Yummy antioxidants aside, a lot has been happening since my last September blog. It's a long, long story (a tome, really) but basically I am starting to see a counselor for my depression. Well, starting. I never knew trying to see a professional about my painful issues would be so draining. I've jumped from person to person, neither quite working out. I thought it would be easier. I mean, I thought the hardest part would be simply coming to terms with the fact that I'm not quite normal, that my problems aren't normal and that my attitude and my thoughts are too unusual to pursue a working fellowship with Christ right now. I thought admitting that I am depressed, unmotivated and anxious about everything was the hardest part. Isn't it? And yet, since facing myself in the mirror and being real with friends and family about it, it seems to be going nowhere. God is good, He deserves all the glory and He knows my struggle, but it's still a draining process and I know He won't let me slip through this clinging to anything but Him.
Here is my story, and this is all coming out now because God is teaching me the sweetness of vulnerability and the nastiness of keeping emotions and experiences to myself, and the more I share my story the closer God draws me to Himself. Three weeks ago, I was preparing to go on a Fall Retreat with Campus Crusade for Christ and the whole week I had an unsettling blurb the pit of my stomach. Is blurb even a word? Anyway that's what it was, a blurb, like a subtle, uncomfortable knot in my gut. I felt that I shouldn't go. I'd been having a rough week prior, God and I weren't on good terms, and the only justification I had for going is that all my UNCG and Wake Forest friends would be there; I hadn't seen them in ages. Yet I still went. I don't know still if that was God trying to stop me from going, or if it was His desire that I go - either way, I had the worst time you could possibly have in a place filled with God-praising college students. Everything that came out of me from the moment we pulled into the campgrounds was forced and unnatural, and I was unusually tuned into myself, into my attitude and my actions towards everyone. God seemed crazy distant, and looking at everyone having a great time, singing their love to Christ and to each other made me bitter and hardened my heart. By the time Saturday came and the speaker gave his last talk on the lessons from Jonah, I was in a shell so impermeable that my thoughts and everything just stayed in me, nothing was transmitting in or out. I remember staring and staring at the speaker until my eyes went blurry; I closed my Bible and stopped taking menial notes in my journal; I adjusted my body position at least five times, struggling to find a normal and relaxed pose to make it seem that things were okay; I struggled to find words for my friends sitting beside me, and all the while absolutely nothing this guy said was getting in. I barely remember what the lesson was about, just that I was so consumed with myself, resentful and confused. So afterwards I decided to talk to my discipler on staff with CCC, which I now recognize was an important step because normally, I don't go to her for much besides the superficial. But even then God was showing me the importance of being vulnerable and how unhealthy it is to dwell on things besides Christ, which motivated me to talk to her. I didn't even know what I would talk about, but as soon as she let me into her room, I felt my heart begin to loosen and gradually I spoke more and more about problems I was having, how I was struggling with family, school, my future, hurting from bad/broken relationships and after ten minutes I was basically sobbing on her floor, not knowing what to do or say, but all the while realizing that my unhappiness was at a new low. I continued crying after some encouragement from her, walked out to the lake, sat in a few different places just staring at the sky, sobbing and sobbing and hating myself and God and my situation and basically despising everything around me. I was crying out to God, sometimes out loud but mostly in my heart, questioning over and over and begging for release. Begging God that he would simply tell me that He is near and that He loves me and that all of these things are for a reason and that He still has a plan for my life. I felt inexplicably lost and naked. I had one last burst of emotion, one last defining prayer, my face soaked and my eyes burning towards the heavens... then all of a sudden, mid-prayer and exhausted, I stopped. I stopped praying and as I kept my face upwards I didn't see the heavens anymore but just a sky with some bright pinpricks. I also stopped crying, like I was all dried up. The earth beneath me became more real than before, the sound of insects chirping and buzzing around my face became loud and distinct. I noticed ripples in the lake that I hadn't before. I took my mind off God and instead, I was consumed with the environment around me, the natural simplicity of it, the silence more pressing than before. I felt alone, entirely alone, alone as a human being and alone as a species, alone on this planet made of only 100 different elements, made without a God, existing without a life force or driving power. I was tired of praying to a wall in my mind, tired of reaching without a response, tired of dealing with an increasingly feeble faith and I honestly did not know if God existed, and I didn't care. I became agnostic at that point. It was amazingly peaceful.
I was fine for the next 24 hours... then the guilt began to settle in. Sunday afternoon I began to feel repentant and silly about the whole thing, but I refused to let go of this peace because honestly, if there was no God, that would for sure be a heck of a better explanation for my anxiety, my problems and the abandonment I was feeling. How could there be a loving God and there still be all these problems, namely this overwhelming depression in my life? Later that evening I was back to where I was Saturday night, numbly listening to the Jonah preacher, depressed, but not quite back to believing that God existed. God was indeed there and He didn't let me run from Him for very long before He brought a dear friend into my life to speak this wonderful Truth to me. When Rachel stopped by that night to tell me she was moving to D.C. for her new job, I was not expecting her to speak this Truth to me. There's something about being in fellowship with other Christians that triggers growth and change, and Rachel played a vital role in my recovery she will never understand. After I cried to her about my horrible weekend and my agnostic views, she began to cry with me and whispered the most beautiful Truth I've ever heard, "God is real, Alicia, and He loves you, He loves you so much!" It shattered every thought I had and it took away any breath I had left in me. It was what I'd been pounding into my head for weeks and yet it never stuck or resonated with me until Rachel plainly spoke it to me. Yet it was not so plain - the words were not just words, but some ultimate Truth that was beyond my comprehension, beyond the confines of my tiny mind but something I knew in my soul, something so obvious to me as gravity or the hardness of the rocking chairs we sat on. It was simple and complex and gorgeous and dripping with a world of possibilities and hope and it triggered an unusual aching in my entire body and my soul cried, "Yes! Yes!" In that rocking chair, holding on to Rachel and my face hot with tears, I repented and came back to a saving knowledge of Christ. Since that fateful night I have clung to this one Truth, and nothing, nothing is sweeter to me now than to be assured that God is present, even more so that He is multi-faceted, loving and faithful - no matter my circumstances.
To shorten things (too late!) I have since realized that while I am back on solid terms with God, my depression is getting in the way experiencing true fellowship with Him and with others, and that depression has slowly been deteriorating parts of my life for the past 8 or so years. My discipler and others encouraged me to see a counselor, to tell others about it, to face this issue head on and to treat this as a priority in my life. I told my parents, and they are of course supportive of me pursuing a healthier lifestyle and concerned about my well being. It's great to have their support in this. And yet... they do not know the Lord and don't understand my desire to see a Christian counselor, they don't get my spiritual pains and tell me that I am diagnosing myself too early. I ache for them to be true followers and for them to know what it means to need a Savior and to know the sweetness of running into the arms of a loving Christ who has taken their place on the cross.
Here I am, a few weeks later, reading little Scripture a day and being careful not to overwhelm myself with duties or Christian literature. My life with God is simple at the moment and it delivers a joy I've never experienced before. Yes, this is a draining process. Physically and mentally I am tired of the demands put on me by my doctor and my parents, spiritually I'm tired of doubting God's goodness and feeling like I have no choice in the matter, no choice in how I feel. Yes, there are dark days, moments of deepest depression with no warning and seemingly no escape... but the good news is that through these things, I am assured of God's provision through all this. That moment with Rachel planted a seed in my soul that will not go away. Despite these things my faith in Him is growing and I'm comforted that He will bring glory to His name through this!
- Alicia
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