Broken, beautiful, messy, grace filled truth and my cracked, broken heart

I  had a bad couple of days.  Such a broken world,  full of broken stories, including mine.  I tried to be happy, I really, really did.  I tried to be thankful, but my mind just couldn't stay there.

This is how it started....

Monday, I went with my bestie to see her cousin whom I dearly love.  She (the cousin) is a beautiful, brave amazing wife, mother and friend.  She is fighting cancer and cancer seems to be winning.  The juxtaposition of her losing a battle while winning a battle swims clearly in my mind.

Paul's says in scripture.... for me to die is gain.  These words ring through my mind.  Logically, I know the right things, theologically I know the right things.  Our loss, her gain.  She sweetly tells me how she will hug Justin when she gets to heaven.  This cracks my heart open, this makes me happy and desperately sad all at the same time.  This gift she shares is full of hope and sorrow. I can envision it, this joyful reunion.  All of heaven waiting on her arrival and my boy there waiting too.  I am jealous for a moment of her ascension.

Just as suddenly, I am sad.  Sad for the sorrow of those left behind. They are losing greatness, gentleness that has lived among them for years and the hole will never be filled.  They will honor her, they will live on full of her greatness and grace but the pain will be unbearable and the only thing any of us will be able to do is hold them and be Jesus with skin on for them.

Jesus is there, in the hospital room and He will be there in the deep grief that will come.  It makes me sad.  I am thankful to be a part of the glory in the room but deeply sad at the same time.

Then Monday night I can't sleep.  Imagine that.  I pray, I talk to Jesus, I ask him a hundred questions but He is silent.  I answer my questions myself.....I still can't sleep.  I judge myself harshly about how I can be so unspiritual.  Why can't I just trust God?  Why do I have thoughts that run through my brain like a crazy rabbit?  Have you ever tried to chase a rabbit?  Yep, that's what I mean.  A thousand thoughts that I cannot capture.

By one in the morning, I am a crazy person.  I decide to take a sleeping pill (I know it's bad, I know I have taken them for too long in the past, don't judge me).  I try not to take them very often but at this point I am desperate.  Sleep comes, sweet sleep.  Suddenly it is time to wake up and I have to take my thyroid pill, because you can't eat or drink anything for an hour after you take it.  That means groping around in the dark, finding the pill bottle, downing the pill and trying to go back to sleep because who wants to wake up without being able to drink coffee right away?

I doze back asleep but awaken crying...I need to get up but I am so sleepy.  I drag myself up, have a teary eyed, brutally unkind conversation with myself and then with my husband.  I am sad for everyone and I am sad for myself.  That's right I, I was feeling sorry for myself.  I admit it, acknowledge it.  It happens.

I am emotionally bankrupt and consider not going to teach bible study.  What kind of teacher can't quit crying?  My lovely husband tolerates so very much.  I am wrapped up in fear as I realize this is 11/11 the date we almost lost him.  I am frozen in time as memories march through my mind.  Flashbacks are not my friend and fear is not of God, but still it sometimes lodges itself right alongside Him in my heart.  That's right I said it....Fear is nestled up in my heart right beside Jesus.  

I sit at the kitchen table reading scripture and seeking desperately to win the war in my brain.  I am too tired to function, I am so very tired, so very scared and so very sad.

I have to go, the disease of pleasing, the virus of expectation, the illness of perfection comes upon me and I go to teach bible study.  My imperfect, broken self tries to pull it together for a bigger picture, for the ladies I love.   I am messy, walking out in tears, worshipping loud and off  key, but Jesus is there.

We have a young boy(6 or 7 years old) joining us for study.  He is a dark haired, darling boy that looks and acts like my Justin.  I cry some more.  We pray and I know Jesus is with me.  In the fire He is there and in this weird, murky, sad place He is there.

This is the prize, His presence through the dark, lonely places.  He knows these places,  He has cried out in dark places, He was a man of many sorrows.  He is not looking for me to be perfect, He is just looking for me to stay connected.  To remember that He is there, He is fixing it all....one day it will all be right.  By right, I mean...redeemed.

There will be miracles here in this world but sometimes they will be disguised as a brave friend who will let you hug her when everything is falling apart, or a cousin who will massage your feet with lotion because you can't do it yourself, or a super strong person who will admit they struggle too.  Miracles will come in many different ways, if we will just watch for them.  

I go through the day in a haze, alternating between fear and fuzzy.  I go home and lay on the couch and text my husband to make sure he is alive.  This is the weird place I live in; a place where someone calls to ask if someone is alive.  It dawns on me that I am much too tired, something isn't right.

Ding, ding, ding....It occurs to me that perhaps I took a sleeping pill instead of my thyroid pill.  I go to my room, the sleeping pills are in the wrong spot...yep I took a sleeping pill at seven in the morning.

Of course, that is why I went so haywire.  This is why I was so very tired, I wasn't having a breakdown, I wasn't in need of being checked into a facility for rest.  I had just taken a sleeping pill at seven in the morning.  This pill popping psycho is not really that psycho.  Well, maybe a little pyscho but who isn't?  

My husband is alive, my Jesus loves me(imperfect and totally messed up me) and the world is all wrong, but I am okay.

This journey, this unfolding story is always interesting.  I am learning that I can cry and laugh and trust.  That when my heart cracks open I am actually the most like Jesus.  Feeling everything.  Most days it's too much for me and I have to put up some distance between my heart and my feelings.  That collision between heart and memories is just to painful.  I can go there, I just can't stay there.  I have to focus on what I do have, and who He is.

I can practice cracking my heart open for others, sharing more than before. Stepping into their sadness and holding them tightly through their story.  God is good, this world is broken.

Job had to learn to love God not for anything He could do for him, but for who He is.  I am learning.  I trust that God knows best...Who am I that I should question anything?

Wednesday roles along and it is uneventful, I laugh, I teach and I have sweet sleep.  I don't lay in bed asking questions.  That is a good day in my book.

Thanks for letting me share my broken, messy, beautiful story, letting me be authentic.  I don't really know how God can use it for His glory....My job is just to share it, He adds the glory.

Let's be brave together, let's crack our hearts open a bit more, let's trust truth to set us free from hypocrisy.  Let's cry, laugh and trust more than ever before.  Let's give room for the glory to come into our stories.

Love you dearly,

Debbie

Disclaimer:  I am not really a pill popper per say.  I take medications prescribed for me by my doctor.  I promise, I rarely take sleeping pills.