed.
Love God with your mind by giving it a break.
Your mind, your emotions, your identity and your imagination need more than going to church. Our mind needs a Sabbath. Jesus disappeared a lot. Sometimes he prayed, sometimes he talked, other times he listened and sometimes he just walked. Maybe it’s time to give your mind a break and take it out for a walk?
Not everything your mind does is spiritual.
Some anxiety is a genuine disorder and some of it is just anxiety that will pass. Sure, I need to trust God and let go, but if you have an illness, you need to get some treatment. If anxiety or depression is chronic or crippling, you likely need some treatment. If your anxiety or your depression is more situational (it comes and it goes), you may respond well to prayer, meditation, breathing exercises and physical exercise.
Stand proud.
Faith has a number of mental health benefits: it is a huge coping skill for when you struggle; being involved in your faith will make you less likely to use drugs or become alcohol-dependent; and you might also live longer. If you are a believer, your body will actually respond better to medical treatments. One thing to remember is that having a faith that is rule-bound and self-critical will actually be harmful to your mental health and overall well-being. It is love that heals, not religion alone. Experiencing depression and anxiety have made me more empathetic, more caring and better able to support other people who struggle. I believe God can, and will, use your pain as a way to encourage and support other people. He can take something powerfully negative like trauma and dark, difficult moods and help you to reach others who face similar things.
A church that is sensitive to mental health is a healthy place.
Healthy churches invite people who suffer depression, anxiety or traumas to feel accepted and at home. You may not know what to say — but you can ask “What can I do?” and then listen. You can watch if someone suddenly isolates or becomes gloomy and avoidant.One of the greatest ways I can love God is through the practice of listening to one another. Getting the help that you need won’t make you less of a Christian, less faithful or less human. Your life will open up and you will change in ways you never imagined.
“The Weight of Living,” a song by Bastille, reminds us that we carry, our depression or anxiety or traumas, they do not have to always be this way. We can leave it behind. This post is adapted from a talk I did at my church on faith and mental health. Remember that this and any article on mental health are not a substitute for medical advice or counseling. Please see your doctor and get the help you need for your mind, your body and your soul. I write articles about wellness, leadership, parenting and personal growth.
You are not alone.
Depression and PTSD Make Me Question My Faith
The current thing my doctor is insisting I work on is finding it within myself to believe I am worth loving — by myself, by others, even by God. It seems to be a simple task, right? Not too much to ask of someone. The fact faith and religion has been a huge part of my life for as long as I have been able to remember should even make it an easy thing to do. Correct? After all, what kind of Christian doesn’t have faith that at the very least God loves them? It is the explanation of Christianity in its most basic of forms — “God loves you!”
Yet for me, there is a deep sense of guilt and shame I am feeling right now, the hypocrisy of myself — admitting to myself, to others, that for the 32 years I have been raised in faith, and made it my own, I have never once felt God could love me. Others, yes. Me? No. I feel too worthless, too broken, too sinful, too unlovable. I do not feel God wants me, yet I personally share my faith with others because I am so convinced God can indeed love them, to forgive them for their sins, to help them to endure their trials, to bless them with a hope for a joyous life beyond what the world of today can offer them. Deep in my heart, there is nothing that shakes my faith in the love of God for other people.
There is an illustration in the Gospels of the Bible that talks about sparrows; they were regarded by the people of the day as being of the most little of value. In fact, they were almost worthless. Jesus was telling those he was speaking to that not even a sparrow drops to the ground without his Heavenly Father seeing it, and that as humans, we are more valuable than even many sparrows to God. It is to show that a life, any life — but especially that of a human — is valuable to God, that He cherishes it. No matter who we are, we are worthwhile.
I do not feel I am valuable, though, and when I think of the future I struggle to place myself in it; it is easy to imagine a world where I am not there. While many people fear being replaced or forgotten, one of my wishes is I could be, because then there would be no obligation for me to exist anymore. No one would sad because instead of having died, I would simply not have ever existed. A world without me would not be better or worse off — it would just be.
There are very few people who I truly feel have loved me unconditionally, and I sadly admit there is even a fear I try to hide deep down. I fear my husband — a man who has stood faithfully and tirelessly by my side for more than 15 years, through all the hard times — will one day realize I am not worth it. I fear even he will wake up one day, see me how I see myself and leave. He has never for one second given me the impression he will stop loving me; in fact, he tells me multiple times each and every day that he loves and cherishes me, but I cannot believe I deserve his enduring love. In fact, there are even times when I feel guilt I have him to love me because there are other women out there who deserved to have a man like him fall in love with them more than I ever did.
Flawed. I have made terrible mistakes that led to horrible consequences. I’ve hidden sickening secrets for the greater part of my life. I feel lost and broken, and I don’t know how it is possible for anyone in this world or even (especially) in Heaven could look through my thoughts and feelings and still love me. It seems impossible to ask, impossible to believe in, selfish to expect or to hope for.
The Psalms are full of heart-wrenching poems about feelings of lowliness, guilt, worthlessness, depression, emotional pain, distress and self-loathing, tempered with assurances God loves us no matter what we have done if we are determined to repent. Assurances that he loves us no matter what has happened to us, appreciating, even more, the faith of those that love him despite extra trials they endure. All he wants is to be able to find even just a small bit of good within us.
I am a good person. I can say that with assurance because I know it is true. I have a gift of empathy and compassion; the emotions of others are deeply interesting to me. Helping and healing them is something that is of the deepest importance. There is one thing I know for sure; I am determined to make the lives of others as good as I can. I have an ability to love even those who have hurt me or let me down, and this is something that makes me feel both blessed and cursed at the same time. There is not even anger or hatred towards those who have hurt me physically in the past; I cannot hold a grudge because I do not know what happened to them to make them like they were. Maybe they are just bad people, or maybe bad events turned them that way? I forgive them for their actions to me.
How do I apply this forgiving spirit to myself? I don’t. I feel I can’t. It feels selfish to say that because I am “good” I am worthy of love. I am good because I don’t ever want anyone to feel like I have — like I do. People need someone to care for them unconditionally, they deserve to be loved for who they are. But in saying that I am a good person, I assign that to the logic of my actions. I try my best to behave in a good manner towards others. But I do not feel my soul is good; I cannot believe my worth extends beyond what I can do to try and make the world a better place for others.
And while I know that the Bible assures us time and time again God loves each of us, I question how can God love someone who has no thanks for her life? Who even at times feels ashamed or resentful of her “gifts” of love and compassion? Who has battled with suicidal thoughts since she was 12? Someone who has tried to take her life? Who has self-harmed, showing so little respect for the gift of being a living soul? How can He love someone who tells him she doesn’t believe He loves her? How could even He forgive the things I have done wrong, the secrets I have kept that I fear maybe have caused endless pain to others?
I don’t really know where I am going right now, or how I am going to work on feeling worthy of being loved. Reflecting on how I personally feel when my children say, “You don’t love me,” maybe gives a little insight into how I think God himself feels when I am unwilling to believe that His love is greater than my own heart’s lowliness. The Bible itself even says to remember, “God’s love is greater than our hearts which condemn us” in John I, but my heart condemns me with such insistence it feels unlikely to ever be silenced enough to believe anything else.
If someone else were telling me this, that these rambling emotions were their thoughts and feelings, I would be heartbroken for them. I am heartbroken for myself in some ways, but I am so scared of trying to mend this. I am terrified of becoming selfish or feeling worthy. I am so frightened by the thought I could become self-centered and hedonistic, thinking of myself more than others, expecting more than I deserve.
So can God love me? Am I worthy of being loved by Him, or even by others? That is what I need to try and figure out. But until I learn to love myself, just a little, I feel there is probably no hope I will ever believe truly that anyone can truly love me.
Childhood Trauma Impacts My Faith
( From You ) Sitting in the old, olive green theater seats where I had watched numerous plays as a child, I heard a voice call my name. Looking around at my high school friends, their heads bowed in prayer, I quietly asked what they wanted. They all shook their heads and went back to their prayers. Closing my eyes, I again heard someone call my name. Before I realized it, I was on my feet, responding to the altar call that had followed a very loud and rambunctious youth rally.
I believe on that night God called me to Him. It’s a belief I have always clung to, and in hard moments I’ve reminded myself that God himself called my name. Twenty-one years later, I still believe that, but as more and more repressed memories emerge, I find my faith in the one who called my name to be growing weaker as I also grow weaker and more tired.
On the night I accepted Christ into my life, I knew my life was different than my friends. Their pantries had food in them, their fridges stocked. Their parents bought them clothes and took them to the doctor. As far as I knew they didn’t have to wake their hungover parent up for work in the morning or were never forced to disown a sibling by a parent. I knew my life was different, but I also knew there was something out there that had been watching over me and protecting me until that point.
There was something good out there that had saved me, watched over me and protected me — or so I thought. Something out there had brought the teachers into my life who gave me the belief that I deserved better and could make a future for myself. There was something out there that promised me peace while whispering into my ear that He loved me and I was worthy. On that night, at 17 years old, I accepted Christ into my life.
For 21 years after, my faith was my rock. Life is hard and no matter the problem, I clung to my faith in God. Every uphill battle was a learning experience to grow my faith. Through numerous job lay-offs in the oil and gas industry, my husband and I prayed and believed that God had a plan for us. As my joints grew worse and worse before I was finally diagnosed with Ehler’s-Danlos syndrome, I believed for healing or for a new form of health. Every time I watch our youngest get into the pool, my heart pounding as the memory of her not moving underwater as a toddler raced through my head, I reminded myself that God was with her and would protect her. My faith was solid.
But then my modern life met my childhood. Even though I knew I had a rough upbringing, except for a tiny handful of good memories, I didn’t remember my life prior to 12 years of age. My mom had laughed when she told me that the court-ordered therapist had told her I block out memories. The way she said it made me feel like it was something wrong with me, so I never questioned why I would block out a large part of my life. I was 38 when those memories finally started reappearing and I learned I had blocked the memories not as a flaw, but as protection.
Now I look at my life, in what I thought was God protecting me and realize He was there when I was destroyed. When an adult prayed with me and sang hymns with me as a small child before abusing me, God was there. When one parent told me another one was going to kill us all, God was there. When I was raped, God was there.
And now, in the present day, I sit and listen to a pastor preach peace as every bone within my body is screaming and withering in pain and wonder if God is there. As the memories of being molested and harmed as a child show up without warning, and the childhood torture comes to life within my adult body, I wonder where God is. People cry out for me to trust my Heavenly Father or Daddy God and my heart screams as I struggle to block those words from reaching my ears because of the terror they bring. And then I remember the faces of the two pastors who I finally told the truth and I wonder why God wouldn’t cast me aside like they did. Maybe He already has and if not, maybe He should.
I see God sometimes in the way the memories slowly build day-after-day and I’m able to get help to handle them before it gets too bad. I see God in the fact that He gave me kids and a husband who I want to stay here for when there’s part of my soul that is too tired to keep going. Sometimes I see God giving me a voice for the suffering, a voice I never wanted and I’m too worn to do justice. I see God working to break my faith free from culture and worldly expectations. But then I start shaking, unable to function again because something small sets me off and my faith starts to slip down the rocky slope that tears at my hands and feet.
Most days I wish I could bury my memories once again. If I could dig a deep enough hole inside my mind, the hurt and pain could once again be laid inside. Then I could pick up my life and country club faith and live again. No one would have to know my doubts or be burdened with my care.
God was there. He saw all of the abuse and didn’t stop it. He heard me cry out. He saw my pain. He knew it all, even when I couldn’t remember. My faith is wrecked, but I believe He knew that would happen too, and yet. He still called my name.
Ways to Christian Faith Helps My Mental Health Recovery
For me, living with schizoaffective disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is an everyday struggle. Some days are alright, when the demons in my head are neatly tucked away and I can smile and laugh like any other person. Other days the emotional pain is so immense it is physically tangible. On those days, it’s all I can do to get dressed and slump into my armchair. Showering, housework or exercise feel impossible. Once I went five days in a row without showering, too broken to do anything but cry. Most days, though, fall somewhere in between the two extremes. Fighting multiple mental illnesses is exhausting. Like swimming against the current of a raging river, battling a mental illness can seem near hopeless at times. And yet I continue to fight, refusing to give up even when my mind screams at me to do just that. What is my biggest motivation to continue on? My faith in Jesus Christ.
I use my Christian faith to help my mental health recovery in several ways:
Prayer
I pray every day, morning and night and several times in between. I talk to Jesus like he is my best friend and mentor, because in actuality, he is. When my anxiety becomes unbearable, when I am terrified that somehow I will be raped yet again, I pray. I pour out my fears to God and feel a sense of peace fill me in return. Does the anxiety vanish completely? No, but it becomes manageable. It becomes something I can handle with my coping skills. When my depressed mood overwhelms me to the point of suicidal thinking, I pray to God for the strength to carry on. Do the heavens part and a magic wand is waved to take away all my problems? No. Instead I believe God helps me in far less dramatic ways, placing people and events in my life at the right time to help me on my journey of life. For example, when I got out of the psychiatric hospital in March of 2017, I was on the waitlist to get into the intensive outpatient program at my counseling office. Still devastatingly depressed, bordering on suicidal and utterly unequipped to handle the various symptoms of my mental illness, I prayed to God to help me hang on. He did. Within a week of me being out of the hospital, I was accepted into the intensive outpatient program and began learning skills to cope with my mental illness symptoms. Now, a month and a half into the program, I have several skills to turn to when I seem to be falling apart from the inside out. I believe God doesn’t always part seas for us, and instead sometimes our prayers are answered in simple, quiet and effective ways.
Reading the Bible
Reading God’s Word has become a part of my daily routine — as essential to me as brushing my teeth and combing my hair. I wake up in the morning, get a cup of coffee and crawl into my recliner with my Bible in my lap. I read the Old Testament in the morning and before I take my nighttime medicine and go to sleep, I read the New Testament. Why is the Bible so important to my recovery? Because when I have no words of encouragement for myself, I inevitably find some in God’s Word. One morning I was really struggling with feeling like my mental illnesses made me too weak to achieve my dream of becoming a pastor. I happen to read the following passage that morning, “For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10). Through God’s Word, I have learned that what seem like my weaknesses can actually make me a stronger person.
Attending Church
Since I turned back to God in October 2016, I have attended church every Sunday, save for the times when I was in the psych hospital. For me, there is something uniquely uplifting about Christian fellowship — something about hearing a church full of people reciting the Lord’s Prayer together, head bowed, hearts open to God. I love everything about attending church. From seeing my friends in the congregation to singing songs of praise from praying to the sermon to Communion. I gain an immeasurable amount of strength from these gatherings with fellow Christians in worship. The congregation’s kind smiles and encouraging words and God’s presence filling the room help me see through my mental illness symptoms to a future of recovery.
How Faith Saved Me From Suicide
( From You ) God was not part of my life for many years before I found myself unable to go on without a miracle. Raised Catholic, I went to church and prayed often growing up. My faith was an everyday part of my life, as necessary as my treasured flip phone was to me throughout high school. Then, with a flash and bang, my faith was decimated. My mom was diagnosed with stage three breast cancer. The doctors gave her six months to live. She hung on for her family for three and a half years, until a couple of months after my 18th birthday. When she died — after I had prayed unceasingly for God to save her life — my faith turned into a bitter hatred at the supernatural being that had taken not just my mother, but the woman who was my best friend. My untreated mental illnesses (schizoaffective disorder, borderline personality disorder (BPD) and post-traumatic stress disorder) combined with grief, prompted me to turn to drugs and alcohol to cope. I abused drugs and alcohol on and off for the next ten years.
Then, life became unlivable.
On September 19, 2016, I found myself standing in front of my dresser, looking in the mirror at a reflection of a girl who had no life in her eyes. I was ready to die. Unable to imagine life without drugs, but unable to imagine life with drugs, I resolved to kill myself.
Then, I felt what can only be described as an instant, pull. Something prompted me to walk out of my fiancé’s and my bedroom, and flatly state to him that I was going to kill myself if someone didn’t help me. The next couple of hours were a blur of tears, terror and confusion, with the instant feeling that I had not wanted this. What made me do this? My fiancé drove me to the psych hospital and I went through the all too familiar and draining intake process. I spent three weeks there, lost in depression and psychosis for the first week, unable to find hope of any kind.
Despairing over the prospect of possibly never improving, I called my dad crying, confessing I still wanted to die. He gently advised me to read the Bible, specifically Proverbs and Psalms, as a source of hope. I scoffed at the notion, having buried my faith and love for God with my mother. Still, after I hung up the phone, my dad’s suggestion would not unglue itself from my mind. The thought, unbidden and unwanted, exploded in my mind. What was so wrong with reading the Bible? I didn’t have an answer. And with that small realization, my harden heart softened immeasurably, and I suddenly believed in God, loved God and knew he would help me achieve recovery from not only my drug and alcohol addiction, but also from my mental illnesses. For the first time in 10 years, I had hope for a future.
God intervened, God saved me from the biggest mistake I could possibly make. I did not have the strength to stay alive, I did not have the strength to get clean and sober and I did not have the strength to continue battling my mental illnesses. But God did. He filled me with not only the strength to do all of those things, but also gave me a unshakable sense of hope and a budding seed of courage. I’m almost eight months clean and sober as I write this article. I am in an intensive outpatient program to learn how to cope with my mental illnesses and to heal from my past traumas of molestation and sexual assault. My faith had become the very essence of my being, my passion and love. I start in a Masters of Divinity program in August of 2017, beginning the journey to become a pastor and share with other people the wondrous grace and hope God gave to me.
The Importance of Faith in Tackling Diseases
Accept what is, let go of what was and have faith in what will be!
Gastroparesis!
First, what it is: Gastroparesis is a terrible stomach disease that can make you feel like you’re having the stomach flu 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You’re constantly battling the symptoms that are changing how you live your life.
Second, let go all of the bad feelings of gastroparesis. A chronic illness like gastroparesis is tough to let go of because its brings never-ending pain, but what gastroparesis doesn’t control is your attitude. You control your attitude. Your attitude changes your direction. Throw away all your anger, frustration and tears out the door. Bring in the positivity!! Look at all the good in your life. All the people who love you and the new person you have become.
Lastly, have faith in what your life will be. Keeping faith in God, your family and your friends will allow you to tackle the difficult symptoms associated with gastroparesis. Faith is having complete trust or confidence in someone or something.
Since diagnosed with gastroparesis, my faith and relationship with God has skyrocketed. I look at the world in a totally different view because of my faith. I realize how important it is to find happiness. Whether that is keeping in touch and developing friendships, enjoying the comfort of my family or being able to try different foods that before had made me sick. Faith is viewed differently for all of us. Think about what you have faith in.
Do you have faith in your doctors to help relieve your pain? Do you have faith in your family and friends to help you through difficult times?
Most importantly, do you have faith in yourself?
Let that sink in.
Having faith in yourself and others allows you to keep moving through life with positivity and perseverance. Faith makes you aware that what happens in life happens for a reason.
The random people you encounter. The things that suddenly affect you. The actions you take. It’s all part of life’s journey.
Life can be one wild ride, but having faith in God, family and people can help you take on whatever life throws at you. It helps you get through each day dealing with gastroparesis or any chronic illness. Now that you know how to accept gastroparesis, let go of it and have faith in what your life will be. The faith you have is going to be the glue that holds your life together.
Balance of Faith and Disability
When you think of the words faith and disability, you may not think they go together. But for me they do. As a baby, I weighed 1 pound 6 ounces (9 ounces after undergoing a hernia surgery.) I was what they called a micro-preemie. I died three times and was brought back each time. I have always had a strong sense of God’s presence in my life.
My relationship with God has always been something very closely personal to me. My church teaches us not to question God’s reasons, and for a long time I never did. That all changed when my sister was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at 14. Our pediatrician told us that had my mom waited and not insisted she be seen by our doctor right away, it would have been too late. Shortly thereafter, I began to change how I talked with God. I soon realized that God would rather have an honest, frank conversation. And sometimes that means not sugar coating things, which I no longer do. I also realize now that questioning God’s methods is not a bad thing, but instead a human thing. No matter what happens, I believe God is in control.
I am a control freak and the ultimate worrywart. This is something my heart and head never can get on the same page about, no matter how much I attempt to practice it. You would think that I would use it by now, but nope. I have decided to just let it all go by praying and finding constructive ways to let whatever I am feeling at the moment out. Even if I am angry with God in the moment, it never lasts because he never leaves me without a way to figure it out. Especially when I am given a physical challenge that requires more effort than normal. With a disability as complex as CP is, you’re always trying to think of innovative, outside the box ways to do things non-disabled people often take for granted. All the while, society continues to make attempts to fit you in this one size fits all box.
This is where the test of faith comes into play for me — figuring out the delicate balance of how much faith you should put in yourself and in your faith in general. Like the scales of justice, but more on a personal/spiritual level. Which scale should be higher than the other? I honestly believe there is no such thing as a perfect balance.
The only true thing that can be connected to faith and disability, in my opinion, is delicateness in how we treat one another, especially those who are different. Remember respect, equality, and humility. I believe that is where the true balance lies.
Leaders Must Stop Forgetting People With Disabilities
Did you know that an estimated 1 in 4 people have disabilities? It’s time our leaders address people with disabilities equally, instead of last. Unless you are a person with a disability, a family member, loved one, or person who has direct contact with people who have disabilities, you probably do not know this. You may even think people with disabilities “are always going to be taken care of.” That is a direct quote I heard from a candidate in the 2008 presidential election. The minute I heard that, I knew the well-meaning candidate had no clue as to what disability issues are in this century. Most people with disabilities do not want “to be taken care of” — they want a life like yours with employment, love, friendship and real inclusion in their communities. And those who need extra support to achieve that life are finding it harder and harder to receive help.
When I say leaders, I mean elected leaders which include national, state, and local leaders, school board members, school district leaders, city managers and mayors. I also mean nonprofit leaders, executive directors, corporate CEOs, and all clergy who lead various faith-based entities.
In every one of those classes of leaders, people with disabilities are often an afterthought. Usually, this is not intentional. But it happens nonetheless, over and over, to the point it seems in 2020 the world of disabilities is taking one step forward and two steps backward.
Case in point: in the wide Democratic field of candidates, excitement is palpable because candidates are announcing and talking about their disability platforms. While this is good news, these platforms are not receiving as much mainstream publicity as those for the Black, Hispanic and LGBTQ communities, senior citizens, etc. In my opinion, the most genuine political moment came from former candidate Andrew Yang, when he told the world he has a son with autism and praised his wife for the work she does raising him. He acknowledged having a child with a disability, and that raising a child with a significant disability is a job. He stated that “special needs are the new normal” in this country.
But let’s move away from politics to the world of public schools. All the data that has been accumulated since the 1990s shows that including the majority of students with disabilities, including those with significant disabilities, results in not only a much better educational outcome, but a better post-high school outcome. Yet in 2020 it is a constant struggle across this country for families to have their children included with proper support. Proper support means trained educators and staff, and adequate staffing levels.
It also means the very first tenet of inclusion — being welcomed. In 2020, the majority of students with significant disabilities are not welcomed in their home school. I have personally experienced this in my daughter’s journey (she has Down syndrome), and everyone I know in my wide network of friends across the country has experienced this, regardless of where they live, their income, or the color of their skin. This discrimination is based on the ignorance that abounds concerning disabilities. And it also exists because schools have never been properly funded to educate students with disabilities. When IDEA was implemented in 1975, the federal government promised to fund 40 percent of a student’s special education costs. In 2020 they fund less than 20 percent, leaving localities left to pay a difference most cannot. So that sadly goes back to politics.
Now let’s address employment. About 80 percent of youth with significant disabilities are unemployed. Another large portion are underemployed. Not because they want to be sitting at home, but because they are not being properly prepared for the workforce, and because in great part we have a workforce that is afraid or unprepared to employ this untapped resource. There is an over-reliance on “job coaches” which is unsustainable. If employers would realize they can train all employees, and adapt to training those with disabilities as part of their corporate culture, I believe magic would happen. Training would actually improve for all employees. Peer friendships and modeling would organically take place. And the overscheduled, underfunded disability support systems already in place could be used on a grander scale to help more people.
Places of worship are to me the saddest areas of discrimination. Again, my family has experienced this when my daughter was a newborn. The interim priest at the time refused to come see us in the hospital and bless her. Later on, he did not want to baptize her. All my close friends who have children with significant disabilities have experienced discrimination in their place of worship, be it Christian, Jewish or Muslim. There are many families who stopped going to their place of worship, and are sadly missing a rich part of life that can be very comforting and fulfilling.
In 2016, Darren Walker, the CEO of the Ford Foundation said,
“In the same way that I have asked my white friends to step outside their own privileged experience to consider the inequities endured by people of color, I was being held accountable to do the same thing for a group of people I had not fully considered. Moreover, by recognizing my individual privilege and ignorance, I began to clearly perceive the Ford Foundation’s institutional ignorance and privilege as well. It is clear to me that this was a manifestation of the very inequality we were seeking to dismantle, and I am deeply embarrassed by it.”
Mr. Walker was talking about being called on the carpet, so to speak, for ignoring people with disabilities. Mr. Walker’s annual letter to his constituents that year was heard all around nonprofit and some corporate circles. It was called his “mea culpa.” His admission of forgetting those with disabilities was honest and refreshing. That was four years ago.
I pray in this new decade there will be many more admissions, and leadership initiatives in all aspects of life, so people with disabilities can be seen for who they are. They are individuals with gifts and worth, and they are an integral piece of our society’s fabric. One by one, let’s all help open our fellow citizens’ eyes.
Self-Harm and Suicidal Thoughts With My Faith
( From You ) I am a Christian. I read my Bible and try to live my life the way the Bible teaches me to live. I go to church every Sunday and Bible study during the week. I’m raising my daughter to know God, to pray, to go to church.
I’ve also lived with mental illness for as long as I can remember. My depression has been so severe, I’ve self-harmed since I was 7 years old, so for the majority of my life. I have tried to take my life on a couple of occasions. I’ve thought about suicide since I was a teenager, so for more that half of my life. Suicide has always been an option for me. It’s not my first choice, but it’s a choice nonetheless.
How do I reconcile my self-harm and suicidal thoughts with my faith? Am I sinning? Do I need to be placed under church discipline? Do I need to be admonished by the elders? The short answer, in my opinion, is no. I’ve had people quote the Bible to me;
“Your body is the temple of God.”
“Do not cut yourself for the dead.”
”Do everything for the Glory of God.”
”Do not commit murder.”
Yes, my body is the temple of God. Yes, I have cut my body, the temple of God. No, I did not cut myself for the glory of God. Yes, taking my life would be considered murdering myself to some people, although, in my opinion, that’s an overreach.
Do I need to be placed under church discipline for self-harming or for suicidal thoughts? Some people in the church have told me yes, I do need to be punished for what I have done and continue to do. I have been told by people in the church that it is a sin, that because of my scars, I won’t be allowed into heaven. The thoughts, the actions, the obvious lack of faith that I have (because if I had faith I wouldn’t struggle with mental illness) exclude me from heaven.
However, my answer is no. I do not need to be placed under church discipline. No, I do not need to be punished. My mind has tortured me for as long as I can remember. I punish myself enough. I have faith. I believe in God. I repent my sins. I believe Jesus will come again. My mental illness is not a reflection of the level of my faith.
Some churches and some people have a very fundamentalist faith. They have legalistic beliefs. They have lost Jesus’ message of love and compassion. They are heavy on condemnation and low on compassion. They do not walk beside people like Jesus did. They do not preach love. They preach law. It’s hard to see Jesus in these people. It’s hard for christians to see Jesus in these people, so imagine how hard it is for non-christians to see Jesus in these people. This attitude doesn’t help people to heal. This attitude creates new wounds that will need healing. Why should people with mental illness feel further from God while the fundamentalists feel righteous in their closeness to God? Why would anyone want to create a divide between God and someone whose mind is tortured? I’m sorry, but that’s not Christ like! That’s not a Christ I would want to follow.
Mental illness is not new. Mental illness has existed for as long as humans have existed. The labels for these mental illnesses are relatively new. We have since attached labels and diagnoses to these illnesses. The illnesses are not new. It’s more common now with the growth in population and modern day society, but not new. God is not surprised by mental illness. He’s not shocked by mental illness. I have no doubt that it saddens God when I think of suicide or harm myself, but I know God still loves me and I am still worthy (as worthy as anyone else) of that love.
I’m not saying that laws and commandments are not important. They are. Love and compassion and being Christ-like is also important, and I think it’s important to show that side of Christ to everyone, particularly to those who are suffering.
Disability Stereotypes in Faith Communities Can Cause Harm
Throughout the history of religions, there has been a tendentious relationship between disability and sacred texts. In Judaism and Christianity, health conditions have been described as the result of sin, given by God. In Christianity, Jesus is conceptualized as a healer of ailments, a divine being who can cure disability by performing miracles. In many Eastern traditions, which have the concept of Karma, health conditions in this life are perceived as a punishment for wrongs in a previous incarnation. These doctrines set the stage for treatment in houses of worship that is too often marginalizing for disabled people.
Activists like Imani Barbarin have had their own set of troubling experiences around disability and religion. On Twitter, Barbarin elucidated her encounters with Christianity in a series of tweets:
“[A]s I grew older, some little things would come up. Like parents yelling at their kids and pointing to me as to why they didn’t have an excuse. Or people who weren’t too familiar with my family making the assumption that I was some little angel (haha, no). By [and] large, my experience being turned into inspiration porn happened [o]utside of my own church and mostly happened when I would visit others or mostly when I was just in the street minding my business. When I would visit, people would try to get me to be healed by their pastors or if I walked by pro-life evangelicals, they would shout at me, [t]elling me I should be grateful my mom didn’t abort me. Probably what got to me the most was when people would tell me that the reason I wasn’t healed was because I didn’t believe hard enough or have enough faith. That it was my fault for not doing enough to not be disabled.”
I’m going to do this one and I’m going to preface this by saying that many faith traditions have this issue, but I can only speak to my own with Christianity. Also, I used to work for evangelical missionaries and my father still works for the church, so I’m going to be delicate.
Inspiration porn, which is a phrase popularized by the late Australian comedian and disability rights activist, Stella Young, refers to the exploitation of disabled people and their stories for the benefit of nondisabled people. In Barbarin’s account of inspiration porn, other children in the church didn’t have an excuse for misbehaving, because she “had it so much worse” and was still acting polite. The assumption with this genre, however, is that disability is what Young has termed a “Bad Thing,” and that disabled people exist to remind nondisabled people how lucky they are not to be similarly “afflicted.”
The most insidious part of what Barbarin and others have experienced is being prayed over to be cured, and feeling utterly inadequate for not being “right with God” when their disability or illness doesn’t disappear. Barbarin elaborated upon her subjective experience of not feeling like a good enough Christian:
“[Religious people] would have all of these stories about someone they knew who was healed and how faithful they were and how if I really dedicated my life to god, I would be too. This would lead to me crying on my bedroom floor pleading with God to be healed bargaining with him to give [m]e a sign to show me I was worthy. It never happened. When I started working for the church, those instances went into hyperdrive, not in the office, but at the events I would have to go to as a part of my job. Once I was prayed over to be healed 12 times in one day.”
Such feelings of inadequacy begin to eat at the conscience and sometimes even the faith of the disabled believer. Some decide to leave the church altogether after such negative experiences vis-a-vis religion and disability. Other non-disabled people have adopted a fatalistic way of dismissing the concerns of this marginalized community, pronouncing “that’s the way it was written,” to invalidate their experiences. In other words, discrimination and poor treatment need to be accepted because it is God’s will to have a certain lot in life.
The answer to the ostracism many disabled people feel at church is in building an inclusive ministry, which is described by disabilityandfaith.org as “one which enables, empowers and engages all persons within the worshipping community, regardless of ability. This stems from a belief that God has created us as equally-valued people in His image.” This website then quotes Scripture to justify the inclusion of disabled people in the faith community. “‘Let us create man in OUR Image’” (Gen 1:26). The image of God is best reflected in community. Together we live out the mandate of Luke 4:18-21, proclaiming ‘the year of the Lord’s favor’ to everyone.” Such a faith practice will include disabled people in all aspects of religious life and will make them welcome members of the community. This approach emphasizes the healing that occurs with Jesus, not necessarily the curing of ailments. It also works to challenge outdated modes of viewing disability as sin, so that disabled people can feel just as accepted in church as nondisabled people.
Faith in Yorself as Your Superpower When Fighting With Depression
( From You ) There was a time when people believed it was physically impossible for humans to run a mile in less than four minutes. People knew we could get close, but our physiology had limits. Then, in 1954, Roger Bannister did the impossible and beat that limitation. Since then, tens of thousands of people, including high school students, have done what at one time experts believed could not be done. Bannister helped changed the world’s belief about human potential, and our faith in new possibilities gave us new abilities.
Today, many people believe it is mentally impossible for humans to completely conquer depression. People know we can get close, but our psychology has limits. However, in 1977, a man named Eckhart Tolle, who had struggled with long periods of unbearable depression, was up all night in his own misery because he believed he could not live with himself anymore. All of a sudden, the idea of not being able to live with himself sparked an inner clarity that he, and the idea he had of himself, were two things instead of one. He realized he no longer had to carry the burden of the negative thinking because they were external to him. The next morning, he woke up feeling deeply peaceful and never fell back into depression again. Since then, he has worked as a mindfulness teacher, appeared on TV specials with Oprah, written several mindfulness best-sellers and helped millions of people around the world let go of their depression just like he did.
The most important part of this story is that Eckhart Tolle is not special. He is no more special than Roger Bannister was. The only unique feature they shared was their unyielding belief in themselves. The belief many people have of themselves is that they are incapable of letting go of their trauma and they hold on. People may tell themselves things like, “once you’re depressed, you’re always depressed,” “you can’t get rid of 100 percent of your trauma,” “the stigma needs to be removed before you start healing,” and “more research needs to be done to solve the problem.” Let’s challenge these self-defeating statements, recognizing people like Tolle’s ability to transcend the mind.
In fact, people have been realizing this clarity for thousands of years through various mindfulness techniques. Mindfulness doesn’t have to be some complicated ritual with yoga, mantras, chakras and prayers, although those are wonderful tools if they have meaning for you. Instead, the essence of mindfulness is simply resting in the knowledge that thoughts cannot touch you.
This is hard to believe because ever since we were born, we have watched our thoughts constantly. After doing this long enough, there comes a point in our lives where we start to believe that we are these observed thoughts. This belief causes pain because whenever hurtful thoughts arise, we cringe in the same way as when we see someone get seriously injured even though we are separated and completely untouched.
Mindfulness is a tool that reminds you of this separation. It is an exercise that strengthens the space between you and all the noise in your head. This separation provides silence, silence provides peace and peace provides joy. If you practice mindfulness, under no circumstances are you required to remove the noise in your head or even outside your head. Instead, practice simply watching your breath and notice how the nonstop traffic of thought activity flows without reason. Watch without judgment. Watch without resistance. Watch without reacting. And watch with the belief that you can achieve perfect freedom.
Every now and then, a thought, which you label as important or interesting, will carry you away wherever it wants. Eventually, you will notice that you are flying off with it. When this happens, simply return to the space of watching. The more you exercise your power of observing this phenomenon, the weaker thoughts become at dragging you away into their nonsense.
Eventually, I realized that depression is just thought activity, and it doesn’t actually have any power over me other than that which I give it. After making it this far, peace can bloom within you without any effort at all.
Unfortunately, it’s likely that in the beginning, you won’t believe in yourself. That’s OK. You don’t have to believe that you can do it. You just have to believe that you can take the first step. If you can get started and maintain committed to the process, you’re halfway there. Your mind will tell you you’re never going to make it. Just keep practicing. It may even seem like every piece of evidence in the world is telling you, you will fail. Just keep practicing.
Don’t worry about failing once or even a thousand times. Mental health doesn’t have to be some miracle overnight. It can be a million baby steps that start with getting out of bed and making some toast. Then, once you get that far, take another step forward in whatever direction you need. Maybe you take two steps forwards and one step back or three steps back. That’s fine too. Stay the course.
There’s no reason you can’t also try to let go of depression as Tolle did. Try to realize that your thoughts are simply thoughts and no matter how big, scary or violent they get, they cannot actually touch you. Your mind cannot force you to believe its lies. But you must be mindful that it knows your weaknesses and your triggers. It’s very cunning and knows exactly how to make you squeal. You have the power to say no to it. Even if the mind tries to make you believe you have a long-term relationship with depression, that’s just the depression trying to convince you of its awesome power. In truth, it doesn’t take any time to put down a heavy weight or a heavy belief, regardless of how powerful it may seem to be.
A belief can cause a war, create life, save life, end life, destroy life, bless life and change the world. The day you conquer depression could be very much like today. Just like a seed already contains everything it needs to become a mighty tree, you already contain everything you need to be a mighty you. And how much greater are you than a seed? When the mind tries to cloud you with doubt, remember that Eckhart is not special, gifted, talented, blessed or lucky. He is just a normal person like you. And since he did it, you can do it too.
Moments That Restored Our Faith in Humanity
Sometimes it feels like you can’t open a newspaper or log on to social media without being inundated with sad, frustrating stories. It’s so easy to feel a sense of darkness and doom, like there’s no one out there bringing positivity to the world. But that’s just not true!
Every day, people show compassion and love for others with large and small acts of kindness — whether it’s as simple as holding a door for a neighbor, or as life-changing as helping a friend pay their bills during a difficult time. As the late Fred Rogers once said, “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”
No matter what negativity is going on in the world, there are always Good Samaritans out there doing their part to bring a smile to a friend’s (or stranger’s!) face.
We hope these stories will serve as a reminder that, if you look closely, you may find kindness in places you never expected. With 2019 coming to a close, let’s reflect on the moments that made us feel hopeful for the future and grateful for the thoughtful friends and strangers we’ve met.
“The first concert I had to attend with my cane, I was one dollar short on what it would take to get the T-shirt I wanted because they had no credit card machine, and the man and woman sitting next to us overheard and insisted I take their dollar so I could get the shirt. It was so sweet and a little thing to them but huge to me!”
Here what people shared with me:
“I didn’t have the strength in my hands to open something for my 4-year-old niece and she just said, ‘It’s OK Aunty Siani, it doesn’t matter.’”
“The other day my best friend forced me into a rolling cart (she has Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and a thousand issues like I do) as I had my neck brace, not my knee [brace]. We ended up splitting up, and I finally found what I was looking for, barely in my reach, when a couple stopped and asked if I needed help. I’m young, and though I look sick to those that know me, others are quick to judge. These small moments, those are the ones that stay with you.”
“A couple gave up seats on a busy train to my two children who are both autistic. They were getting increasingly upset as was I. It was my fault for messing up the booking. I have fibromyalgia and anxiety. At the moment of their kind gesture, I burst into tears. We’ve had so many travel issues over the years this was a huge deal to me.”
“I had a bad fall outside and couldn’t get up as my legs became useless and a lovely chap came and picked me up off the floor. Angels come in many forms.”
“A dear friend from high school sent me flowers with a lovely note. This while battling breast cancer herself. She calls me her ‘Shero.’ The flowers lasted for weeks, bringing me a smile every day.”
“I was at a rock festival on Saturday night and I misplaced my bank card. Went back Sunday to a totally different area and stage to get set up for the day and asked one of the event helpers where the lost and found was. I told her what happened and where. She asked my name and color of the card. When I told her, she said it is there, I was the one logging in the lost and found stuff last night. Now how crazy is it that I lost it in a totally different area on many many acres of land with like roughly 50,000 people and it all lined up that I asked this lady! Thank you to the Good Samaritan that turned it in.”
“I was living in emergency accommodation in a hostel the past two years, which has deteriorated my health. I’ve just moved into permanent home, the council and social services refused to help me move in any way even though I’m bedbound, more so in the winter. I was extremely lucky that my mum and her husband took time out of their busy schedules to help me move, and get me settled as much as they could. If they hadn’t I don’t know what I would have done.”
“My friend knows that I like to help others. I put out a plea for someone to buy a blanket I had crochet so that I could buy some things for a dog rescue. While everyone else was silent. She spoke up and bought two blankets from me.”
“My friend from middle school reconnected with me through Facebook and found out I am not well. She has made a point to be here for me when no one else is. She brings me my favorite cookies to cheer me up. She makes plans with me to get me out of the house and isn’t embarrassed when I can’t wear anything but sweats and a T-shirt. If I am so unwell that I can’t leave the house, she comes over instead. She texts me through bad pain spells in the middle of the night. She even researched ulcerative colitis and asks me questions about my personal experience so she can understand. These things are not little to me. They mean more than I can ever express with words.”
“We were waiting to be seated at a crowded restaurant when another family walked in with a daughter about my son’s age. My son then got up and offered the girl his seat. The father walked up to me and congratulated me on being an amazing parent to teach my son such manners. I almost cried. I needed that reassurance.”
“A few days ago I was the recipient of a Starbucks pay-it-forward at the drive-through. My total was $24 and they paid the whole thing! I’ve never had that happen before. I paid for the person behind me, but I got off pretty light since theirs was only $5.”
“Tonight at my wife’s transgender support meeting, the other people helped me and asked questions about how they could help someone like me and asked about my illness, etc. Made me drinks and got me food. I had my own waiters tonight. People like those tonight have restored my faith in humankind.”
“My daughter lost her wallet in a town an hour away by leaving it on top of the car putting my grandson in his car seat. A gentleman found it in the middle of a busy intersection and drove all the way to our house the next day to return it to her.”
“We have had a power outage in Kentucky recently for hours. When it was getting dark I left home running an errand of ‘Let’s find dinner at a place with power.’ An anonymous neighbor left a stack of chem lights with a nice fabric bowtie around it at our front door. Thank you whoever you were!”
I Struggle in My Faith With Borderline Personality Disorder
( From You ) I decided to write this after I skipped church for the past three weeks, one of which because of Hurricane Irma, and the others were my choice. But if Irma hadn’t decided to send her wind and rain our way, I still wouldn’t have gone.
I have borderline personality disorder (BPD). I have unstable and intense interpersonal relationships. So, it comes as no surprise that in continuing this pattern, my relationship with God has suffered. My motivation to attend church service has completely dwindled, and now it has become a chore that I often leave unattended to because of my job. I have zero desire to be in the physical building, and much less with the people that sit in the pews.
This is an example of devaluation. This means going from a state of considering a person or thing to be perfect, flawless (idealization), to being riddled with flaws and having no redeeming characteristics. This pattern can be seen in personal relationships, celebrity opinions and beliefs.
Recently, I’ve been going through a tough time in a couple different aspects of my life. My faith has gradually decreased and now, I’d say, it’s almost nonexistent. It’s the age-old story of “Why hast thou forsaken me, God?” But for me and my BPD, it becomes a lack of faith in God and a lack of trust. I have literally told God I hate him.
This was the first time I’ve gotten to this point, but I often vacillate in my faith regarding Christianity. It wasn’t until now that I’ve recently I realized that BPD is the reason why I catastrophize what I’m experiencing which leads me to this complete devaluation of God and Christian belief.
And it’s very likely that two weeks from now, something remarkable will happen in my life which will have me in the “idealization” side of this stressful pattern.
And then something bad will happen and I’ll be right back where I am now.
It’s exhausting and confusing. It brings up feelings of anxiety and depression because I feel like I’m a “bad Christian” or a “fair weather Christian” both of which lead me down a spiral of believing that I’m not good enough and that I am doomed to Hell no matter what.
I must continue to remind myself that all relationships have ups and downs, so it’s natural to have difficulties in a relationship with God. I have to cut myself some slack and allow myself to receive the grace I have already been gifted with, especially when I feel I’m undeserving.
My Faith Comforts Me as I Lose My Hair to Chronic Illness
My hair is falling out and I have to admit, I’m scared. Thinning hair I could handle but falling out? This is just too much.
When my not-so-golden locks became noticeably finer, I embraced that
part of my “healing journey” with a pixie cut. A short hair style I could pull off, but not bald. That’s a hairdo I simply cannot do.
To be fair, I don’t have fully developed bald spots just yet but what I do have is a dramatically receding hairline. My hairline’s retreat occurred so quickly I didn’t even get to say goodbye. One night the thin strands of my bangs packed their bags and fled the scene of of my head. I hoped they were just going on vacation but that was weeks ago and they haven’t returned. In fact, my departed hairline has done just the opposite of reappear. It has enticed more hair follicles to follow.
Like strands of hair to the slaughter, the hair on the tippy-top of my head has fallen right in line with my hairline and frizzled right out. It is as if my hair were being scorched, beginning at the very end of each strand. Without any heat, the strands sizzle and sear until they are so fragile they snap off entirely, leaving behind charred hair debris and a much more exposed scalp. The severe frizzling and falling out of my hair scares me. It petrifies me. I can’t imagine my head without hair.
The thought of a hairless fate for my head taunts me. I have disturbing visions of a vanishing hairline, patches of exposed skin and a tender, vulnerable scalp. I’ve tried to run and hide from my receding hairline by wearing hats and avoiding the mirror but it has been futile. I have been unable to escape my fear.
While I’ve been looking at the receding hairline on my head with fear and concern, God has been looking at the receding trust in my heart. He knows how truly frightened I am of the future. He sees how scared I am by each scorched strand.
But I need not be fearful of what will become of my hair because God already has it planned. I don’t need to know how many strands I’ll have in the future because God already has them counted. As I’ve looked in the mirror I have tried to face my fear by imagining what I might look like bald but even with my most vivid imagination cap securely fastened I can’t picture it. And the good news is I don’t need to.
God has already plotted out every step of my life’s journey according to His will and graciously lifted from me the burden of knowing the future. Whether my hair continues to retreat or miraculously returns with increased thickness and volume, I can rest assured that God is in control. If my health continues to sizzle or if I gain strength and vitality, I trust and know that God is always in control.
Today, with this head of receding hair, is the day the Lord has made and I will rejoice in it, no matter what lies ahead for my locks. Because I trust and believe in the perfect will of God, I can cast off worry and live free of fear. Today, in this balding moment, I can concentrate solely on the goodness and glory of Christ and leave the future of my hair, my health and my heart in the almighty hands of God.
Faith Helps Me Be a Parent to My Children With Special Needs
( From You ) Dear Parent of a Child with Special Needs,
I see you. I see you waking up yet another morning, looking at your calendar to check and see which therapy or doctor’s appointments the day holds. I see you picking up, feeding, changing, holding, helping, sitting up, pushing around, positioning, carrying, cleaning up, taking care of your child in ways you never thought possible. I see your blood pressure rising when you first notice your child has a stuffy nose, remembering the last time and how it ended up. I see you doing all you can for preventative care, with suctions, syringes, nebulizers and more. I see you waking up in the middle of the night to do the same thing — checking to make sure your child is still breathing at a comfortable rate. I see you recording every last ounce of fluid taken in or vomited up, sighing in relief each time a wet diaper appears.
I see you. I see you patiently attempting to get your child to drink and eat enough. I see you trying method after method, day after day, to get your baby to hold their bottle or sip out of a sippy cup. I see you wiping away tears as your little one vomits during a meal. I see you patiently cleaning up and comforting your child all the more. I see you anxiously watching the scale at the doctor appointment, waiting to see a higher number than last time to appear and feeling defeated if it does not.
I see you. I see you going to therapy after therapy appointment in which they each tell you five different things to work on at home in your spare time. I see you smiling, nodding and making a mental note of what point you will try and do this throughout the day. I see you cheering your child on as they attempt to do the same thing they’ve been trying to do for months. I see you wondering if they will ever reach another milestone while continuing to make sure your little one knows you believe they can. I see you blinking back tears as your child screams while the therapist places them in a new contraption or therapeutic suit, all the while assuring you it isn’t hurting your child; it’s just uncomfortable. You’re agreeing, but deep down inside, you’re wondering how they know that to be true. You’re wondering if it’s all worth it. You’re thinking about whether or not, at the end of the day, you should just let your child be himself/herself, instead of pushing them over and over again. But, you continue, because if you don’t, what then?
I see you in the waiting room at one of many doctor appointments. I see you walking in nervously, wondering what news will be given at this one. I see you holding your child tightly as they’re poked, prodded, examined and analyzed. I see you remaining determined to not cry in the doctor’s office as they tell you yet another discouraging part of your child’s diagnosis or lack thereof. I see you jumping each time the phone rings, hoping the results are in from the most recent blood test. I see you checking the calendar to think back on when the test was actually given and when you should receive the news.
I see you. I see you in the grocery store, pushing your child around, hoping no one will stop you to ask his/her age. I see you watching the typically developing child across the aisle, munching on a cookie, pushing things off the shelves and running to and fro. The momma looks frustrated, and keeps asking him to stop. “No!” You’re thinking to yourself. “Don’t tell him to stop. Tell him to keep going!” I see you looking in amazement at all the milestones flippantly being reached around you, and as you do this, wishing for just a second that your child would pick up a cookie, push things off shelves, run away from you. I see you feeling guilty for even thinking this way.
Being a mom of children with special needs is isolating in many ways. It’s hard to find your place in a sense, because in ways, it feels as if your life doesn’t have much in common with anyone. Going to playdates with typically developing children feels awkward (and for those of us who have immune-compromised children, germy); but people without children can be hard to relate to as well. Because my girls don’t have a diagnosis, I haven’t found a support group or fundraising group just yet; but I’m members of many online groups in which I get to interact and bounce off day-to-day normals with other people. I’ve found that many of them, many of us, become bitter and stuck in our own stuff, and if you took a poll (and people were honest), I believe that most would say their faith has worn thin on this journey. I get it. But, I’m here to tell you it was never intended to be that way. In fact, I’m here to encourage you that not only is God with you on this journey; He is the One that is writing it.
I know, I know. This journey has been tough. It’s included a lot of suffering and struggle, and many of you might say that a good God would not allow these moments to have happened. A good God would save His children from any and all suffering, right? Here’s the thing friend: He did. My faith in Christ has been strengthened through this journey with our girls. Now, if you’ve suddenly become turned off by those couple sentences, please stick with me. I’m not writing this from a place of ignorance. Far from it. I not only have one child with special needs, I have two. I know I’m not the only one in this boat, and I’m not asking for a medal, but I just want to make sure it’s clear that if anyone has reason to get discouraged in all this, it could be me. After all, the medical community has been perplexed by our situation. Fraternal twins with the same undiagnosed, quite debilitating, disease? I was once told there was only a 6 percent chance. Many chalk it up as “unfortunate” or “bad luck.” But God.
First off, to be blunt, I don’t want to serve a God I can predict and understand. If I can fathom His doings in my mere humanity, then how is He God? If I could understand His ways, then where would the faith part come in? I believe Christianity is about what God did for me, not what I can do for God. I believe God knows more than we do about watching a child suffer. Yes, being a parent of a child/children with special needs is hard. Yes, there are layers of challenges that build up every day, but I never think there is not a God that controls it all. I do not want to serve a God that isn’t fully sovereign. I want to serve a God that chooses to bring that which is best into my life, even if I cannot understand it at the time. Faith. When I view my children, regardless of their needs, as little ones made in the image of God — not by chance but by His sovereign plans and power — it’s a game-changer. When I view my day to day tasks as worship to the Creator rather than mundane activities of survival, I can find joy. Beyond that, when I remember that, while our bodies are wasting away, (all of us), He is renewing my spirit each and every day, I can find joy even in the hardest moments. Hope. I believe this did not happen by chance. I believe He chose it all in His perfect wisdom, and He did it out of sheer love. A good, good, God. Worthy of my trust and my confidence. Able to carry my loads when it’s just too much. Displaying His strength through our weakness as His megaphone to a bitter, hopeless world. Purposeful. This is why, instead of shaking my fists at the sky in our reality, I can lift my hands in praise. This is not mere positivity. You and I both know that no matter how many times we repeat, “I will be grateful today. I will lean in to happiness and lean away from hurt,” blah, blah, blah, it doesn’t help. Dead, futile words to a hurting heart.
Parent of a child with special needs: I see you. I am you. And, I know it’s hard. You are walking through the unimaginable at all times, many of you with loads much heavier than mine. I cannot compare our journeys, but I believe that my God can meet the needs of both of us. He wants to use this, and He is in control. I believe If He chose this for my child, it is absolutely His best. I allow Him to mold that into my heart.
Parent of a child with special needs: you are so very loved. You are seen. You are cared for; and what you are doing matters. There is purpose in it all, and you are never, ever alone.
HEAL
Psychology heals by addressing the whole person through emotional processing, self-regulation, supportive relationships, and the holistic understanding of biological, psychological, and social factors. Techniques include mindfulness, exercise, healthy habits, and professional help in the form of therapy to process trauma, manage stress, and improve well-being and resilience.
The Difference Between Acknowledging You Need to Heal and Allowing Yourself to Heal
Healing. It is a concept and process that is rarely, if ever, quick and easy. There are some cases where the process is smoother and steadier than others, while in other instances, it can be agonizing, slow and dragging. It can also be draining, both physically and emotionally and comes in many patterns and waves. Sometimes, the physical side of healing can be easier than the emotional aspect and vice versa. Each case and instance of healing is individual and yesterday, as I placed my foot inside a sandal for the first time this season, I reached a significant revelation.
They are sandals that quickly became a favorite of mine after purchasing them early on in the summer season last year. Easy to wear, the style I longed for and even comfortable, I wore them more often than not and they were my fashion fix of the season. Then one early August evening, after spending several hours working feverishly at my laptop, I entered the kitchen to sit at the table and, out of frustration, somehow managed to drop the heavy, wooden kitchen chair on the little toe on my right foot. Surprisingly at first, while I did feel some initial pain, it wasn’t as bad as I would have imagined it would be. Looking back, it may have been the anger and adrenaline pulsing through me as I was tired and frustrated, which probably masked much of the initial pain.
There was little to no pain the rest of that evening and the next day after dressing and putting on those beloved sandals, I started to feel some discomfort. I didn’t think much of it, distracted by my other responsibilities of the day. However, later that day as I was walking through the local library the pain worsened. Attempting to walk became a feat I could barely manage. At first, I couldn’t fathom why I was experiencing a sudden uptake in pain, completely disregarding and even forgetting the prior evening’s events involving my little toe.
Realizing something was inherently wrong even though my toe lacked bruising or really any signs beyond some swelling, I made my way to the urgent care center. An x-ray later, I was told there were no fractures, but I still couldn’t comprehend the amount of pain I experienced. To me, I did not feel “in the clear,” and a sprain did not seem logical to me either. The next week or so, I attempted to traverse through the days as I typically did, but continued to struggle with walking. At first, I believed maybe those sandals were not the best footwear to wear at the time, so I attempted to wear another but still experienced identical pain. The swelling in my toe worsened and so again, I made my way for a medical intervention, this time visiting a local podiatrist.
Two different podiatrist visits and an MRI later and I received a diagnosis: bone marrow edema, indicating a stress fracture unable to be seen through an x-ray. Finally, a diagnosis was achieved, but the actions that followed I am not proud of and to this day, I wish I’d acted differently. Casts, both walking and regular, a boot and crutches were all suggested and recommended to me, but I refused them all. Instead, I continued to walk, wincing in pain, stopping every few steps to braise myself and whimpered through all of it.
Truth be told, the only thing that healed me was the arrival of the colder months and boot season. My favorite pair of boots, rigid, hard and similar to the composition of a walking boot, proved to be my saving grace, when all is said and done. After a week or so in the boots, my pain started to lessen and once again, I was able to walk with minimal to no pain.
Today, the pain is a distant memory, but one that I contemplated yesterday as I slipped my feet into those very sandals. It was a reminder of how slow the process of healing can be, but also how responsible we are for our own healing; it is evidence to me that our healing is our responsibility, alone. We can choose to push through it, as I did through refusing to wear the proper footwear and treatment, or we can compromise and endure the discomfort the healing process may and can bring us.
Healing is not always linear — often times, it is the contrary. Sometimes, we start the healing process and it abruptly stops, or halts over time and then begins again. Sometimes it happens without warning, while other times, it is a conscious effort to begin again. Moments happen where we think we are healed and then realize we are not; this can be after an inciting incident, or happen spontaneously. There have been many cases when I deemed myself “healed,” from certain situations, encounters and personal relationships and then I realized I’d only temporarily anesthetized myself. It’s important to recognize though in saying this, that struggling to heal or needing to begin or stop the process is not a failure; it is a sign we are human. It is a sign that life happens, situations arise, people change, needs shift and our attentions are required in other ways.
At the same time, sometimes we fail to recognize at first just how much we actually have healed through it all, as I did, yesterday. Slipping on those sandals and walking in them sans pain, it was astonishing to me how far I’d come and how through the agonizing last weeks of last summer and fall I managed to heal. The pain is gone and now I look back on that time and realize the choices I made were not the best and hampered my healing, but having the awareness of it is still healing in itself. Being aware and being grateful, is essential to the healing process — or at least for me, it is.
In saying this, I hope that if you are healing, no matter where you are in the midst of it, or even if you have yet to begin the process of it or recently stopped or felt stuck, know that healing is like an ocean; it ebbs and flows, sometimes encountering big waves or feats and other times, it is stagnant or maybe turbulent. Remember that healing is not a race to be run, or a test to be graded; it is a personal process filled with many changes and shifts. One thing though, is true and that is all of our unique abilities to heal in ways that work best for us.
Can’t Heal in a Toxic Environment
Survivors are told they are responsible for their healing. I, as a survivor, say we as a collective world, society and culture are responsible for creating an environment that isn’t traumatized and causes intentional harm. One that isn’t oppressive in the first place.
A plant cannot thrive without the necessary conditions. An experiment was even carried out that showed how a plant responded to being verbally bullied by withering away and dying instead of thriving and growing. Humans are like plants, needing the right conditions to thrive. I don’t believe trauma should be divided into small or big T’s, or abuse into “worse” and “lesser.” This isn’t helpful and only brings shame, and shame becomes toxic and blocks the healing process.
Survivors shouldn’t have to justify their pain or feel they are not worthy of help or support because pain and trauma is being measured. We shouldn’t allow abuse by acting only when it’s reached extreme measures, we should be saying “no” period. Abuse is abuse. We should be supporting all who hurt and bleed not only physically, but also emotionally. It can take years for the psyche to heal, and even then, healing doesn’t mean things will be the same, it means adapting to a new life, managing the pain and triggers and emotions, and the lessening of the struggle and pain. A fulfilling and happy life is possible, but we need to adapt and learn new ways to live and function in life and new skills to help us do that.
COVID-19 was a collective threat and trauma. It took the lives of many and we struggled with all we lost. Yet, sexual abuse and violence, domestic abuse and violence and racial trauma have been pandemics throughout endless history. And in the present, continue to threaten the lives and well-being of so many who have lost their lives to offenders or are driven to end their pain by ending their own lives.
I see adverts encouraging survivors to come forward, and those who struggle with depression not to struggle in silence and to talk. How many times do survivors need to talk? We have been talking, but oppression has silenced us. Society has victim blamed us. Justice never seems served, changes take endless years to occur and when they do, it’s thanks to survivors.
The world thinks they can know pain they have never experienced, as well as judge those who have lived it.
As humans, sometimes we think we know better and know it all until it happens to us.
Survivors don’t need to speak up, the world needs to open their ears to listen, to see change and put it in action. It’s not enough saying, “I’m not a rapist, I’m not an abuser, I’m not racist, misogynistic …” because most of us have been the problem even when we don’t realize it. We need to really challenge ourselves and look within and we need to get angry collectively, not only when things personally affect us or loved ones.
If you really are in support of mental illness, stop shaming, judging, voting for leaders with narcissistic tendencies. Start believing survivors, start listening to them. Fight for equality, fight for justice, fight for the end of cruelty to all humans and animals. Start respecting the environment and world you don’t own and are not entitled to. Stop destroying life and nature and then wondering why things happen. Stop doing this and thinking there will be no consequences.
If we live in a world that doesn’t meet human needs, that isn’t safe or feels safe, do we really think mental illness is just a disease? That suicide is just the result of depression? Depression is a symptom that manifests in a world that can render us to feel helpless and hopeless and alone. The world needs to change if mental illness is to get any better. All these things are injuries to the psyche, and naturally, the psyche will bleed. Sadly, when it’s the psyche, many are left to bleed or told to stop bleeding. You see, struggling is a normal human experience and it’s hard to heal wounds when the environment that caused them doesn’t change.
How Labeling Anxiety Helped Heal
Getting sick is scary. When you don’t know what’s causing your illness and have no way of confronting it, it’s even scarier. My first bout of anxiety occurred when I was 14, though I had no name for it at the time. At first, it was just another Tuesday. I walked home from school, had a snack and then played outside with my dog and horse. As always, it made me ravenous just in time to have dinner with my family, which was always at 5 p.m.
While I would play outside, my brother would be in the front room watching television, my dad would be tending to the garden outside and my mom would be in the kitchen cooking. Then, at dinnertime, my family would gather around the table and discuss each other’s day.
It was 4:30 p.m., but my home was as silent and still as a ghost town. There was no usually-boisterous noise echoing from the front room, no new plants or stacks of weeds in the driveway, no sound of sprinklers satiating plants in the garden, and mysteriously, no sound of pots and pans or the oven humming coming from the kitchen. The only noise I could hear was the sound of my heart beating. As the clock ticked past dinnertime and the sky grew darker, it increased in tempo.
I knew where my mom was. Two weeks earlier, she abandoned my family. So, it wasn’t that I knew where she was, but where she wasn’t, and that was at home, making dinner for her family. Certain uncertainty, if you will.
I didn’t know where my brother and father were either. I hoped they hadn’t followed in my mother’s footsteps and made the impromptu decision to drop the family and run away, too. The rational part of me knew they didn’t leave forever — they were out somewhere else, doing something else, without me. But my mother introduced the distinct, existentially terrifying possibility that, at any moment, the person who is supposed to love you the most in the world will one day change their mind and realize that, actually, they don’t love you and leave you in a skeleton of a house, alone and hungry.
These were the thoughts I harbored as I sat alone at the kitchen table, waiting, hoping, dreaming, that dinner would be served soon. I wanted to hear about my brother’s day at school or my father’s day at work. And, most of all, I yearned to hear my mother’s voice again. Silent tears dripped from my eyes, so I would not disturb the peaceful environment of the kitchen, which I once idolized.
Eventually, 4:30 became 5:30, 5:30 became 6:30, and then 6:30 became 7:30, and there was still no dinner or family in sight. Resigning to this new reality, I moped over to the cupboard, pulled out a jar of peanut butter and proceeded to devour the contents inside.
My dad finally stumbled through the front door at around 8 p.m. Except for this time, he reeked of booze instead of smelling like the fragrant trimmings I remembered. My brother never came home that night at all. Neither had behaved this way before today. But it certainly wasn’t the last time, for them or me; I would continue to worry as I sat home alone without a proper dinner in store for me.
Indeed, this was just another Tuesday, the first of many in this new normal. Once a safe, wholesome routine, it was now a pipe dream, corrupted by the harsh realities of family trauma. And the anxiety that resulted from it.
Decades later, after my marriage ended, these same feelings of worry and fear resurfaced, but with greater intensity. As a result of the fallout of my marriage, I found myself home alone in my big empty house at night, locking the doors and cowering in fear on my couch with only a bottle of wine in hand to quiet my nerves, like that jar of peanut butter back when I was a teenager at home. I couldn’t sleep or think or do anything I used to like to do.
I felt stuck relying on coping mechanisms that were doing nothing to relieve the underlying fear I felt. It was like a slow death, leaving me unable to move forward or be happy. So, I sought out a therapist who put a label on how I felt and diagnosed me with generalized anxiety disorder.
Surprisingly, receiving this diagnosis comforted me because now I knew what name to put on the face of the monster that terrorized my mental health for decades. And now I knew where to begin learning more about the disorder and ultimately how to combat these feelings.
Being an avid reader, I read books about anxiety at night. A repeated theme in these books was the concept of meditation as a treatment for anxiety. No longer willing to feel the way I did, I was open-minded about any treatment that I believed could alleviate my anxiety. These books sent me on a journey to learn to meditate, and I got more than I bargained for.
That was 15 years ago. Not only did my anxiety gradually diminish, but meditation gave me the direction I needed to rebuild my life after my divorce. I became stronger and more independent, cultivated a close relationship with my then young son (now all grown up) and started a business helping others learn meditation as a way to help them heal from anxiety and trauma. In the long run, meditation saved my life and still does every day.
Trauma-Informed Therapy Can Help You Heal
Trauma hurts
Trauma can have a severe effect on a person’s mind. It’s imperative that if you’re facing traumatic experiences, you see a therapist who understands what you’re experiencing emotionally. Rather than working with a psychodynamic therapist, someone who practices trauma-informed therapy may be more adept at treating your symptoms.
Your therapist needs to be an expert in trauma
It’s imperative that you work with a therapist who knows what trauma is so they can help you heal. People who don’t know how to treat trauma survivors aren’t going to be the best at showing them ways to cope with their traumatic experiences. When you see a therapist who specializes in trauma, you’re taking your mental health into your hands and trying to heal. What you’ve been through is real and valid. You won’t have to explain how trauma works to a therapist who specializes in the field.
Survivors of sexual abuse deserve to be heard
When you have survived rape or sexual assault, you have the right to be heard. Your voice matters and working with a therapist who understands survivors is imperative. They will be able to help you work through trauma. They get it more than any other kind of mental health professional. When you step into a therapy session with a trauma-informed therapist (whether that’s online or in your area) you’re meeting with a trauma specialist.
Surviving sexual assault is serious and you may be scared to open up about it. Rest assured, I can tell you that a trauma-informed therapist knows you’re hurting and wants to hear your story. They know not to push you if you are feeling triggered and they want to help you heal. That is their responsibility as a therapist. They have been trained to handle trauma in a way that is productive and effective. No matter how long it takes, they will stick with you, and they believe in your right to a good life.
You survived
Trauma means survival. You went through something awful and made it out the other side. You are resilient. You can bounce back from an something that hurt you deeply, and keep living. Your strength is inspiring to others survivors. Remember that you are strong even when you feel weak. Remember that you are loved even when you feel unlovable. Your therapist is there to support you on your journey to wellness.
Being afraid is normal
It’s natural to be afraid when you’re expressing something that happened to you that is traumatic. What you need to remember is not to let that fear freeze you; keep going. Think of your therapist as a cheerleader. Imagine your counselor as a coach. They want you to work through your pain and feel better. They are patient if they’re good therapists. They believe in you. Even if you don’t believe in yourself, an excellent therapist is going to stay with you and help you through that self-doubt so you can do more than you imagined and live a life where you can acknowledge your pain and move forward. Being in pain is extremely difficult, but you can survive. You were able to make it through the experience, and now you’ve learned just how strong you are inside.
Find a relationship with an excellent therapist
You deserve to work with a mental health professional who you feel comfortable talking with. Your story is a sensitive subject, and you want to feel safe when you’re vulnerable. You have the right to feel comfortable during your session. A trauma informed therapist is a specialist in surviving traumatic events and offers you a unique skill set. Whether you’re working with a therapist online or in person, the goal is the same, to help you heal from something that tried to destroy you. You matter, and you are strong. You survived, and you can get through this. No matter how hard it seems, you are a warrior.
You are not alone.
Time Doesn’t Always Heal
( From You ) Birth mother, birth parent, first mother, biological mother… each woman prefers a certain terminology when speaking about their adoption journey. Regardless of it all….you, the woman who gave birth, you’re a mother.
I was never fond of being called a birth mother — but I was so saddened by the entire experience and feeling like I didn’t have a voice, so just stuck with birth mother. It’s as if I felt guilty taking the title mother… but felt disrespected like I was some baby-making machine. There are not enough stories about birth mothers. Not enough support.
The stories you do hear are fictional stories and the birth mother is usually a young woman who either has challenges with addiction or very young and cannot parent a child.
Then you see the Lifetime channel stories where the birth mothers are the villains. It’s so disgraceful. Birth mothers are strong, selfless, beautiful humans. They give someone the ultimate gift, something they were unable to do… I was able to bless their family with a beautiful baby.
The reason for these stereotypes is because we are shamed into remaining quiet…because society views the parents who adopt the child as a savior.
Not all birth mothers feel this way, but many do. Here is the raw truth of being a birth mother.
Her birthdays are the hardest. The most painful. Waking up from the emergency C-section on that Christmas Eve morning in 2004.
Seeing my daughter in the NICU for the first time, not yet knowing that this first time seeing her would soon be my last. I studied every single inch of her face. I counted her toes and fingers. Held my face gently close to hers so I could try to remember the sound of her breathing.
I named her Faith.
The hospital had given me a birth certificate with the name I gave to her. But that was irrelevant because she would be getting a new birth certificate with her new name and new parents.
I appreciated the fact her new parents agreed to having her middle name be Faith. I really respected them for that. They didn’t have to do that for me.
I left the hospital childless, with a fake birth certificate and the tiny little the hat she wore. I held that hat with me as I slept for months.
I still have that hat, folded away in my dresser. Never washed it. Born at 26 weeks. Holding her… my god was that bittersweet. At this point I agreed to the open adoption, but nothing was set in stone. She was still mine.
I remember weeping to the nurse who handed her to me when I would go see her in the NICU. She comforted me as she knew I was choosing adoption. The entire experience was traumatic. I didn’t want to leave her. Knowing what day I was being discharged was like a countdown, a countdown to a painful reality.
It doesn’t get easier, time does not heal all wounds; maybe for other birth mom’s, but not for my journey. You just learn to put a band aid over your broken heart. You are told to move on, go about your life. I didn’t know how to.
As each birthday passes I think “this is it, the year I am at peace with it all, I can move on with life.”
Her 17th birthday just passed. This year was difficult. Every year is hard, but sometimes hits differently. Each year I’m overcome with so much sadness.
Yes, this is my life and I had an unplanned pregnancy out of wedlock. Yes, I take full responsibility for my choices, yes I was young but I was still an adult…I was 21 years old and in a toxic relationship.
I say all this because no matter what there is going to be those people who are judgmental, insensitive and lacking any empathy. No matter what path I would have chosen, those same people would judge me.
If I chose to parent I would have needed government assistance and other accommodations to get by.
Then I am judged by some who say “I could never give up my baby.” As if she was a piece of trash I threw away. This enrages me, because adoption is not the easy way out. The path I choose was selfless and the most difficult decision I would ever make. It’s always the people who have no idea what life was like at that moment. You can’t win. Damned if you do, dammed if you don’t.
Being a birth mother for me has been a very painful experience. I feel like I live a double life. It is a strange feeling.
I really let the grief consume me… it made me feel so dysfunctional at times over the last 17 years. I really struggled thorough my journey. I struggled to come to terms with what happened, to accept what my reality was. I still struggle with adoption.
Adoption is hard. Open adoption is hard.
Being a birth mother is a feeling like no other, a feeling I wouldn’t want anyone to ever feel. It truly changes you.
Being a birthmother is not something you want to be — you want to be a mother. I never envisioned this.
The feeling of sadness where your heart literally aches — you’re heartbroken. You feel that knot in your throat trying to contain the emotions.
I miss her. I miss everything I lost with her. I feel like I failed so many, not just her.
The adoption agency was a joke in my opinion. Now that I am older, less vulnerable, wiser and more educated — I realized they will say whatever it takes to convince the birth mother her child is better off without her so their clients (potential parents) can have a baby.
They make you think that it will be OK because they glorify open adoption as a choice.
What they don’t tell you is there is nothing set in stone with open adoption. Once you surrender your parental rights, it’s over… that’s it.
You put all your trust and hope in these parents not to do you wrong. You have no rights.
The broken promises, the lack of support and therapy for the birth mother. They hand you a book called “How to say goodbye to your baby” or a book on open adoption, along with some pamphlets. Then they send you on your way. They wish you well and scoot you out the door.
There is this awkward and unusual feeling. Loving my (birth) daughter so much, but I don’t even know who she is. Even saying that out loud pains me deeply. That’s hard. Hard not knowing things a “mother” should know about her daughter. I knew more about her when she was little, when I saw her more than now. That’s what can happen in open adoption. Not by choice; I would love to have continued a close relationship, but as years went on phone calls stopped, visits stopped and getting updates and photos were mostly non-existent. I couldn’t tell you her favorite color, her favorite season, her favorite book or her favorite subject in school. I don’t know her favorite meal, or favorite desert. I couldn’t tell you what she aspires to become in life. I don’t know her favorite holiday, I don’t know her favorite song. I don’t know her favorite movie… so much I don’t know.
They say the baby doesn’t remember being separated…
Yet according to Adoption.org, “Experts have considered separation from a child’s birth parents, even as an infant, a traumatic event. Which means every adopted child will experience early trauma in at least one form. Everything the child had been used to, even in utero, the sights, sounds, and smells are gone.”
I was looking at old photos of my (birth) daughter. I came across a few photos— these photos you see me giving a forced smile. I was miserable. These pictures she was still just a newborn. It was too soon to be watching another woman and man holding her. It felt wrong, unnatural… I can literally still feel the pain I was experiencing in that very moment. I questioned if open adoption was right for me. Every time I saw and visited her, it was like opening up that wound, over and over again… never healing. Every visit was a trigger. I had to stay involved. I didn’t want to lose her again. I wanted her to know who I was. I learned to become numb to the pain over the years.
In these photos I was only about six weeks postpartum. Of course I wanted to see my (birth) daughter, but it was very uncomfortable. I was depressed, mourning my child, still healing from the c-section, still binding my breasts to help stop milk supply, my hormones were raging, I was experiencing postpartum depression along with everything else.
I know under all the hurt, sadness, and pain… that I did what was best. I wanted her to have a beautiful life.
To all the birth mother’s who are still in pain — and even to those who are at peace.
You are amazing, don’t ever forget that.
Heal From PTSD
( From You ) I was a relatively new member at a small church in Atlanta when I was grieving a loss. Over the previous two years I had faced mental health challenges, and as a single mother through donor insemination, I not did have a partner to help out or rely on. I had to utilize foster care and eventually place my daughter for adoption.
Most Sundays, some of the congregation would go out to dinner after services. I was invited along to dinner one night; reluctantly I went, but I ended up having a fairly good time. While at dinner a woman approached me. I later learned that she was an adoptive mother. She offered to come over and read her book at my house. Well, I thought, this was strange. Why would she want to read her book at my house? She was not offering to read her book to me. I did not know what to make of this offer, but she seemed to need somewhere to read her book, so I said OK.
The next week she showed up. She sat in my living room and read her book. That day I got out of bed. The next time she came I did some dishes. She came again and I did some laundry. She just kept showing up. I had given up on life, but she just kept showing up for me. The reality was she was not able to say anything that would have made me feel any better. No one knew what to say to me. This was not even a casserole situation. Everyone else stayed away.
She made all the difference in the world in those early days after losing my daughter. I am so grateful for her presence. We eventually began doing chores together as I prepared to sell my house. She even sat with me as I cleaned out my daughter’s bedroom. It was an unbearable process that brutalized me at my core. I cannot quantify what an impact she had on me. Sometimes there are no words, and we just need to be present for each other.
When I do public speaking, people often ask me how they can help a loved one. I tell them this story. How she showed up for me in the absence of words or actions. Sometimes you just need to go read your book in their living room and the rest will come.
My new friend and I are now old friends. You can now find us at the IHOP on Saturday mornings sharing coffee and showing up for each other.
Books That Have Helped Childhood Abuse Survivors Heal
If you grew up experiencing child abuse, oftentimes it affects you long into adulthood. Maybe you hear yourself repeating words to yourself that you heard in your abusive upbringing. Maybe your emotional trauma manifests physically in the form of chronic headaches, pain or flashbacks. Or maybe you struggle to find healthy coping mechanisms to handle the emotional pain.
It’s at times like these that books may come in handy.
- “Matilda” by Roald Dahl
“I first read it in third grade and it’s been my book since. My story aligned with Matilda’s nearly perfectly and before I got my happy ending, it gave me hope there would be one eventually. It’s been almost a year now since I was adopted by my teacher of eight years.”
“It made me not so alone, as I always felt like the outcast in my family growing up. [I felt like] the child no one wanted around. And like Matilda, my gifts were seen as weaknesses or overlooked completely. It also gave me hope that things could one day get better, and that I could have a loving family of my own. And I have that now.”
- “The Body Keeps the Score” by Bessel van der Kolk
“It helped explain why PTSD symptoms can have such strong physical manifestations and how somatic therapies are so important to healing.”
- “The Shack” by William P. Young
“The Shack. I’ve struggled with why God would allow such a thing to happen, but this book challenges my anger and I broke down crying when I finished it. I’ve read it several times since.”
- “A Child Called It” by Dave Pelzer
“It was hard to read, and I definitely skipped some parts, but it helped me to understand I was suffering from abuse too, and I knew that believing it was abuse was a radical idea for me then. It literally changed everything for me to know I wasn’t alone, but I needed to get help from someone who wouldn’t jeopardize my safety, either. It turned the tables on my abusers and made me feel like a hero.”
- “The Hunger Games” Trilogy by Suzanne Collins
“The ‘Hunger Games’ books. Especially in the last book in the last pages where she says how there will be days that you will lapse, but you will come back from it and still love your loved ones. Also her description of being pregnant. I could relate to that as a sexual abuse survivor — being pregnant wasn’t always magical.”
- “A Series of Unfortunate Events” by Lemony Snicket
“Violet, Klaus and Sunny went through hell and back in every book, but no matter what, they powered through their situation and came out alive on the other side, which was always a super motivating message to me despite the grim subject matter. Gave me hope that I still had the power to get through just about any stressful situation thrown my way.”
- “My Sweet Audrina” by V.C. Andrews
“‘My Sweet Audrina’ and then other V.C. Andrews books helped pre-teen me feel less alone as a victim of multiple types of abuse and helped me discover that having an extremely screwed up family was common enough that stories are based off it. Decades later, I discovered my teen reading those books and was told it was in order to better understand my experiences. I would recommend to young adults for these same reasons.”
- “She’s Come Undone” by Wally Lamb
“So many little things in it that tell me I’m not alone. It’s rather soothing for me. I’ve read it no less than 50 times.”
- “Will I Ever Be Good Enough?” by Karyl McBride
“Was a book about being raised by a narcissistic mother. Was an amazing book that helped me through my healing of child abuse and rejection.”
- “Blood and Chocolate” by Annette Curtis Klause
“I identified heavily with the main character Vivian, whose pack is in shambles after the death of her father, the once-Alpha. I read it while I was in foster care, and I honestly credit this book with saving my life. It dealt with family dynamics, relationships, internal conflicts and low-key depression and suicide. But in the end it’s hopeful and full of opportunity.”
- “All Out of Pretty” by Ingrid Palmer
“It was a beautiful story about a girl having to go through homelessness because her mom [was taking] drugs. My mother left me alone a lot when I was little when my dad was in the service. I had to take care of my brother, so I didn’t get to be a kid.”
- “Eleanor” by Jason Gurley
“You get to see all the viewpoints of mental health within a family and I found myself in each of them. So, so good, and such an insight into where things went wrong.”
- “Eleanor” by Jason Gurley
“You get to see all the viewpoints of mental health within a family and I found myself in each of them. So, so good, and such an insight into where things went wrong.”
- “The Bone Coven Chronicles” by Jenna Wolfhart
“Fearless, daring girl takes control of her own destiny. Made it easier to deal with everyday life.”
- The Bible ( Actually First )
“The Holy Bible. [I believe] it addresses every problem we have in life. Jesus healed and loved unconditionally.”
How Art Helped Me Heal
( From You ) Part One
The biographies of artists and of their works are as curious to me as their creations. What compelled them to pay attention to their creativity? Why did they choose to create a particular piece? How did their creative pursuits change the lives of others? In what historical context did their art make an impact? These multi-layered stories transcend time and space by creating heartfelt connections between the viewer and the artist, a connection that is equally as fascinating to me as the aesthetic value of their work.
Art has inspired and invigorated all aspects of my life: as a child, a friend, an elementary school teacher, an activist, an art museum educator, but primarily as a daughter. From a young age, my mother Nina would take me to shows, musicals and exhibitions in our hometown of Manhattan. She encouraged me to keep drawing at home when elementary school journals required “less illustrations and more words, please.” For a short stint in elementary school, I attended an Isadora Duncan dance/ballet school near Carnegie Hall. The teachers were kind enough to end that thundering period, for my sake as well as theirs, then moved me to a progressive, interpretive jazz dance class on the Upper West Side. I am immensely grateful in this age of social media that there are no photos commemorating that period. Think rainbow colors, sparkly leg warmers and purple tights.
Tickets to “The Nutcracker” at Lincoln Center were a winter holiday essential. George Balanchine, Patricia McBride, Rudolph Nureyev, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Pavarotti and Leonard Bernstein were the only names that could lure our whole family to watch TV in unison. We saw “Les Miserables” twice in Manhattan and again in London, because who could see it once? During my senior year in high school we started purchasing our theater tickets exclusively from Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. After college, she didn’t really mind when I got a Keith Haring tattoo on my ankle. In part because she knew I could wear pants or stockings to cover it up when necessary, but mostly because she understood why her straight, art-loving daughter was working in the Philadelphia LGBT community to fight AIDS and homophobia.
We walked through Central Park beneath “The Gates” to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to dine in the Trustee Dining Room, not so much for the food, but to see “The Gates” from above. We attended the Neue Gallerie upon its opening and wept in front of Klimt and Schiele. Whenever one of us would see an exhibit without the other, inevitably we left shlepping two copies of the hard cover exhibition catalogs. Those catalogues serve as an auto-biographical timeline of my obsession with different artists. Monet was my first obsession and love. Then Matisse and Chagall, followed by a brief period of infatuation with Lichtenstien, then Giacometti, Klee, Morandi, Georgia O’Keefe, Dora Marr and Francois Gilot, Jackson Pollack, Lee Krasner, Toulouse Lautrec, Keith Haring and Frida Kahlo.
At the top of the my list sits Van Gogh.
In the fall of 2003, I took a trip to the Netherlands and France, with an itinerary devoted to walking in Van Gogh’s footsteps. While others questioned me for choosing this as a dream vacation, only my mother could appreciate the rationale and spiritual implication for this itinerary. She understood my obsession, because she made the pilgrimage to the south of France herself several years earlier.
Time has taken a toll on my mother’s physical strength, but not her intellect, beauty or spirit. Even if we cannot attend performances and exhibits together, we still converse endlessly about the arts: the frustrating and rewarding process of creating; choices of subject matter, colors, medium and materials; exhibits; costumes; great actors and writers; paintings; couture fashion; and new discoveries about the old masters.
As a daughter, I can only make an assumption about which of my life experiences my mother holds in the highest regard. If I were to guess, it was the supreme moment of privilege I had in 2012. I was standing completely alone in a small gallery space with Van Gogh’s 1890 Almond Blossom painting. The Van Gogh Up Close exhibit had not yet opened to the public at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where I had been hired as a Museum Educator. It was a rare, private moment to be alone with an art world treasure. The painting was made with love, and perhaps hope, by Vincent for his brother Theo to celebrate the birth of Theo’s son, appropriately named Vincent. Like my mom, Theo was a loyal supporter of his brother’s artistic pursuits. Once more, I carried home two hard cover exhibition catalogs.
Part Two
In October of 2014, I was injured and sustained a fractured skull, a mild traumatic brain injury and PTSD. One day I was a confident, energetic, intellectual woman, an active teacher, thoughtful friend and endurance athlete, and in an instant I became a stranger in my own skin. I was incapable of functioning, fatigued, and limited by physical pain and cognitive symptoms that have since forced me to live in a quiet, carefully planned, slow-moving, small world. My neuro-optometric system, the frontal lobe, along with other neurological circuits, were impacted by a blow to my face, head and cervical spine. I lost my ability to multitask, to remember details, to organize, to navigate busy visual environments, to drive, to juggle the art of walking and talking at the same time, to follow multiple conversations in social situations and formulate coherent thoughts due to extreme cognitive fatigue.
Reading was impossible; television and computer screens were intolerable. Even following a story on a pod cast was exhausting. I slept for 12-14 hours a day and struggled with incredible migraines, nausea, balance issues, light sensitivity and tinnitus. I could thankfully sit and flip through pages from my collection of museum exhibition catalogs. Staring at the images of paintings brought me comfort and a connection to beauty.
Several months of vestibular therapy, neurofeedback and vision therapy passed, and I mastered the series of exercises prescribed by my treatment team. These therapies were initially exhausting and terribly painful. My first neuro-optometric doctor recommended doing the vision exercises with a blue vellum filter at bedtime, so that I could fall asleep immediately afterward. These exercises were tedious, induced headaches, fatigue and nausea, but were necessary for retraining my binocular focus, visual tracking and saccadic eye movements.
When I mastered the vision therapies, there were no additional levels of books available to challenge me and the doctor dismissed me as her patient. There was simply no more she could do for me. But none of these exercises could be applied to the real world. In the real world, your neuro-optometirc system works on a much larger scale and in much busier environments with a wide scope of external stimulation. Imagine what it takes for the brain to organize and process driving, grocery shopping, going out to eat with a group of friends in a loud restaurant, triathlon racing, teaching a group of 30 students, hosting a fundraiser, or attending a blockbuster museum exhibit?
Take the museum exhibit as one example. Such an activity includes tracking moving bodies, adjusting to a variety of lights and sounds, visually scanning and processing parts of a painting, judging your distance from a another person or group, navigating crowds while climbing stairs or riding escalators, walking and processing while listening to an audio, reading and processing the curators notes stenciled on the wall, comparing two or three paintings, and organizing your thoughts, reactions and memories about the art work, navigating the exhibit space for prime viewing without disturbing another visitor’s viewing.
Now add a friend! You might engage in quiet conversation, follow their eyes, contemplate their reactions and remarks, look back and forth at a piece of work while ignoring the people passing in front of you while your eyes dart back and forth to your companion. Our brains are sorting, processing, making connections and engaging all at once!
My initial vision therapies improved my abilities to the degree that I could start reading texts with large font, with the blue vellum shield for several minutes and then gradually longer periods. However, the training exercises I had mastered in the privacy of my home would never get me back to a museum or a classroom setting, and neither would the routine vestibular therapy exercise conducted in a quiet setting, with the guidance of support therapists.
One day at home while journaling it occurred to me: I could start drawing designs in my journals on a larger scale to mimic the vision therapy exercises to further retrain my eyes and strengthen new neuro-pathways. I began creating more difficult exercises by inventing drawings and what seemed at the time to be complicated designs. This is how my artistic medicine walk began. I moved my dusty drawing table to the dining room where there was extended daylight and began my own form of visual and emotional art therapy.
My doctors and therapists were quite surprised at the rate of progress my neuro-optometric system made on account of the drawing at home. The evidence lies in the progression of the complexity in the designs and colors I created. Once I reached a plateau where I could create something on my own without inducing symptoms, I incrementally added more details and colors to the designs and began posting them on Facebook. The led to more communication with the friends I missed seeing in person, and I began to ask them to give me “assignments” to create personalized illustrations.
Creating illustrations for my friends came very slowly, and required increased levels of executive functioning and therefore more rest and meditation during the process. I could only draw in very short spurts. My executive functioning skills were challenged by researching botanicals, sketching on graph paper to organize layouts, selecting colors, developing spatial relationships and patterns on the page. Intermittent meditation breaks and breathing exercises became part of the process to calm my aggravated symptoms. My brain was rewiring and its battery faded quickly with tasks that were once effortless.
The singular focus of drawing and meditating, in the quiet of my home, cultivated a connection with something intuitive and creative that surpassed the physical realm of bodily sensations. Drawing and meditating became an intentional distraction from the pain, especially the migraines associated with the brain injury. The art felt as though it was pouring out of me from a divine place and healing my broken heart. Creating art for my loved ones both calmed my overactive sympathetic nervous system and elevated my mood, much like meditation and prayer. Today I look at certain pieces and cannot believe they came from me.
I have attempted a few exhibits at the Philadelphia Museum of Art with help from patient and humorous friends. With the encouragement of another artist, I submitted my work to juried local shows at the Philadelphia Sketch Club. I was surprised and thrilled in the fall of 2016 and the spring of 2017, when two of my paintings were accepted into Phillustration8 and The Art of the Flower. Attending the reception of each show with friends was very humbling, and I only wish my mother was well enough to be there with me.
Epilogue
Several years ago, my mom left her beloved home in Manhattan to relocate to Philadelphia to be closer to her daughters and two grandchildren. Downsizing a lifetime in one residence requires making piles of what to keep, what to throw away and what to give away. Some time after her move to Philly, my mother brought me a thoughtfully packed tall, heavy box. Inside was her vast collection of member’s bulletins from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, acquired over more than two decades.
She had archived and packed my sketchbooks from elementary, middle and high school, as well as a six-foot long ink scroll illustration I made in high school depicting a diverse queue of people outside a NYC nightclub my friends and I frequented, aptly named The Underground. She always knew art was meant to be my path to happiness. This past Christmas, I gave my mom a framed print of one of the illustrations which helped me heal: the “Iris for Alex” illustration, made for my loving friend Alex. Mommy told me she can’t stop staring at it.
Heal After the Emotional Abuse of Gaslighting
Apparently, gaslighting has become the new “thing” in popular psychology circles. We see article after article warning of the dangers of gaslighting and how to spot a gaslighter. I have written a few such articles myself.
Is it time for another? I think so. Now that more people know about gaslighting, they need to know how to heal after the experience, as they would after any kind of emotional abuse.
Because that’s what gaslighting is — emotional abuse. But it’s a specific kind of emotional abuse. In gaslighting, one person in a relationship (romantic, familial or friendship) denies the other’s perception of reality and works to convince the victim that they are the “crazy” one in the relationship. As in other forms of emotional abuse, the gaslighter may try to isolate the victim from friends and relatives, give intermittent reinforcement (insincere apologies) that draw the victim back into the relationship, or denigrate the person with insults.
But the heart of gaslighting is that denial of the other person’s reality. The abuser says, in effect: “You can’t trust your own feelings. My view of the world is accurate and yours isn’t. You’re ‘crazy.’” Of course, the gaslighter may also use the familiar techniques of emotional abuse as well: isolation, insults, projection and belittling, but gaslighting is unique because the perpetrator distorts a person’s world view, sense of self-worth and belief in themselves.
Healing from gaslighting is not easy, but it can be done. Here is some advice from me, a person who was a victim of gaslighting but is now healing.
- Get as far away from the gaslighter as you can.
Yes, this may mean cutting off contact with a family member, if that’s who is doing the gaslighting. It may mean leaving town. It does mean making a sincere and lasting emotional break.
- Do not maintain contact with the gaslighter.
You may think that once you have broken free from the gaslighter, they can do no further harm. This is just an invitation to more emotional battering.
- Name the abuse.
Say to yourself — and possibly to a trusted person: “This was gaslighting. I was emotionally abused and tricked into thinking I was ‘crazy.’ My worldview was denied and my thoughts and emotions were said to be invalid.”
- Feel the feelings.
It may be some time before you can admit to or even experience the emotions that gaslighting brings. Your first reaction may be relief (“at least I’m out of that!”), but there may be years of anger, frustration, fear and rage lurking behind that. It may take work to surface those feelings, feel them and recognize they are valid.
- Get some help.
This can be a therapist who specializes in treating victims of emotional abuse, or it can be a supportive friend, family member or religious counselor. It should be someone who can listen nonjudgmentally, validate your perceptions of reality and sympathize with your situation.
- Do not try to get revenge.
This is just another way of reconnecting with your gaslighter. It gives the person another opportunity to “prove” you are “crazy.”
- Develop new relationships.
It may seem like there is no one in your world who will understand and be supportive. For a while, you may not be able to trust enough to have another close friend or lover. You may have a lot of healing to do first. But remember that gaslighters are in the minority; most people don’t do that to people they profess to care about.
- Give it time.
It may take years to fully get over the experience. I know it did for me. Maybe don’t go directly into a rebound relationship. You need time and space to work through your feelings and rebuild your perception of reality.
Just know that gaslighting doesn’t have to be a way of life. It can end when you gather the strength to break away from it. You can heal and take back what you know to be true — that you are a person who is worthy of love. Your perceptions and feelings are valid. You don’t have to live by someone else’s view of what is real. You are not “crazy.”
Pole Dancing Lessons Can Help Heal From Sexual Assault
( From You ) A few years ago, I went through what no person ever wants to go through, but unfortunately is something a lot of people endure: sexual assault. It didn’t happen like it does in movies, and honestly, if I look back on it, it actually feels surreal. It took a long time for me to process what happened, it wasn’t instant for me. I didn’t go home later and break down, it took about six to seven months before it sunk in. I pushed that memory so far down so quickly that it took a long time for me to openly admit it happened.
Once I did, though, I lost all self-confidence, I felt dirty and I hated myself for not seeing it coming and not reacting how I thought I would. I refused to go on dates, I even refused to talk about sex with anyone. I had disassociated with myself, and I couldn’t stand looking at myself in the mirror. I thought I was never going to overcome it, that the person who did it robbed me of my dignity. I could feel myself getting stuck in this never-ending circle of just reliving the memory and hating myself more. So, I thought of trying something new to get myself out the house to see if it would build up my self-confidence.
Pole dancing is something I’d always wanted to try, but never had the courage to. I always thought the way people would pull off tricks on the pole and do a freestyle dance was incredible because you need so much strength and confidence to do it. I found a studio online that had amazing reviews and just threw myself into it before I’d start overthinking it too much. The feeling I had after my first class was indescribable, I knew I had to keep coming back. And I did. Every class I took, I could feel my self-confidence growing, the encouragement and support I got from my trainers and other people in class was pushing me to keep going. Each time I succeeded in something new was another triumph for me, I felt on top of the world.
But best of all, I fell in love with my body again. I no longer felt dirty, I no longer hated myself, I no longer felt the need to hide away from people and feel ashamed. I had this new kind of love for myself that was so strong it made me look at what happened to me in a new light. It made me realize I am able to overcome such an awful memory and still live my life. It made me realize I wouldn’t let it ruin me. Instead, I’d let it make me stronger.
Unfortunately, there’s still a large stigma around pole, and I think it’s ridiculous. There isn’t any other thing in this world that has built my self-confidence the way pole lessons have. I’ve found that you just get so lost in what you’re doing, it takes you to a different place mentally. I learned how to love every part of myself because of pole. I learned how to let go of anything that was plaguing my mind every time I would grab hold of a pole at the start of a lesson. The atmosphere being around such supportive people all enjoying the same thing and all encouraging each other was so uplifting.
The best part, though? I learned how to love myself again, and it feels amazing.
Things Childhood Trauma Survivors Need in Order to Heal
I spent many years absorbing the blame for my abusive family, and exhausted every possible avenue of attempting to “get along” with them. When I finally went no contact, it took another 10 years to feel safe enough to fully embrace my past and grieve. Even though I thought I had done quite a bit of work along the way, it has taken an entire lifetime for me to come to terms with certain aspects of the abuse. Some memories were locked away, some were buried under misplaced guilt and shame. Some were minimized so much, it seemed almost normal. I was fortunate in the sense that most of my adult years were spent acknowledging that the events in my childhood were not right, and I went no contact even before I fully understood how important it was to do so. I just knew I needed to do it for my own sanity. But for me, it’s far from over, and in many ways, I feel I am just beginning the work.
Healing from childhood trauma is possible, but survivors need the right environment. Often, it is not until a child is fully grown and far removed from their toxic past that they have an opportunity to deal with the fallout. Some people never get to escape their abuse, and some people never get to a place where they feel safe enough to do the hard work of healing.
Well-meaning friends and loved ones who want to support survivors often end up doing more harm than good when they don’t first educate themselves on the effects of trauma. Pushing survivors into “forgiving” their abusers or telling them to “get over it” are some of the most common mistakes. Based on my personal experience as well as the journeys of many other survivors, here is a list of five things trauma survivors need in order to heal. By no means is it a complete list, but for those who seek to support their loved one, it’s a good place to start.
- Distance from toxic people.
First and foremost, survivors of trauma need to get far away from anyone who creates stress and disharmony in their present environment. No other healing can take place until and unless the current environment is free from people who lie, cheat, manipulate, blame, rage or show poor impulse control. Opening up old wounds will only magnify the toxicity that is in the present. For many, no contact is the way to go, but not everyone can do that. One of the most important skills a survivor needs to learn is to remove themselves from anyone who stresses them out, and to do it without apology.
- A quiet, calm environment.
There is a war raging inside the brain of a trauma survivor, and many struggle with PTSD or complex PTSD. Trauma survivors can easily startle from loud sounds or overly excited energy around them. Even a positive, but chaotic environment, such as a sports game or being around children who are playing, can cause extreme distress for many. Noise feels like static in the brain, and can quickly overwhelm someone dealing with trauma. A calm environment is crucial to feel safe. Some studies show that trauma survivors need up to two hours a day of total silence to decompress and recalibrate.
- Gentle activity.
It is well known that exercise has many positive health benefits. For someone dealing with trauma, activity is an important part of the healing process, but it has to be the right kind of activity. Too often, competitive sports teams or other high-impact activities are counter-productive, and pushing a traumatized child to achieve in sports can be re-traumatizing. If, say, a survivor has a “rageaholic” father, the coach yelling from the sidelines will do more harm than good. Activity needs to be motivated by what feels good to the survivor, not what feels like a punishment. Individual, “personal best” sports, like swimming, can feel good, or activities that encourage the mind-body connection, such as yoga, are often preferred. The survivor must feel that she is in control of her own body and her experience. For trauma survivors, getting reacquainted with, and allowing them to choose for themselves what feels good to their bodies is an important step.
- Safety.
Trauma survivors are often dissociated or detached from their feelings as a coping mechanism that protected them from extreme terror. It is important for a survivor to decide for themselves what feels safe. It is equally important for any supporters in their environment to immediately honor whatever survivors need to feel safe. Do not try to reason or argue with a trauma survivor about what is safe and what is not. It’s their perception, not yours. If they don’t feel safe, support them to make whatever changes are necessary to their immediate environment. Allowing a trauma survivor to say the words, “I don’t feel safe,” is a huge step toward recovery. If you are someone they don’t feel safe around, don’t take it personally. If you want to support them, do whatever they need you to do to be a safe person.
- Autonomy.
A survivor needs the freedom to decide for herself what she likes and dislikes. It is extremely important for a survivor of trauma to not feel controlled or manipulated by anyone in her immediate environment. Child trauma survivors do not respond well to authoritarian, “my way or the highway” rules and regulations. Trauma survivors need people who teach them how to think, not what to think. Critical thinking skills can be life-saving for abuse survivors. When survivors are empowered to make their own choices, their confidence and self-esteem grows. Abusers are by definition controlling, manipulative people who twist facts around to suit them. Survivors of abuse need to be supported in reclaiming their own power.
How Music Helps Heal
“Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.” Victor Hugo
( From You ) Music has been a consistent presence in my life. I’m not one for silence really. Cleaning the house, music in the background; in the car, music in the background. I have even been known to break out in song at work on my hospital unit. Music has been that much of an influence in my life. The exception being when my world fell silent when my grandson Konnor passed away on November 22, 2015.
For three full weeks I couldn’t bear to turn on the radio for fear of what I may hear and what it would bring out of me.
Music is emotional to me. It has meaning. It can bring me out of a mood. It is in my soul.
I was on a pretty good stretch. Now I wasn’t riding high or on cloud nine or anything close to that, but I was mellow and things were going pretty close to what I would classify as good. Like a kick in the proverbial butt, I was sent back into grief reality. The grief reality of my life where I function in automatic during the day and pull it off just enough for everyone to think I’m doing OK. I converse just enough to get me by; I get home and it’s the ultimate release. The tears are cathartic and yet the ache in my heart and my gut are ever-present. No matter how much I cry, I know he will never come back.
It’s been suggested to me that I start antidepressants. “Maybe you’ll feel better,” they say. They want me to join the land of the living and be happy. I did try the antidepressants, not once, but twice and I could not tolerate it. My stomach just said no.
I am moving forward with the intent of coping with my grief as it hits. It’s always the smack of reality that Konnor is gone, just in case I forgot. The days that have me gasping for breath remind me he is gone. My mind replays that horrible day over and over again. The kind of day where I feel my heart racing all day long. Damn my mind and my heart because I can’t control it. It just hits me like a freight train and I know better than to ignore it. I just don’t know how long it’s going to last. A day, a week. I don’t fucking know.
I have my own personal measures and put them in place that ensure my grief has its release in a safe manner. I feel I am continuing my grief journey in a healthy way. I’m using music as its companion. Most often when silent tears are shed, music helps me feel less alone. For me, the lyrics understand me, and I couldn’t have written it any better. The melody just brings me closer to feeling calmer, more relaxed and even peaceful.
Haven’t you ever listened to a song and shared it with a friend or a lover and said, “Listen to this!” “This is how I feel about you!” Music is a universal communicator. It doesn’t matter what form of music it is. Whether it’s pop, rap, or alternative. It’s about perspective. If you can sing about something I can relate to in a melody that touches my soul, I am deeply touched and attached to that music and that artist. I want to hear more.
If you’re in a good mood, you often want to hear songs to keep you in a good mood. When you’re down, you often want to listen to music that understands your feelings. Perhaps a more melancholy radio station is the choice. Frustrated? No problem, we have music to fit any mood.
What would a movie be like without music? Those beautiful scenes probably wouldn’t be half as good without the music as a backdrop. Especially the dramatic, sad ones. Think about that.
When I’m having a bad day, I play music that allows me to release the emotions I’ve kept inside all day. I let the music take me to where I need to be at, let the lyrics say what I need to say. I grab a tissue and just let go.
Music allows me to shed the tears I need to release and yet not feel as though I am alone when I do.
As explained by Victor Hugo, “Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.”