The Ramblings of a Christian Girl.
When Faith, Freedom, Mental Health and Life collide what becomes of the girl in the middle?
Hope is…
The strength to wake up another day
A reminder that pain ends
A dream to live another way
From darkness it defends
The assurance that life goes on
A yearning for better days
The sound of a bird singing its song
The sounds of a child when he plays
An invite to the table again
A recognition of your hurt
A wiping away of a tear of pain
An animal bathing in dust and dirt
A prayer from a broken heart
A worshiping wounded soul
A sucess before a start
A person becoming whole
It’s 4am and the bird song has begun
The night is over and the battle won
The dawn appears, the sun begins to rise
Rest your head now darling, rest your eyes
It’s 4am and the day begins to break
You survived the night, those hours awake.
The mail train the milkman the usual sounds
Drowned out but the birding, his grace abounds
It’s 4am and sleep hasn’t arrived yet
It’s no long a play, there’s no longer a set
Exhausted you lie as the world awakes
Running through your head those past mistakes
Its 4am the house has become your friend
Insomnia is haunting you, time it won’t lend
The neighbours arise they prepare for their day
But its time for sleep eventually you say
It’s 4am and the bird song has begun
The night is over and the battle won
The dawn appears, the sun begins to rise
Rest your head now darling, rest your eyes
Today I met up with a friend to follow up on a email I sent her. I basically told her that I’d been wanting to ask her to pray with me for a while but I’d been too scared. Even on the way there I was really frightened. I’m trying to learn this vulnerability thing for two reasons. Firstly I feel so desperately alone a lot of the time. That isn’t that I want to tell everyone everything but sometimes problems and thoughts can become obsessive when they are stuck in your head. Secondly as humans we are meant to live in community, there is nothing I love more than laughing, praying and crying with my friends in whatever they are going through. That is what friendship is and it’s such a honour and privilege to be able to walk with my friends through good and bad times. I’m not as good at letting my friends do that for me.
I knew that I wouldn’t be able to tell my friend what I wanted prayer for so I wrote a note. Being able to physically say what’s going on is a massive struggle for me. When I say things out loud it makes them real and there is not going back from that. I hope one day I can say those things out loud, that’s something I think I will need to challenge myself of in the future.
A few things stood out for me during the chat and prayer. The first one was the concept of courage. So often I feel like a lot of the things I find hard are due to my mental illness where as actually I think it’s more true that I’m harsher in myself and set higher standards of myself due to my illness. I was reminded today that these conversations are difficult for everyone and not just because I have a diagnosis.
I was challenged of times in courageous, the things I often see as weakness others see as courage. Maybe it courage not weakness that leads me to be vulnerable with people. A question to ponder what does courage mean?
The second thing that stood out to me was when my friends was praying and she said something about me being a person with a past and present and a future and how God redeems that. I guess I kind of just think of my past as Impossible to redeem. That those periods of hurt and mistakes and challenges as a Red Cross against me. I don’t let God speak into those parts.
There is something I’ve never mentioned on this blog (and that I’ve only told 2 people in my life) but it’s one of the main reasons I struggle with any compliments or believing God loves me. I’m not going to go into any details and I never have with anyone but when I was younger I was assaulted. That’s something I’ve built a wall around and tried to hide ever since then. It’s something I’ve never prayed about and not really spoken about. I think the first step to God redeeming something is to be allowed near it. Partly because I feel guilty and embarrassed it happened.
Hiding things from God doesn’t really work, he knows anyway but closing God out of parts of your life that only leaves that area unable to be redeemed. Somehow I’ve got to work out how to have those hard chats with God and allow him to work in those things.
The Third thing that’s stood out to me was when my friend said something along the lines of the Holy Spirit reminding me I’m not a little girl anymore. So often as a child I felt things were completely out of control, I couldn’t save my dad, I couldn’t stop myself being hurt I couldn’t defend myself. Too often I feel like that defenceless scare little girl. Now I can stand up for myself I have hopes and fears and dreams and skills. Things I didn’t have or wasn’t able to articulate or defend then.
Too often I see myself as the little girl who couldn’t protect herself or her dad. That little girl shouldn’t have had to do that. Sometimes I forget that now I am not in that place I’m not that fragile little girl.
The final things I’m gonna mention her is the ‘favourite time of day’ when praying my friend said something about Gods favourite time of day is the time I spend with him. The time we spend with him. I think lately I’ve become weary of spending time with God because I get discouraged when I just don’t feel it. But maybe It’s in the persistency, maybe I’ve fallen out of love with my God time and it’s time to rekindle that.
Today was a massive exercise of trust, it was terrifying but I’m so grateful that they make me feel safe. I genuinely don’t feel judged like I don’t think my friend actually looks at me as any worse of a person even if I do. There is something really special about people who can make you feel cared for even when you think you don’t want to be cared for, I’m thankful to have a couple of people in my life who do that.
This isn’t a huge revelation blog post, or a angry blog post, or a depressed blog post. It’s a blog post about a frustration I have with recovery and how it’s view by those around me. It’s a hard post to write because I love my friends and I don’t want to hurt them but there’s something they just don’t get.
When your a year or so into recovery you generally have friends that fit into one of three categories.
Category 1 – The friends who have ignored your mental heath forever. Although these friends can sometimes seem unsupportive they are consistent and actually good people to have around, they see you as they do everyone else and when you want to have a good night out they’re fab. In fact they are great until your feeling low or unwell again.
Category 2 – The friends who are waiting for the relapse, they don’t ever believe you are having a good day and they constantly remind you of how ill you were. These friends can be frustrating to be around when you’re doing well as they seem unable to celebrate success with you but they are the first people you can tell when it’s all going wrong. Because they are waiting for a relapse they are ready to support you and you don’t feel your letting them down. Your just affirming their view that you aren’t doing great.
Category 3 – The friends who think you are recovered, they celebrate your success and they are excited about how many good days you’re having. They are great people to be around when it’s all going well, however when things are hard they seem unable to process that you aren’t okay, they can’t understand bad days and rather than acknowledging the pain they counteract it with ‘but your doing so well.’ It’s not that these friends don’t try to understand but they don’t usually sit in the dark with you till the storm passes.
All of these people are important, I love all of my friends but sometimes I wish there was a fourth category. I struggle to find friends who truly understand recovery or at least my experiences of it. You see just because my behaviours have changed and I’m over 700 days since my last OD or SH my thought processes haven’t totally changed and I still get the urges to make an attempt.
I find it hard to find friends who can strike the balance. Who can say “I know that your feeling like you want to X but I’m proud of you for not doing X.” Or “I know it feels impossible but I’m proud of you for making it possible” It’s hard to find friends who understand what my whole life revolves around living a life of altered behaviour without altered thoughts.
Today I wish I had more friends who understood that recovery is amazing and tough. Who understood that just because my behaviour has changed doesn’t mean I need less support. Who really wanted to know and help me work out my story.
So what would category 4 be? It would be a friend who celebrated the successes while asking how you feel now. A friend who still sent care packages or messages to check how you were. A friend who still prayed with and for you regardless of how close you were to a meltdown. A friend who understood that just because the behaviour had changed doesn’t mean the feelings are less intense. A friend who still loved you fiercely and championed you.
I wish my friends knew that this recovery ring is harder than relapse and something I have to work of every day and although the last 700+ days I’ve won the battle it doesn’t mean that I’ll win every time. At least in relapse there is support there.
So what would you need out of a friend to support your recovery?? What do you wish you could tell the people around you?? Do comment and let me know, maybe together we can change the culture of recovery support.
E x
The Ramblings of a Christian Girl. 