Grief, Guilt and Grace

When walking through grief there is often guilt that is tied to it. What could I have done, why couldn't it have been me - Grief is a challenging walk, and it never really ends. The waves of panic and over whelming grief will get farther and farther apart, but will still be there and be a part of your life. The guilt will start to change and morph into into something else, but it will still always be there. 

On Nov 22, 2019 when I went into the hospital my sweet friend took me in, she saved my life by her obedience to Christ. I would not be here if it wasn't for her. She walked that very close road of death with me in on hand and Jesus on the other, fully reliant on him to carry both of us in his will. and he did. They saved me. 

After getting out of the hospital and going to the recovery family I lived at she still continued to remind me that we are not going back to that day. We are waking forward pressing into Jesus because he is good and he has a plan...

5 months later her son died in a tragic tragic way that could never be replicated even if people tried. After saving my life, HER son died. When I talk about guilt being tied to grief, this is what I mean. What if it would have been me, would he not have died? Would she still be a mom to 3 sweet boys instead of having to grieve and relive that loss everyday? I don't know. we don't know. I don't understand why he kept me alive and not her 14 year old son, I don't know why his time was finished and mine wasn't. What I do know is that Jesus has a plan in all of this, even when it breaks me heart day after day and even more so breaks hers. I KNOW that HE is still good and he is still God, seated on the throne but also with us in the muck and mire. He is holding her hand as she walks through this just as she was holding my hand as I walked the hard road I was on. 

Paul asked the Lord three times to remove the thorn from his side. We do not know what his thorn was but we know it was something he desperately wanted removed. In this verse we can insert our thorn in; grief, guilt, shame, depression, anxiety, abuse, whatever the thing is we have been asking and asking for the Lord to remove. Over and over we ask because it hurts us, and makes our walk harder. The Lord answered him and me in a way that is beautiful and humbling. He says "MY grace is sufficient for you, for MY power is made perfect in weakness" 2 Corinthians 12:9 (Emphasis added). When we have to walk every step reliant on the Lord because we are completely unable to walk the road by ourselves that is when His power shines through us. When we continue to get up and pursue Jesus even when the world deems us "finished" his strength is PERFECTED in our weakness. There his grace is sufficient. His answer to our begging may be, no or not right now. With those answers we can know that his grace is sufficient and he wants us to rely on him because his power IS enough. 

He is enough for whatever you are walking through today, I am sorry this road is hard. I am sorry that your heart hurts. I love you and so does Jesus. His grace is sufficient for you, it wont take the pain away but he will be your crutch, I promise. I love you.

365 days

 A year ago I was fighting for my life, sitting in a hospital bed wishing I was dead. 5 days of sitting and wondering how my life had gotten to this point. Sadness and anger swallowed my body, clouded my vision, and stole my hope. I sat and stared in disbelief at what had happened, stared at the wounds on my arms and cried at the bigger ones in my heart. Every morning I would get asked how I felt, and it was always the same "like I want to die" the first morning I woke up there the nurse gave me an amount that was too high of the wrong medication and it sent me into an overdose. I felt like my organs were shutting down and I was dying, I felt relief, I didn't have to fight any more. I fell asleep and woke up the next morning, I was in shock that Jesus didn't let me die, I questioned him and I begged him to let me. On the other side of this experience, I am so thankful he didn't I want to live, I love my life and the people that Jesus has filled it with. While I was in that moment I was so angry and it just filled me with more resentment and sadness. 

The difference that this past year has created in me is astounding, Jesus really got ahold of me, picked me up from the bed I laid on and said lets walk forward. Not ignoring the pain I had endured but holding my heart and body as I healed. Giving me a safe place to feel, weep and grow. 

I now fight for my life in a different way, I fight to live it to the fullest because of how close I was to no longer living. I fight to live in the joy and the hope the Lord has promised. Don't get me wrong, there are still challenges and I do not always live in the joy that I am promised. On the days that are harder than others I cling to the verse in James that says; "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." James 1:2-4. It produces something we have to have joy in it, we have to hope in it. 

My pastor said something this weekend that was an incredible insight. "When you look at a plant that produces something, I doesn't have to work at producing it, it just happens. When we face trials it PRODUCES steadfastness. It is an outcome that is almost guaranteed when we experience trials WITH JOY" 

There is a responsibility we have in producing steadfastness, and that is having joy in the midst of trials. 

Now, if you are in a boat that is similar to where I was a year ago, I want to say something to you and your heart. I see you, you are not crazy. You are not wrong for the thoughts you are having, it is how your heart is coping with the pain you are experiencing. With me saying that, please please I am begging you don't choose that. I was there, I felt that over whelming and excruciating pain BUT there is hope, there will be a time you get to the other side of it and see the lord holding you through it. I am here to remind you that you have a purpose here. The Lord is NOT finished with you. You have a reason you are still here. I hear your heart sweet friend, I know it hurts, let me hold the hope for a better season for you. Grab onto someone and allow them to walk the road of pain with you. We are not meant to walk alone. The lord was a PERFECT being but he still had his friends that walk that painful road with him. Allow someone in, even if its just one person, you are worth it. 

We have a hope in Christ, we are going to encounter thing that will make us question if he is there, let me promise you that he is, holding our heart and reminding us that he has a plan, encouraging us to walk forward in trust EVEN when we don't understand, because we won't. 

I love you, Jesus loves you and I am proud of you for continuing to take the next step even when it hurts. 

One step at a time

MAUI
I was the walking dead. I barley walked, and definitely did not live.
Everyday seemed to get harder and harder and longer and longer. Every morning I woke up and completely lacked ALL motivation to do anything, but I got up and went to work anyway because there where people there who depended on my to open up the coffee shop.
Wake up, satisfy peoples fleshly desires for coffee, go home and sleep the rest of the day. That was the life I lived from June 2019- Sept 2019. October was a whole different ball game. I rarely got out of bed, and when I did it was to drink so much that I couldn't remember if I fell asleep or passed out. Then for weeks after an outing, I'd lay in bed and feel like the most awful human to walk the planet.
The middle of October came and I decided I was ready to be the most careless version of myself I could possibly be. Constant parties, and multiple heartaches that followed. After a night of making one of the worst decisions I could possibly make, I laid in bed and tried to cry but nothing came out, cutting was the only way I was able to release the built up pain and mental terror. I felt like I was dead. The next morning I woke up and told my mom I was coming home and never coming back here again. "You only have 20 more days..19..18" I told myself this every single day, because everyday that I lived there in that bed with no hope, the more I thought about what it would be like to be dead instead of just feeling dead.
The thought of packing up the life I had lived the past 5 months into two little suitcases and ignore the mental and emotional baggage that also came along with those 5 months made my heart ache. So I didn't pack. I sat and stared in disbelief at all I had to do but did none of it.
While I sat there in that room full of bad memories and mascara stains, a friend reached out to me and told me that she was coming to visit to help me pack and to see the island. I waited anxiously for her to come, the thought of no longer having to be alone made a little spark of light jump inside of me that I quickly stomped out because of the guilt that rose up inside of me for not being capable to handle something so simple as packing a suitcase.
She arrived and it was such a sweet time, laughter, sun burns, and food.

OREGON
We both flew home October 26th. Then, life went right back to the way it was before.
Masks on, walls up. I walked through life like I had it together and wasn't wishing I was dead every quiet second I had, or cutting every lonely moment I had.
The start of a new season was exciting at first, I started to feel important and like I did something beneficial to those around me. I got a job as a receptionist and thought that it would give me the hope that I begged and begged for to a God I wasn't sure even existed.
The excitement wore off and the feeling of pointlessness grew. The cutting got worse, and the thoughts of death became more detailed. There was not much release from the thoughts that haunted me, except numbing it in any way I could, so the self harm continued.
It got worse
and worse
and worse.
I would wonder every time if this would be the time that I would die.
I never did by the grace of God.
I decided one day to reach out to a friend of mine and tell her that a wound wouldn't stop bleeding, she then reached out to my mom and told her the reality of the situation I was in and how close to death I was getting.
I needed help but was at work and didn't want to disappoint the people who counted on me to do my job. "I am coming to pick you up to take you to the hospital" my friend told me as I wailed in my car with my head pressed against the steering wheel as hard as I could. "Go tell them you have an emergency and have to go." I trusted what she said so I went. My eyes were swollen and I could barely breathe. I walked in and told them someone I cared about was going into the hospital and that I had to go. I walked out and kinda giggle at the fact that I said someone I care about. There was still a spark of hope inside of me that I thought I had stomped out.

HOSPITAL
I got to the hospital and was absolutely petrified. I got taken into a tiny room with absolutely nothing inside of it and claw marks on the walls and glass from someone who apparently desperately wanted to get out. I sat there and cried, I had no idea how I had let myself get to that point and I never thought I would ever get out of the mental place I was in. I was in that tiny room for 7 and a half hours, then got escorted in a wheel chair up to the psych ward where I spent 5 of the longest days of my life: screaming, scars, medications, and overdoses where some of the horrific things that my body endured while I was there.

Smelling fresh air after being in the psych ward for so long was reviving all in itself. The next day was thanksgiving, I sat on the couch all day and watched movies. The pain was still there but I was able to silence it with the occasional laugh at the characters in the movies. I just wanted to be them, careless, free, full of joy. I hoped it would happen eventually but doubted it ever would.

5 ROCK
This place is where the Lord RADICALLY changed my life and who I am.
I got there on Friday the 29th of November. I met some of the sweetest and most loving people ever in the time I was there. We ate together, we cried together, we worshiped together, we learned about Jesus together. We did everything together.
for some reason, I couldn't let it be enough.
I continued to cut, over and over.
I was blessed my a spiritual momma who really cared about me and my mental health. She ended up taking me to the hospital again to make sure I was mentally safe enough to stay at the ranch. I was and didn't have to get admitted again. We went back and I told her I was going to do whatever it took to get on my feet and as far away from cutting as I possibly could.
The next three weeks were amazing, the connections I was getting to make with the people there and with Jesus is something I will forever take with me. The Lord stretched and grew me, he loved me perfectly and exactly where I was at. He didn't want me to get everything together and then come to him, he wanted me to come to him right where I was at. Absolutely broken, and BEGGING him to show up in someway or I was going to walk away. He did, but still, it wasn't good enough. So, again, I cut. I hid it. I put on the mask, and put up the wall again.
I could no longer stay silent and continue to lie to those I cared about, and ultimately who genuinely cared about me. I told them that I had kept something a secret that was a really big deal, they loved me right where I was at and didn't hate me or walk away, and neither did Jesus.
It is normal for sins to have consequences, I just wasn't expecting mine. They came to me in the most loving and supportive way and told me that they wanted me to go home and do some deep therapy, get out from under the rock of cutting and to come back and seek Jesus with all I have.

OREGON
I left that place devastated, I couldn't believe I had let myself fall back so far again.
Everyday after that I got up and out of the house, I sat at a coffee shop and clung to Jesus with everything I had. There was no way I was going back to the hospital, but in my power I would have. So I white knuckle GRIPPED to Jesus and begged him to walk every step, breathe every breathe, and hold my hand the whole way through it, and he did.
I am absolutely in awe of the work that the Lord is doing in me. I am no where near where I was, he has turned me 180 degrees and pointed me in the other direction, the one where he is the center, not me. It has been one of the hardest nine months of my life but the Lord has shown up in bigger ways than I could have ever imagined.
Everyday after I left 5 rock I told myself I was going to do whatever it took to get back there, but in reality, I did what ever it took to run as fast as I could back to Jesus. He welcomed me and embraced me as if I had never left. He loved me as if I had never sinned or told him I didn't want him any more, he wanted me more than I didn't want him, and that wins my heart over again and again. He wanted me in the most perfect way. He still wants me in the most perfect way, and will forever want me in the most perfect way.
In the waiting to be able to return to 5 rock, the Lord rekindled and introduced some amazing friendships. Part of me wanted to stay here and see all that the Lord had for me here but I was terrified I was going to end up back in the hospital so I told Jesus staying here wasn't an option (funny isn't it). Staying here is exactly what he had in store, he made it clear over and over, and I continued over and over to say "Lord, if you want me to stay, you have to make it really clear." and He reassures me often when I doubt that he has a plan for me here.
I applied to RCC (Rogue Community College) got accepted, and start classes March 30 to become a Psychologist. Allowing other people the place to be heard, accepted, and valued, and the chance to heal. Today is 60 days of no cutting and 60 days of turning to Jesus to cope instead of anything but him. Jesus is in the business of restoring out story for his glory and for our good. We get to point other people to Christ to be able to receive the hope that we have through him, friends how exciting is that!