I am so ...!

I am so amazed that God loves me this much!

I am so amazed that God has given me so many things that I do not deserve!

I am so amazed that God has restored my ability to love another!

I am so amazed that I was willing to let God work in my life!

I am so amazed that I can say those three little words, I LOVE YOU, that have scared me for so long!

I am so very thankful for the opportunities that God has given me!

I am so thankful for Kevin and his love for me!

I am thankful for the two children that God has blessed me with!

I am looking forward to my life ahead!

I am praying that Kevin will be in my life for a very long time!

I am in love with a wonderful man that God placed into my life at the exact moment I needed!

Hmmmm, Thank you God just isn't enough!

Open Letter to God:

God,
You are so amazing and wonderful! I don't know where to begin or how to thank you.

Life. Is. Good.

My depression is either gone or at least into a long term remission, WITHOUT medication. My anxiety is under control WITHOUT medication. I have learned to talk my way through it with you. I do my best to not panic under it. I have accepted my life as it is. My past is that, my past. I cannot change it nor do I really want to anymore. My past has made me who I am but it does not define who I am. I am no longer the scared little girl in my house who is afraid to say what my feelings are but I am cautious about it. I am no longer the young woman who went searching for love in the arms of any man who would show me what I thought was love. I look for love in You! I know I am loved and I have no fear of being rejected by you. I am no longer the woman who felt like she must stay in a relationship so that her children would be able to say they have both parents in their lives. I am now a woman who is beginning to experience life again with someone who is an answer to many prayers.

God thank you for Kevin. Thank you for the slow meeting that has taken place. The months of brief chatting online, the few dates that were full of conversation. The Sunday afternoon and evening we were able to spend together just hanging out. God there have been so many conversations since then and I thank you for my ability to share my thoughts and feelings. I feel alive again and honestly these feelings overwhelm me. As I told Roni today in an email. There is so much I want to share with him, say to him, discuss with him. I'm not afraid to tell him my thoughts and feelings. I am comfortable with him. I know I do not know him well yet but I am enjoying getting to know him. I want to let him get to know me. My prayer of finding a godly man who loves You more than anything else and is NOT afraid to say so has come true! Someone who will love me and respect me and my love for You! Someone who wants to live his life right but is not afraid to say he screwed up!

God, I have a concern. I'm not panicked by it, I'm not anxious about it. I'm just concerned with my own ability to maintain my composure. I want to have a conversation with Kevin about sex. More importantly, I want him to know and understand that I have made a decision for myself that I do not want to have sex before I get married again. That has been so very easy to live by when I've not dated anyone, I've not even  kissed anyone for so many years. He has opened a box that had been sealed shut and my hormones are alive! I do NOT want a relationship based on sex. I want a relationship focused on You. I want a relationship full of love and respect. I believe I can find that in Kevin. I want a relationship where the level of intimacy is so deep without sex even being involved. Sex will just mask things, make things different and will stop all growth together. I want sex to be the icing on the cake! The awesome surprise that God has in store for us!

I cannot keep a handle on my hormones alone. I won't lie, I want to have sex because I'm human, I'm a woman, I miss it, and I like it!  I will have to call on You ALL the time to help me get through it. I will need Kevin to help me stay on this path, I think he will respect my wishes and I think he will work with me. I believe, he cares about what is important to me. If he doesn't then he is not the one You have planned for me.  But, Lord, I need help with this!

I do not want a relationship where I am afraid to say what I'm thinking about. I want to have a relationship where we can discuss all things good, bad, or ugly. I want to have a relationship that will grow together in you, will pray together, will serve You together, will laugh and play together. God I want so desperately to worship You together. 

I am no longer just surviving in this life. I am now living and enjoying every minute!

Where do you need me to be God?

Where are you God?

What is the plan LORD?

Where do you need me to be God?

So much has happened in my life in the past 4 years since I really began walking down that path toward you. It has been 4 years but some days it feels like it was just yesterday that I wrote on the communication card “please pray, I have issues.” I remember that day so well. I remember wanting to chase down my card out of the basket and pull it out after I let it go.  I remember the fear inside of me because I had just done the unthinkable. I let someone know that life at home was not good. At least in my mind that is what just happened. All it said was “I” had issues, there was nothing said about home.

God you knew what was about to take place because you orchestrated it all! You took someone who I noticed 2 ½ years prior, someone who I only knew in passing as someone very pleasant and full of love for you. You brought her into my life through the use of this communication card. You were going to use Roni to bring me back to you. I was so incredibly lost and alone. I was so scared and intimidated. I thought I could fix it all on my own but that day in January 2008, there was something inside of me that made me realize I could not do it. Not by myself. There was a small part of me that knew I needed you and I thought that if I told David to pray for me I would feel better knowing someone knew ‘something’ even though I didn’t really say anything. You knew who I needed.

It’s been 4 years ago this week since that first call from Roni. I can almost hear her message in my mind. I remember standing at the counter listening. I remember the panic I felt because what if Eric had listened to the messages? What would he say to me? How much worse would it get if he knew I said anything at all? I remember going to the church website to get her email address so I could tell her thanks for calling but don’t call home again. I had no idea she would return the email and I was afraid to run into her at church because I didn’t know what she would say to me. I was afraid to be confronted.

Thank you God for choosing Roni to pray for me when she saw my request. I can’t even begin to think about where I would be today if she would not have called me. Thank you God, for pushing me to contact her again, a few months later. I wanted to get to know her better but I really didn’t understand why. 

So many things have happened since then that make me just shake my head. I have come so far from that Sunday in January and I know it’s all because of you. I remember sitting in Panera Bread on Colerain in April 2008 waiting on Roni to show up. She told me ahead of time that what we talked about was up to me. I had no intent of telling her my life story that day. But as I have said before, you were sitting there too and you knew that would be a life changing conversation for me. I remember telling her my story could keep Jerry Springer on the air without any re-runs for many years! I just knew I was the only one with a story like mine. No one else could have as much dysfunction in their life as I had in mine. When I left there and she gave me a hug, I knew ‘my secrets’ were safe with her. I felt about 10 pounds lighter that afternoon even though I was in shock that I had just told her so much stuff about me. She didn’t make me feel like a freak for being so dysfunctional.

Today, I feel like that part of my life that was so secretive to me back then doesn’t belong to me any longer. It’s as if it’s someone else’s story. I no longer look back on my life and wish it were different. It is what it is, the past. Unchangeable. It was a different lifetime. Before I knew you God. It’s strange to me that I can now truly differentiate the two lives. Before I knew you and after I came back you. I can look back now and I can see where you were back then. Growing up you was always near me. You put us 2 doors down from the Howard’s because they would look out for us and took me to church. I remember loving you then. I remember having so much fun in church for a few years. You showed me love from a family who really cared. You watched over me on so many occasions.

My teen to early twenty years I felt alone in so many ways. I wish now I would have stayed close to you but I realize I can never go back and change anything. I don’t believe it was part of your plan for me to wander so far away from you. That was my own choice.  However, I do believe that you knew I would come back. You were with me all along, keeping me safe, so many many times. I would acknowledge you mostly in anger when I blamed you for all the bad things that happened to me. I remember blaming you when I had my miscarriage and I truly could not understand why you would take my child from me when I wanted a child so badly. I needed someone to love and someone to love me unconditionally and I thought I had finally found that with this unborn child. It took me many many years to overcome that and realize that my life would have taken a much different road if I would have had that child. That time was my first true battle with depression.

This past year has been interesting to me. I look back over the past 12-14 months and I see so much growth in me. I do not need to write Roni every time something in my world is shaken. Well, maybe I do still write her each time I am rattled by something but those things are not happening multiple times a day! I’ve stepped out of my comfort zone so many times this year that it boggles my mind. And I stepped out without Roni standing beside me but the only time I thought she wasn’t there was with the Not a Fan testimony. It didn’t occur to me that she wasn’t beside me the other times. I’m not sure why I didn’t recognize that with the others. I guess because she was close enough for me to be comfortable, but that doesn’t make sense since she was not in Joplin with me! My anxiety is not gone but it is under control without medications and does not control me. My depression is gone even though I do have moments of sadness. It doesn’t paralyze me any longer. I have determination and drive again. I feel like smiling and no longer want to climb into a hole never to surface again! I am interested in living life again and not watching it pass me by like it did for years. I am no longer just simply surviving this life. I am participating again.

I do feel like something is missing from my life. I am happy to be where I am in my life right now but God; I want to be a part of someone’s life. I want someone to be a part of my life. I feel like I am finally ready to share my life with someone again. I see my friends around me and I am surrounded by people who have loving, respectful marriages centered on you. Something I never saw growing up or when I was married. I love looking around and seeing my friends and even those people I do not know worshiping together. I love hearing them talk to one another and wish I could be a fly on the wall in their home to see how things function on a day to day basis. How do they make their marriages work? How do they communicate when no one is around? How do they include you in their daily lives? Most of these people have been married 20 years or longer and I understand it’s not all peaches and cream. They have had struggles, may still have struggles, and didn’t get to this point in their marriages overnight. It’s how they got through all those struggles that I am interested in learning about but I want to learn those things with the right man in my life. So we can learn together. I want to share my life with a man who wants to know about me and why I am the way I am. I want to know about the man I am with too. I want to be the person he comes to with problems, issues, concerns, and successes. I want to pray with him every day. I want to learn about you together with him. I want to work for you with him. I know this exists God. I see it in my friends. I have to believe they did not take the last few good men! There is someone out there for me and you know who he is and where he is.

I miss being touched God. It’s not just sex. I miss being touched on the arm. I miss having his arm around my shoulder or my waist. His hand on the small of my back just letting me know that he is beside me. I miss being kissed just because he passed me by. I do not want to be touched and kissed because it means sex is to follow. I don’t want that. I just want affection, intimacy, and tenderness just because I am special to him. It doesn’t have to lead to anything else. In my mind I know this can happen but I also know me, or at least who I used to be. I didn’t live like this before. Everything always ended with sex, I didn’t stop it. I do wonder sometimes if maybe I’ve not met anyone yet because I am not ready for this in my life. I might think I am but you of course know me better. Maybe I’m truly not ready for this type of life yet. Yes, I miss sex. I would love to make love with a man who truly loves me but I know that cannot happen until I get married again. That is what I want for me. That is what I want to teach my daughter and my son. This is what is right in your eyes. I have so much to learn between now and this happening again in my life and I wonder if it’s easier for me to learn if I am not in a relationship. For now, I will keep waiting for you God to point me in the right direction. I know you have a plan for me. I will keep praying that you will put the right man in my life at the right time. I will keep praying for that man to want the same things in a relationship as I do. I will keep praying that you will show me what needs to change in me and where I need to grow before I get into a relationship with a man so that I do not make the same mistakes I’ve made in the past.

More than any touching, intimacy, affection, or sex, I want to hear the words I love you spoken to me from the man in my life. I want to believe them to be true without a shred of doubt in my heart. I want to be able to say them back to him with the same conviction so that he knows without a doubt I mean each and every word.

I know this is not too big God to handle. He will make it happen if it is in his plan for my life. I do not believe his plan is for me to be alone the rest of my life and in time he will give me so much more than I can imagine right now.

A Good Goodbye

I finished out my appointments with Dr. L. It was so very hard to keep going into her office and seeing things disappear. I had grown accustomed to the bookcases and could find books easily that I had burned holes in with my eyes to keep from retreating into my cave. The four chairs and electric fireplace with the pictures on top. Each week as things started to leave the office made it more real that she was leaving. I had tried to ignore that little fact. I wanted to just go on as if it wasn't happening because goodbyes hurt. People always left my life it seemed. So if I didn't think about it then I wouldn't get engaged in it and it wouldn't hurt! She and I had yet to talk about her move but finally in the last 3 weeks we did. She started to tell me about her new job waiting for her. She would tell me about the things she was looking forward to doing when she got there such as hiking and eventually writing a book about her practice. I wondered if I would make in the book as the most introverted human being she had experienced! After talking for a bit about her move to Alaska I would change the subject. She would ask why and I told her I don't like goodbyes, they are never good. She said that maybe this was God's way of showing me a 'good' goodbye because they can happen. Its not always because someone walks out of your life because of something bad. People grow and people change and therefore people may leave to go after their dreams, they may get married and go with their husbands, etc. I couldn't feel it, I refused to feel the emotions of her leaving while I was in the office with her but she could read them on my face and in my body language. She knew that I was really struggling to stay in the moment with her when all I really wanted to do was run screaming out of the office into my cave and ignore that she was leaving.

Our last meeting was the Wednesday the evening before Thanksgiving. She looked at me and asked me if I was really in the office with her or was I in my cave. I told her I was in the cave. She asked me to come out to try and enjoy our last hour together. Good goodbyes are that they are good. They are bittersweet and its OK to feel sad. Its okay to cry and grieve the loss of a new friendship. But its not a loss, the friendship will remain. I can still send her an email every now and then to update her on my status. That wasn't enough though, I wanted to keep meeting with her. I wanted to be her friend because she was someone I liked and trusted. Being a nurse I knew that could never happen due to the patient/doctor relationship rules. That's crossing the line. She told me that for one year there could not be much contact but she would respond to my emails if I had a crisis or something. She couldn't advise me though. I knew that but it still hurt and it confused me so much. I mean, I hated going into her office, I hated talking about me and my problems, I hated opening up and facing the demons of my past that held me captive for so many years but I grew to like her.

After our last meeting I went to our Thanksgiving Eve service at church. It was so hard and I needed a hug from Roni. I just needed to be hugged and told I would be okay, things would be okay. I needed to know she wasn't leaving too. She knows me so well and told me that she wasn't leaving but she won't be this person in my life forever. But of course I wouldn't hear that from her. She told me to be sad for a bit but to pick up and move forward there really are 'good' goodbyes.

Women's Retreat at Woodland Lakes

Oh my goodness! I had no idea what to expect from this weekend. That's probably good because I may not have gone. The retreat was held at the church camp I went to as a child. It brought back some pleasant memories! We all slept in the big dorm room under the center and we were in the old wooden bunkbeds! God was already at the retreat ready to meet me. He knew I was scared and nervous. When I walked over to the main chapel I noticed all the chairs were around the room in a circle and I immediately found Betty! Next thing I noticed was a long line of chairs set up facing one another in 2 rows and we were given a question on a piece of paper when we arrived. Roni saw me and asked me how I was and I told her I was fine until I saw this set up and realized we were going to do some sort of one on one discussion with people. She told me to stop it, its not bad. I guess maybe she could read my face and she told me it was a game similar to speed dating where each person has 30 seconds to ask and answer each others questions. Thats all it is. Its an ice breaker of sorts. It didn't help much but Betty said to me to keep an open mind this weekend. Just be open.

God worked so very hard on me in the next 22 hours while at the retreat! I cried so many times and just let the dam break finally. We had a lot of times alone with God and I used every minute of them to connect with him! I finally gave Betty the letter I had written telling her how much I loved her but I was unable to tell her out loud. The words were so very scary to me. She said the letter was enough for now.

God used so many people this weekend to talk to me, to show me his love so that I would know without a doubt I was not alone. He spoke with Roni, Valeri and Betty the whole time. It was wearing me out but it was invigorating at the same time. I spent some time outside with Roni talking at one point and she called me out on something when I said I didn't know who I was. She told me to stop lying to myself because I did know I just had to choose to believe it! More words from God straight to my heart!

I left the retreat feeling completely energized and overwhelmed all at once!

lots of hard work!

The next 8 weeks were the most challenging, heart wrenching, terrifying, rewarding weeks of my life up to that point. The anxiety was through the roof again but I kept saying I would do whatever it takes. I wish I could remember now what I used to say but it was something about we had 8 weeks to 'fix' me, I had to make it count. God turned up the fire to full blast! He was no longer nudging me down the road. He had a hold of my hand and was pulling me hard!

I had homework from Dr. L. I thought Roni's homework was crazy sometimes but I think these two women were two peas in a pod! Dr. L asked me to describe myself to her and I couldn't do it. I thought of things like coward, introverted, fearful, failure. So she told me to ask a number of close friends to tell me who they thought I was, what did they see in me? This was very hard for me to do. We were also getting challenges from church at the same time such as the 'no regrets week' and then the 'love challenge'--we tell someone we love them and why. Now this assignment! And I had a deadline! 1 week. So I sent emails out to friends but not to Roni. She had told me these things in the past and I wanted to hear from others who were not really in the up close and personal arena in my therapy. The responses were overwhelming to me and I had such a hard time believing them! They couldn't be talking about me!

They used words like courageous, determined, strong, patient, etc. These words did not describe me! I was a coward on all levels. I was so weak I could barely stand it seemed. These people obviously didn't know me like they thought or I was extremely good at hiding what was really inside of me. I was told by one of these friends and by Dr. L that I was not able to decipher these at truth or not. They are truth I just need to find it inside of me again. The depression was keeping me from seeing the truth, the lies I had been believing for so many years were preventing me from seeing the truth.

The love challenge at church was happening around this same time. This was completely overwhelming me! I told my kids and I told my Aunt Phyllis that I loved them. That was it. Occassionally I would tell my Aunts kids, but as a routine I didn't. Dr. L wanted me to do this challenge also. Another part of the homework. She said it wasn't as scary as I made it out to be. Roni told me the same thing. She said until I do it, the fear won't go away.

At first Roni and I talked about it being Robb and Sandy that I start with because they were all the time telling me they loved me. I was about to spend the afternoon with them and when the time came I just couldn't do it. Then I thought I would tell Betty. She was my 'safe' person. She was telling me each time she saw me, talked to me on the phone etc. Roni thought she was perfect! I had many opportunities but again, I failed. I couldn't do it. I think Roni asked why and I told her I was afraid to tell them because people I loved have always left. What if I told them but it wasn't really real coming back to me. She told me to do it anyway. The words just would not come. I was feeling like I would never be able to tell anyone. So what did I do? I wrote it out!

I wrote out what I wanted to say to Betty and I read it a few times but still the words would not come. We had our women's retreat and I had this tucked away in my Bible. One of the sessions to get with God at the retreat I went outside. It was early morning and it was frosty outside. I had taken a quilt with me so I took it outside too! I was out there a while and Betty came to join me. We were sitting on a swing just enjoying the wildlife at the camp and the frost on the trees. We were okay to sit quietly. I took out my paper and again, I couldn't read the words out loud to her but I let her read it herself. We were both crying and that wasn't too smart when it was in the 30's outside! But now she knew that I did love her, that I was scared to say the words out loud and she said that this letter was good enough for now. When I was able to she knew I would say it.

The retreat was a whole other piece of my healing and that will be a post all by itself! man oh man I was on a major roller coaster!
I wrote out

Deer Creek and God!

When I went to Deer Creek, I took my laptop, my bible and my camera. My phone didn't work there, my laptop didn't get internet service and the weather was perfect! When I arrived, I got the last room available and it was on the water side of the building even though I didn 't sit on the balcony. I immediately set to work.  I was going to meet God somewhere that weekend and my hope was that it was going to be a long long meeting. I went for a walk on the grounds and they were beautiful. I took lots and lots of pictures just watching nature. My mind started to settle down. I took out my laptop and started typing. In a 24 hour time frame I typed about 18 pages of thoughts. The anger came out, the fear came out, the disappointment came out.

When I left Dr. Lyall's office just a few days before I told her I didn't know if I would be back or not. What was the point in continuing to open up to her, to keep going deeper into the pit of darkness to find the light if she was leaving. What was the point in starting all over again with someone new if it was going to take 6 months for me to open up to them also. She told me she wouldn't take my appointments off just yet but I can call her if I decided not to come back. I was okay with that. So while at Deer Creek I wrote alot about these appointments and my feelings that we really hadn't done a whole lot. I was still as messed up in the head over my mother and my past. I cried to God, I pleaded with him to please tell me what to do. If I went back to these appointments then please let there be some break through in my emotional well being because I was literally about to crack! I was barely functioning again and it hurt!

I felt so abandoned again. I went right back to the feeling that everytime I begin to trust someone they leave! I was terrified again and panicked that Roni would leave also. It was not a good time for me. I sent Roni and Dr. Lyall the 18 pages I had typed that weekend. They said it was a great work! I couldn't see it.

I did go back to the appointments with Dr. Lyall. We had 8 more weeks to work to get me well! I was willing to do whatever it took to get me there. I was scared and the anxiety was back in full force it seemed. By the time Dr. Lyall was leaving there had been more progress in my healing than there had been in the previous 6 months! It was a very stressful, emotionally draining, rewarding time! So many things started happening inside of me. I need to go back and read the emails and the journal entries so that I can get the facts straight to write them out here.