my faith story

I've been thinking recently that it is so easy to write about tangential issues and never get around to writing about the most important and central part of my life: faith in Jesus Christ.  So today I want to take an opportunity to share my faith story with you. 

I grew up in a Christian home where I was taught the Bible from a very early age.  In fact, I'm pretty sure my Mom even read me the Bible when I was in the womb!  Saturation in the Bible would describe my growing-up years.  We had family devotions.  We were required to have personal devotions (Mom used to say, "You need to nourish your soul just as much as your body" so we would have devotions even before breakfast).  We listened to Christian radio, read Christian biographies, and even listened to tape recordings of Scripture as we went to sleep at night.  As I became a teenager, we were paid 25 cents to memorize each Bible verse.  This motivated me to memorize chapters of Scripture...even a few whole books (short ones!). 

At the tender age of two years old, I was laying on the changing table when I said to my Mom, "Jesus...come in...heart."  Mom marks that down as the beginning of my faith journey, the stake in the ground of faith, if you will.  I have a lot of appreciation for her belief that a tiny child could have saving faith in Christ (or shall I say, "faith in the saving Christ"!).  Clearly, for a little child to believe, it is the work of the Holy Spirit!  I was baptized a year or two later, at my request.  Although I now believe that conversion and baptism are best understood as a single act, I also agree with an article I recently read on Christianity Today's website: if we find ourselves in the posture of faith and trust in Christ, that is what is important.  It is not so much the journey we took to get there or whether we said a perfect sinner's prayer or had baptism at the "right" time.  It's not whether we use the term "decision for Christ" or the term "Christ's decision for me."  The point is that we trust Jesus for our salvation.  I would add to that that we should also realize that faith itself is the gift of God and from God much more than it is our gift to God.

At any rate, from the earliest of ages, I found myself in the posture of faith in Christ for my salvation.  I had been taught and came to understand for myself that I was born with sin and brokenness in my heart.  After all, who needs to teach a child to rebel?  Rebellion is so common and normal among children that it points to the innate nature of sin.  Children normally and naturally go through selfishness, disobedience and lying.  I understood, though, that sin wasn't just something I did; it was something that was inherently part of me.  I had a nature that made me turn away from God and from my parents.  I came to understand that I needed a Savior to take away my sin, to carry it for me so that it would no longer weigh me down.  I came to understand that I needed forgiveness and restoration.  And I truly believed (and still believe) that Jesus' death on the cross and subsequent resurrection gave me such a salvation and redemption.

As I grew, I came to understand that that sin nature is always there as long as we are on this earth but that in salvation, God also gives us the "firstfruits" of our new life with Him in eternity.  We have a new nature too and that is why despite the in-fighting and hypocrisy and sin and ugliness we see from Christians, we also see that Christians are some of the most generous, sacrificial people in the world.  We see this in the Christians who venture into the leprosy colonies, who reach out to treat those who battle foot-deforming illnesses in Ethiopia, who serve and care for the most hungry and impoverished in the world.  Even Nick Kristof, the New York Times columnist who tackles social issues and doesn't shy away from criticizing conservative Christians, has noted that, in all fairness, you will always find Christians at the heart of seeking to alleviate suffering, in the most dangerous and ugly places on earth.  There is a glory that shines in the midst of the darkness and God uses Christians to bring some of that beauty and hope into the world.  That is why Jesus told us we were the light of the world.

At any rate, as I went through junior high, I found myself less interested in growing in faith and more interested in my hormones.  This passed shortly though and gave way to a period of two years of anxiety and depression that didn't exactly make me suicidal but didn't really make me want to live either.  An increasingly unhealthy dynamic at home probably didn't help things (I was living through the second disintegrating marriage in my family).  I believe that I developed obsessive-compulsive disorder during this time and found myself trying to purge myself of any sin (even a sinful thought) and doing illogical things like obsessively washing my hands.  The outward compulsions were a sign of how much pain I was in inwardly.  There were so many days I crawled through, only holding on to the hope that I would find the answers and be able to be whole in the future.  My interest in matters of faith had returned, thankfully, but often the heavens seemed dark and answers were elusive.  By the grace of God, I didn't give up, though.

It was the restoration to a healthy Christian community that led to my restoration.  Although I had grown up in evangelical and Pentecostal churches, we began to attend a Lutheran church that had a lovely service by the lake.  As we continued to attend and to hear God's Word faithfully preached, as we became a part of a small group and began to serve in the church, I found my hope and wholeness begin to be restored.  In this church, I found pastors who showed me unconditional love and that was healing as well. 

At the same time, I began to study Martin Luther's story.  I came to see that he had suffered the same obsessive anxiety to be perfect and to receive God's favor that I was going through. Martin Luther did not grow up in a world where he had access to the Bible like we do today.  The Mass was in Latin and the Scriptures were in another language and reserved for the elite.  It was only in his work as a young monk that he began to actually read the Bible.  When he did, he was completely overcome by the grace of God.  He came to see that salvation is never dependent on what we do, but is totally dependent on what God has done and is doing for us.  Jesus died for us so that we could be free from efforts to please God (efforts which are never enough to match God's perfect standard).  He saw that while God is holy, He is also merciful.  When we could not bring redemption and healing for ourselves, Jesus did it for us, at great personal cost. 

It was not that I had never been taught this.  I was steeped in Scripture and its teaching about salvation.  But somehow I had gotten myself into a place where I believed that, as a Christian, I was responsible for holding on to God's favor.  I saw myself as a worse sinner than other sinners and was desperately trying to claw my way up the ladder of holiness.  Martin Luther reminded me that only Jesus can obtain God's favor and that it is given to us as a gift--not only at the moment of our conversion, but for the rest of our lives.  Is obedience important?  Yes!  But not to obtain God's favor.  It is the way we show our love and gratitude to God for what He has already given us.  Little by little, I began to experience more and more freedom from the obsessive control I was trying to take over my life.

In the years that followed, I had many ups and downs.  I had times when I followed God more closely than others.  I had times when I clung to my own control instead of to Christ.  I think of myself now as "in recovery" from this obsessive control.  It's a life-long journey.  And now as an adult, I often feel I have more questions than answers.  But in the midst of the questions and struggles, there is one passage that I cling to.  In John 6, Jesus has just finished a particularly difficult-to-understand teaching ("eat my flesh...drink my blood").  Many people are repulsed and turn away from following Him anymore.  Jesus asks His disciples if they plan to do the same.  Simon Peter's words are the ones I cling to, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God" (NIV).  This is so often how I feel.  So often, I don't understand God.  I have so many questions.  The heavens often seem dark.  Scripture is so often hard to understand.  But what I do know is that there is no other credible place to which I can turn.  There is no other Person who was willing to die for me.  There is no other assurance like that which I have in Christ.  So I cling to Him in the midst of the questions and confusion of this life.  I remain in the posture of faith. 


There's a lot more I could write about.  My growth in faith in college and at Bible camp.  My years in Christian ministry.  Seminary.  But this will suffice for now.  


Jesus has saved me, redeemed me and given me the gift of faith.  He holds me in the palm of His hand and promises that no one can snatch me away from Him (John 10) and nothing can separate me from His love (Romans 8).  To whom shall I go?  I go to Jesus.

Book Review Friday, Part 2: Life, In Spite of Me

I picked up Life, In Spite of Me: Extraordinary Hope After a Fatal Choice by Kristen Jane Anderson because stories of people who have overcome serious depression resonate with me.  I have battled depression and anxiety at least since my teenage years and greatly appreciate stories of those who have survived and even triumphed through these illnesses.

Kristen Anderson suffered a series of deep emotional wounds and losses as a teenager.  She had several family and friend deaths occur, including the loss of a friend to suicide.  Shortly thereafter, she attended a party with a boy she liked and was raped.  No one knew that this had happened.  Her despair began to deepen and deepen, until one night she went for a walk and impulsively threw herself on the train tracks, intending to kill herself and end the pain.  Instead, the train ran her over and severed both of her legs.  She was profoundly wounded.  She shouldn’t have survived, but she did.  Thus began a long journey back through physical and emotional rehab, spiritual transformation, and deep inner healing. 

Kristen believes that God had a plan in all of the pain that she experienced.  According to her account, she was only a nominal Christian prior to the accident.  This crisis became a moment of reckoning, forcing her to re-evaluate everything and come to a personal relationship with Christ.  As a Lutheran Christian, I frequently found myself questioning the way the theology was articulated (did she really have no faith, or did her faith simply deepen with the accident?), but I had to remind myself that God clearly has done a work in this young woman’s life, a work that led to the healing of her broken soul, a deepened faith in Jesus, and a ministry of encouragement to others who are without hope.  I appreciated her vulnerability in sharing her story and the clear transformation God made in her life. 

For those without hope and those who are tempted to end it all, this book could be just the encouragement they need to keep going.

3 stars out of 5

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group .  I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 <http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html> : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

what insomnia feels like

It hit again last week.  The dreaded insomnia.  Ever since August of 2009, when the sleeplessness was at its worst (4 nights without sleep, followed by me giving a sermon at the largest service we had all year), I have had periodic bouts of it.  None of them as bad as that first one, because I am able to take steps to rectify things sooner.  But still very difficult.

This time, it hit on Monday night.  I was innocently making my way down into the kitchen late at night and spied a mouse on the kitchen floor.  When he saw me, he flew into the cupboard.

This was all it took to upset my sleep equilibrium.  I have a real phobia of mice. We've had them before in other houses where we lived and they would eat through packages of food, poop all over everything, and even run up the stairs.  My worst fear is to find one crawling on me in the night. 

I got jittery and felt the creepy crawlies all over me.  I couldn't get to sleep.  Everything in town was closed when we found the mouse and we had no traps.

To a normal person, finding a mouse would bother them, but not set them completely off their game.  To my friends, my hysteria was a bit amusing, until they realized I really was a mess from lack of sleep.  I have real trouble whenever my nighttime routine or sense of security is threatened.  Even sleeping in a hotel room can set me off.  It's pretty frustrating.  My husband was bothered by the mouse, but not enough to have his sleep affected.  I get pretty jealous of that ability.

We tried to make our own sticky glue that night.  Inhumane, yes.  But I was desperate.  However, we only succeeded in burning it to the bottom on the pan and leaving pock marks of porcelain-like glue on our stove. 

So, seeing my distress, Christopher took off for Walmart, a half hour's drive away.  He got a bunch of traps of all kinds and set them.  But the damage was already done for my sleep.  I was so worked up, I could barely get to sleep.  I didn't sleep much that night.  I was so tired the next day, I let Burrito sit in bed with me and watch cartoons much of the day.  The next night, I think I slept even less, so in the morning, it was more of the same. 

When I don't sleep, I don't just feel a bit fatigued.  My whole body hurts.  It aches.  I feel pressure on my heart.  My thought processes move slowly.  I can't keep a thought in my head.  On the plus side, I don't find myself obsessing over anxieties like I often do.  But on the negative side, this is simply because I can't seem to think.

Finally, on the third night, I gave in and took a sleeping pill.  Unfortunately, I was thinking so poorly, I first took my antidepressant at night (too much of it in one day can rev me up).  So, I was pretty screwed up, but did manage to sleep a bit that night. 

On Thanksgiving, I was still feeling like a bit of a zombie, but we did manage to have a nice day with our friends.  I was glad to have at least some sleep under my belt.  Slowly, I have managed to get back to full night sleeps this week and am feeling more normal. 

Insomnia can be a very serious thing.  It puts pressure on your body in ways that really aren't healthy.  It causes physical and emotional pain.  But there is a way back from insomnia.  I know what to do now.  Take a pill (as low a dose as possible) to restore equilibrium (and then get off it relatively quickly).  Establish a routine at night and stick to it as much as possible.  Cover the clock so as to not obsess over the time of the night and how I REALLY REALLY MUST GET TO SLEEP NOW!  And I have found a glass of red wine at night to be helpful, but I realize this may not work for everyone. 

I'm back on the right track again.  But we still haven't caught that mouse. 

I am getting more ok with it though.

the upside of depression

If you struggle with depression, particularly chronic, lifelong depression, as I have (although at times my depression and even more prominent anxiety abate for a while, they always come back), it is probably pretty hard to see any upside to their place in your life.  I know it has been hard for me.  Sometimes the weight of these emotions on my shoulders has been significant and even crippling at times.  A while ago, I saw Nassir Ghaemi interviewed on The Colbert Report, concerning his recent book, A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness. 

I found Ghaemi's thesis so encouraging: that during crisis times in history a person with a non-psychotic mental illness such as depression or anxiety is of more use than a person who scores high on the optimism scales and would generally be described as mentally healthy.  This is because a person who battles depression or anxiety has certain qualities such as resilience and realism that well-equip them to deal with trying times, qualities which the average healthy person does not possess in the necessary quantities.  Well, I have had A First-Rate Madness on my library waiting list for a while, so in the meantime, I got a book that follows the same theory, but zeroes in on just one great person from history, Abraham Lincoln.  The book is Lincoln's Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness by Joshua Wolf Shenk.

For any person who struggles with any mood disorder and wonders what the point of it all is, this is highly recommended reading.  Abraham Lincoln's journey with depression is carefully portrayed, with all the fine elements of story.  This is no dry history book, but a living, pulsing account of the private agony that Lincoln suffered throughout the course of his life.  It emerged publicly in young adulthood and at that time, Lincoln's friends sought to protect him from suicidal urges.  Later, Lincoln's depression became quieter and more indrawn, particularly after his marriage to Mary Todd.  He was able to use the energy of his depression to fuel a larger purpose, for which he became relentless and more determined over time, the cause of ending slavery.

Shenk shows how Lincoln was able to deal with the complex times into which he was thrust through the perseverance that he developed dealing with depression throughout his life.  He shows how Lincoln developed patience that enabled him to plod through, steady as the tortoise to the hare.  He shows how despondent he was over his failures but so willing to continue in what he believed.  He shows how Lincoln overcame his suicidal tendencies to live for something greater than himself, how brave this was, and how Lincoln can be a profound role model for the depressive.  As I was reading the book, I said to myself, "there is no way Shenk could write about the agony of depression the way he does unless he himself had suffered from it."  And sure enough, a perusal of his website reveals that part of the attraction to Lincoln's story for him was that Shenk was battling depression.  It appears that Lincoln's character became profoundly transformative for him, just as I believe it will be for any depressive who reads this book.

Lincoln's story gave me great courage in thinking of what the life of a depressive can look like through the years of life. So often, it is easy to look at "just now" and feel that all is lost.  But if I can train myself to take the long view, as Lincoln did, I can let the storms of depression carve my character out of the rock of life.  I can nurture in myself creativity, resilience, and realism that will make me available to the challenges of leadership that come my way.  Rather than viewing my depression and anxiety as shameful, I can look at them as opportunities to deal with life as it really is, rather than with avoidance of challenges.  Depression can be an awful burden but it can also be a great gift.  I have written before about leaning into the pain (rather than avoiding it) and how that has been a helpful metaphor for me in dealing with depression.  Shenk's book on Lincoln provides even more hope to embrace the gift of depression and the benefits it brings with it which would not otherwise be possible.

I'm linking this post up to Momma Made it Look Easy and you should too!

Fall Resolutions Challenge: Join up!

If you follow my blog on Facebook, you know that I've begun a Fall Resolutions Challenge through the middle of November.  The challenge is basically to make a weekly goal for the next month and see it through.  You can find accountability to accomplish your goal through the Flathead Mama blogging community.  There's still time to join up, if you're interested.  Just go to my page on Facebook, click "like" and post your challenge for the month.  Make sure the challenge is something simple and achievable for you.

Where did this idea come from?  Well, check out this post for the back story.  I guess I just finally got tired of being out of shape to an extent even shocking for a sedentary person like myself.  I know that I'll never be a great athlete, but surely I can take some simple steps to be a bit healthier.  I also know that since I suffer from anxiety and depression, exercise can be a powerful boost to mood.  I read an article in Oprah's magazine a few years ago that cited research showing that exercise can be as effective as an antidepressant. 

Anyway, I have made the goal for myself to get in three workouts a week, either walking for a half hour or doing a Pilates routine (if it's raining).  This seems like an achievable goal for me and I sat down with my husband to discuss how we could make it happen realistically in our schedule.  It's just about getting some movement and feeling and looking healthier. 

For me, I feel that exercise that is natural has a better chance of succeeding.  Hence, walking!  The Flathead Valley is beautiful this time of the year as the leaves begin to change.  I love the smells of wet leaves, moist earth, and pine trees.  I love the fresh, clean air.  I love the beautiful mountains, jutting up into the sky.  Honestly, it's a real shame to live in such a beautiful place and spend so little time (lately) getting out in God's creation.  And yet, it is rainy season again in the Flathead, so I wanted to make sure to have an alternate plan in case it did rain.  Pilates is a fun activity I have enjoyed for a few years now.  It's a great form of exercise for someone like me who has bad knees and is not a great athlete.  It is low impact and is able to be challenging no matter how much you practice it.  It requires a lot of concentration and deep breathing too which is wonderful for people who struggle with anxiety.  I still would prefer a walk out in nature but if need be, I have a back-up plan.

And I have to say, after a couple of walks, I have come home feeling alive and exhilarated!  It's amazing what a little fresh air and getting your blood flowing can do for a person.  It's also a great time to unplug from noise, electronic devices, and stress and just reflect, pray and enjoy creation.

So, those are my goals for the next month.  Who wants to join me?  Don't forget...Go to my page on Facebook to join up.  Your goal does not have to be fitness-related, by the way.  It can be any simple, achievable goal.  Happy Goal-making!

computer Sabbath

A couple of weeks ago, I was totally ready to lose it.  The stress was piling up so high.  It seemed like I had constant commitments and projects: some for church, some of my own goals, some for husband and Burrito, some for others, some for writing projects.  And most of it centered around the computer.  Which makes sense, since my main skill set is writing.  But I just COULDN'T TURN IT OFF.

It wasn't that I disliked doing any of the projects I was committed to.  In fact, I loved every single one of them and every single one used my gifts and abilities.  I wasn't coloring outside the lines of how God designed me.  It was just that there was so much to do.  And I wasn't getting the down time that my introvert self needs in order to function well.

That this coincided with truly in-earnest toddler behaviors and some attempts at potty training did not make it any easier.  I felt upset at myself for over-commiting and doing the things I love to do.  Was I really being fair to my husband and daughter who need an unstressed, stable person at home?

And then I remembered something I have practiced during stressful times in the past.  When I was in North Dakota, I was getting a lot of stressful emails (and in this case, they were not related to happy situations in which I was using my gifts...they related to strife and judgment, and discussing strife and judgment with trusted friends).  And I was getting so stressed out by having to be "on" all the time that I began to adhere to a computer Sabbath.  This meant powering down the socially "on" button, saying no to workaholism and trusting that all the same problems and responsibilities would be there the next day.  I think I took my day off in North Dakota (Monday) as my computer Sabbath.  And it helped.  I was able to get as much of a mental break as I could muster in the situation, such as it was.

So as I began to feel pretty darn stressed out here in Montana, I decided to bring the computer Sabbath back.  I think that finding Sabbath is even harder for stay-at-home parents and other people who work at home than it is for those who work outside the home.  For most people who work outside the home, there is a clear end time of work and oftentimes even a whole weekend to enjoy.  I understand nobody's time schedule is perfect and we all have challenges getting in time to rest, recreate, and build relationships with our loved ones, but I think stay-at-home people and always-on call-people like pastors and doctors have a particularly difficult time.

We all need to learn how to use the "off" button for our work.  Work can be a wonderful and meaningful thing, particularly when it is work that we feel gifted for and called to do (as I do with my writing--for pay and for volunteer opportunities--and my work as a mother and support to my husband).  But even joyful work is a work from which we need rest.

There could be no more joyful work than God's artistic work of creating the whole world.  Think of the colors, the detail, the beauty.  And no one needed rest less than God Himself.  He is self-sufficient in Himself.  But He knew that we would need to rest.  And so on the seventh day, after six days of creation, God rested.  He did this so that we would learn to stop what we are doing and rest too.

To take a Sabbath means to trust in God enough that we take ourselves off of the throne.  Psalm 127:1-3 says, "Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain.  In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat-- for he grants sleep to those he loves" (NIV).

What does this mean?  This means that we trust that at the end of the day, we are not responsible for the fate of the world--or the fate of any part of the world.  God has told us to rest and so we do it, trusting in faith that if we do, what He truly wants us to get done will get done.  We stop idolizing ourselves and our efforts in the world and we worship God alone.

And, oh, what a huge sigh of relief when we do this!  We don't have to always be "on."  We can take a rest and recharge and it will be ok. 

For every person, we may take Sabbath a little differently.  It's not about legalism.  As Jesus once said, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27, NIV).  For me, because I find myself tied to the computer all the time (even for good reasons), because I sometimes focus on it too much, because I get overstressed if I don't take a break from all my projects, a meaningful step is to turn the computer off one day a week.  I do this on Sundays now.

And I'm not gonna kid you.  It's difficult.  Particularly for the first half of the day as I get used to the idea.  I am tempted over and over again to go turn the computer on and check something.  I almost feel like the computer is a third arm; that's how connected I am to it!  And I feel like I am missing an arm when I turn it off.  But that is precisely why I need a break from the computer.  I need to remember that God is on the throne, not me.  I need to nurture relationships with my husband and daughter (all too often, I turn away from them and to a screen).  I need to catch up on my enjoyable reading.  I need to breathe.

And it's amazing...really, amazing...how little I miss when I step away.  Until I do step away, I essentially believe that I will miss everything if I look away from my computer for a second.  And I suppose once and a while, I may miss something fun or important.  But most of the time, there isn't much going on that matters that much.  And even if I do miss something, it will still be there waiting for me the next day.

I can't tell you the relief and stress reduction I am feeling as I step away from my work for a short time to get the rest God counseled us to take.  God truly is wise. 

How do you find Sabbath in your day to day life?  I'd love to hear your experiences.

lean into the pain

One of the very best pieces of advice for life came to me in the very specific experience of childbirth preparation.

I studied the Bradley Method in preparation for giving birth.  Perhaps the most central and fundamental principle to the Bradley Method is this: rather than resisting the pain, lean into the pain.  Resistance is what causes greater pain.

But leaning into the pain is counter-intuitive.  When we feel something attacking our body, our natural reaction is to push it away, to try to make it stop.  Because this is our natural reaction (even though it isn't the most helpful reaction), the Bradley Method puts a couple through drills to train the laboring mother in this skill.  These drills involve the mother laying in a completely relaxed position and imagining the pain washing over her body, letting it happen to her, instead of resisting it, as her husband coaches her in relaxation exercises.

I found this approach remarkably helpful in labor, in dealing with the pain.  But since that time, I have found it helpful in dealing with everything from a Charley horse in bed in the middle of the night to grief to anxiety.  But I always initially forget that this is what I need to do.  It slips my mind and the natural human reaction of resisting pain instead of leaning into it sets in.  And I make it far worse.  I make my anxiety stronger and more dominant, I make my physical pain more intense, I make my grief more looming.

If you've been reading my blog for any length of time, you know that I battle depression and anxiety and have since my teen years.  You also know I came through a profoundly difficult struggle in my work as a pastor, a position I left only last December.  You know I battled insomnia and struggled profoundly with stress.  And you know that my father passed away a little over a year ago.  These are three profound stresses on me, but I too often find myself pushing their pain away.  I don't want to deal with them.  But then the heavy blanket of anxiety settles over me, suffocating my joy and energy.  The anxiety is a message.  It is saying, "Listen!  Pay attention!"  But I resist it and resist it.  I fight it.  I give my fears far more power than they deserve.  I say to them, "I can't listen to you!  You are too scary!  You will destroy me if I listen!"  I dig myself so deep in a dark hole that it becomes far harder to climb out.

In the past couple of weeks, the anxieties resurfaced again.  At first, I didn't know why they were coming back.  Was I just unbalanced chemically?  While it is true that I have a serotonin problem, I am beginning to think that I don't give enough justice to the heavy stresses I have faced in the last few years.  I stuffed many of my painful emotions during that time, and perhaps during my life in general.  I was too distracted by too many immediate needs of so many people, too distracted by crises, too distracted by simply surviving to deal with the deep pain and sorrow in my heart.  And when I came to Montana, I was too distracted by the good things: the beauty, the new friends, the hopeful things, settling in to a new home.  But now, as I am starting to feel at home in Montana, I am less distracted.  More of my attention is freed up to face some of the pain and losses from the past few years.  And it's hard.  Because I would prefer to be distracted.

One strategy that I have learned to use in dealing with anxiety is to speak out loud my greatest fear, in very bald terms.  It is pretty much always an exaggeration of something that would really happen.  But what I have learned to do is to speak these worse case scenario fears over and over again, exposing myself to the fear until it becomes boring.  While repeating the fear to myself, I keep track of my anxiety level.  It may start very high at a 80 or 90 and end up at a 40 or 30 or 10. 

I had a hard time with this exposure idea to begin with.  I was brought up to believe that you don't speak negative things or you may be bringing a curse on yourself.  It is the belief that words are powerful.  I certainly don't disagree that words are powerful but I am coming to realize that Jesus is more powerful and what I am doing when I speak my worst fears out loud, without qualifying them or saying things to make them less scary, is leaning into the pain so that it might be healed.  I think about it this way: I am going into a dark room with Jesus.  I am showing that my God is big enough to handle my worst fears, my worst anxieties.  He isn't intimidated by that stuff.  It is so counter-intuitive to much of what we are taught in Christian churches, but anxiety is a different animal altogether.  If it is resisted, it only gets stronger.

Leaning into the pain also applies to relationships.  I heard a wonderful interview with actor/musician Jeff Bridges on CNN's Piers Morgan last night.  Jeff married his wife, Sue, in 1977.  Unusually, for Hollywood, they have stayed together all this time.  He said that they have had hard times and disagreements over the years, and he said that what they have learned is to lean into those hard times, to view those times as opportunities for greater intimacy with each other.  What wisdom!  Of course, this does not work if a relationship is abusive, but for those of us with regular marriages, marriages that face challenges and ups and downs, this is excellent advice.  Will we let the stresses, pain, differences of opinion and personality, and arguments push us further from our spouse, or will we see in them an opportunity (which, frankly, doesn't come in easy times) to draw closer to one another, to know one another better? 

Again, in relationships (and of course, this can apply to friendships, as well), leaning into the pain is counter-intuitive.  We want to draw back, to be self-protective, to focus on justifying ourselves.  Or we may find that relationship is too painful, intimacy is too painful, and so we just withdraw.  Perhaps we don't formally leave the friendship or marriage, but we go through the motions, we do the bare minimum.  We shut off our hearts to the other person.  What good can possibly come from feeling the pain?

But just as in childbirth, closing ourselves off to relational pain can sometimes lead to greater pain.  In the resistance to the pain, we make ourselves more miserable than if we had simply walked through the dark relational valley.  Our hearts become muted and dark and empty.  We feel alone.  There is no real intimacy in our lives.

We hunger for intimacy, for depth, for wholeness, for a life of purpose.  But the only way to grow toward these things is to lean into the pain, when it comes.  This doesn't mean seeking out pain but it means being willing to open our hearts to it when it comes.  It means being willing to feel and grieve our losses, to allow God to soften our hearts, to open our hearts toward others. 

I am learning this.  But as I said, it is counter-intuitive.  I don't want pain anymore than you do.  But oh the relief when I allow it in, instead of fighting it.  It still hurts, but honestly, it doesn't hurt as bad.  It doesn't hurt in such an empty way.  Rather, I empty the pain out of my heart through the vulnerability of tears, honesty, facing my fears.  And so I walk this journey that is so central to being human.  One day we will no longer need to feel pain.  But until then, we are never alone.  Even in the moments when we feel most alone.

relapse

You may have noticed a decrease in frequency of posts on the blog in the past few weeks.  There is a reason for that.  I was unexpectedly blindsided by a relapse of depression and anxiety this past month.  And at first I was embarrassed to write about it.  I build this blog on the picture of a happy mother, writer and cook, living the dream in the gorgeous Flathead Valley.  I didn’t want to show you the struggles I was still having.  I didn’t even want to show them to myself.  But I couldn’t write a gushy post either because it just wasn’t true.  And I hate things that aren’t true.  I owe it to you to give you an honest blog, a true account of what it is to be a mother, to be me the Mother.

So, yes, March was a month of being blindsided.  I say blindsided, because after such a difficult year last year, the year in which my father died, the year in which I underwent strong conflict at the church I pastored, the year in which I struggled to give up my job for the sake of being with my daughter, the year in which I battled insomnia, the year in which I underwent a biopsy…after all of that, there is so much going well in my life.

For the first time in at least 4 years, I have friends nearby that I can call, spend time with, and be myself with.  I live in a beautiful area surrounded by the splendor of God’s creation—beautiful, snow-capped mountains, a glistening lake.  I am finally able to follow my heart and be home with my daughter.  I have a wonderful husband who is thriving in his new call, and is highly supportive of me.  I have many ways to express and broaden my love of cooking.  There is something enjoyable to do in the community all the time.  I have the pleasure of sitting in a Bible study and just listening and soaking it in as a respite for the soul.  For Pete’s sake, I have this blog…and I’m finally writing again for the first time in years.  There is so much going right in my life.

And yet, I found myself yet again stricken with high anxiety and a strong dose of depression.  It made me very upset with myself because there is no earthly reason I should feel that way.

I began to feel really hopeless.  Would I never escape this?  Could I really not let myself be happy?

I read recently in one of my books about anxiety that it often hits when things are going “too well.”  A person who struggles with anxiety almost does a little better sometimes when there is an external, challenging situation.  It sucks up their attention, gives them a visible enemy to fight.  But in good times, our nature still is on “high alert,” still expects struggle and conflict and picks a fight with itself.

Yet again, my internal conflict became so physical and scary that I finally took myself back to the doctor.  I found it impossible to sleep without my sleeping pill, felt hopeless, had racing thoughts.  I began to feel really bad like clock-work at 3:30 or 4 in the afternoon.  Then one day, I had an anxiety attack that lasted all day.  That was the day I trucked myself in to the doctor.

A week or two later, I am feeling better each day.  I was able to talk things out with a friend who was understanding and listened.  A dosage adjustment of my antidepressant has helped a great deal.  I’ve also been working hard to improve my diet.  (I think I got a bit overly excited at all the delicious desserts available in the Flathead and had been consuming way too much white sugar and white flour.)  After doing some reading on the internet about a diet to help with depression and anxiety, I am bumping up my whole grains, flax seed, and walnut consumption (low blood sugar seems to greatly increase my anxiety).  I’ve lowered my coffee consumption a bit.  I’m trying to eat other Omega-3 rich foods like fish and avocado.  I’ve dug out books on anxiety and the issues I struggle with and am working on facing my anxieties, instead of running from them.  Turns out the more we suppress and run from our anxieties, the more they dominate our lives.  Antidepressants work to help us better cope with anxieties, but they don’t eliminate them from our lives.  And if we run from those anxieties, we will still have to come back and cope with them later.

I feel good about the fact that yesterday although I had two or three attacks of anxiety, I was able to work through them.  I was able to lean into the anxiety and face the fear and find relief.

The sun is out for the second day in a row and that helps too.

I’ve come to see that I am a person in recovery from anxiety and depression.  I will probably never fully live without it.  But it doesn’t have to dominate my life and doesn’t mean I can’t experience joy.  I will have relapses.  I’m sure of that.  Sometimes they might make logical sense and sometimes they might not.  But if I can lean into the anxiety, the fear will pass and I will gain courage for the next challenge.  There is a full and wonderful life to be lived, even for a person like me that struggles with this disorder.

how I came to be a stay-at-home mommy in montana

This time last year, I was beginning to fray at the edges.  

Ok, I had started to fray a while back.  The truth is, in recent months, I was finally beginning to admit to myself that I was fraying at the edges.  I had a one year old daughter (who I will call “Burrito” for reasons I’ll explain in another post).  My husband and I were serving as pastors of two churches in rural North Dakota.  My father had just been placed on Hospice in Arizona, and I was trying to provide effective care for the wide-ranging needs of 600 or so members of our churches and attempting to still care well for my little family.  And I had just begun to suffer from serious insomnia a few months before. 

The lowest of the low point was the weekend of our biggest service at our northern congregation.  The service was during the big town celebration in a predominantly Icelandic community.  This little North Dakota town didn’t have a lot of notoriety throughout the rest of the year, but every August during the celebration of Icelandic independence from Denmark (the “Deuce of August”), large crowds gathered for the festival.  Important people journeyed from the homeland, including the Prime Minister of Iceland on two of the four summers we were there.  Each year, we conducted a worship service in the heart of the festival and it always turned out to be one of the best attended services of the year.

On this particular day in August, it was my turn to preach.  I had not slept for four nights before this (seemingly out of nowhere) and as I stood up to give my message to the large crowd, I remember the room swaying around me.  I remember a feeling of wispiness and unreality.  It was all I could do to keep my focus on each sentence and try to read what I had written.  My lips and whole body felt weighted down under each heavy word.  When I finished, I collapsed, exhausted, into my chair and my husband led the rest of the service, as we had agreed.

For four nights, I had not slept.  I was wrung out and exhausted and my bed at night became a torture chamber of fear.  Watch the clock.  Count the minutes.  Mind wide-awake.  Unable to shut it down.  “If I go to sleep RIGHT NOW, I can have four hours of sleep.  But I must go to sleep RIGHT NOW.”  But of course, I couldn’t.  It was like I had literally forgotten how to sleep.

Yes, that was the low point.

As you will come to see, I am a particularly stubborn individual.  I was beginning to feel the pull of the exhaustion months and months before.  Some of you might not know a pastor or a pastor’s life very well.  But if you’ve been in any sort of leadership position, you might understand a bit of what I was going through.

I got into ministry because I loved God and His Word and I wanted to share it with others.  I think I was more attached to this work of ministry than I was to the idea of being a mother, in fact.  I had grown up dreaming about getting married and about doing an important work in the world (Writing a book?  Being a missionary?), but not too much about having a baby.  More about that later.

What I didn’t count on was the 24-7 nature of being a pastor.  When you are a pastor, you can get called anytime of the day or night and there’s no telling what kind of situation you will face: someone’s drunken rantings, an expected death, a tragic death, someone’s anger due to your own fault or not due to anything you did at all.  There are countless expectations put on you, some intended, some not.  Everybody who sits in the pew has a different idea of what you should be doing with your time.  Some are charitable, some are not.  That’s human nature; that’s people.  And that’s the burden of leadership.  It goes with the territory, and it went ok for a while, I guess.  Until I had a baby.

The most surprising thing that happened to me when my daughter was born and as I got to know her in the months that followed was the profound love that absolutely captured my heart for her.  Suddenly, my new role as mother—previously not very interesting to me—became the dominant role of my life. 

I know, I know.  Everybody says this will happen to you when you have kids, but you see I really didn’t understand kids before Burrito was born.  I had never babysat a child under the age of 5.  I had never changed a diaper.  I wondered if I had what it took to be a mother.  I had always been much more attached to the idea of having a career or a ministry than the idea of being a mom.  The idea of having a baby was to me something I wanted to be sure to do before I died.  But it was also something I was frankly scared to death of.  But I couldn’t have been more mistaken about how much I was going to love being a mother.

Now, don’t get me wrong.  I’m not going to tell you those first few months were easy.  You watch these chick flick movies about having a baby and you think you are supposed to have these rapturous feelings about your screaming, diaper messing little one from day one…even though they are a bit of a stranger to you.  I didn’t have those rapturous feelings all the time right away.

First of all, I got off to a rough start.  I was going to have a home birth, and Burrito didn’t want to come and didn’t want to come.  I was in pretty intense labor at home for two days before I decided, “Yep, I need to go to the hospital.”  Like I said, I’m pretty stubborn.  (And apparently, so is my daughter.)

So, I had a c-section, and I was absolutely exhausted after that.  My maternity leave was spent trying to heal up from the trauma on my body and journeying through a painful start to nursing.

I remember that in the early days it was easy to resent the baby who never wanted to go to sleep and who woke up so often.  I remember the despair and exhaustion and the physical pain from the c-section.  I remember how I felt it physically when she cried.

Yes, those days were tough.  We had family and friends come and help us the first couple of weeks but I was pretty stubborn there too.  I could have gotten a little more help, I think, but somehow it was important to me to do things for myself, my way.  I wanted to own those early days.  But I was very, very tired.

But even in the most painful times, there was this strong attachment to my daughter.  I have never before felt it physically in my body when another human being cried, but I felt it with her.  I think we bonded early on over the trauma we had been through…me to bring her into the world, her to adjust to the world she had been brought into.  I think we neither one like change too well at first.

I went back to work, and I was trying to work, care for the family, take care of the baby, nurse the baby every couple of hours, and somehow remember to eat.  I felt like I was letting everybody down.  I felt really, really empty.  I remember one time agreeing to go to a meeting for a funeral when I should have been nursing and how crummy I felt and how I knew I shouldn’t have done that but how I felt I would let the grieving family down if I didn’t go.

A family friend cautioned me that if things didn’t start getting better for me soon, I might have to face that I was asking too much of myself and my health.  She said I might need to think about making some major changes in my life.  I shrugged her comments off.  No way.  I’m super woman.  I can do this.

I did start going to counseling, and it was helpful, but that was before the onset of the insomnia.  When it began, my counselor convinced me to go to the doctor.  I finally went.  I have battled anxiety and depression since at least my teen years, but I finally had to admit that this had gotten out of control.  Medication slowly began to bring stability back to my life.  I could handle the stress much better, but I still felt like I was letting people down: my husband, my baby, my churches.  Honestly, I want to do things so whole-heartedly, so when I feel I am not giving something my all, it bothers me a lot.  But I was doing better, so I slogged through. In the rural towns in North Dakota where we served, pastors come and go a lot.  It’s pretty tough on people and I really wanted to not let them down, to give this thing a chance.  In my head, I was committed to a ten year stint with them.  I even told some people that that was what I hoped to do.

But then things began to turn.  To add to the stress, my Dad died in February of 2010.  I had barely had a chance to mourn his loss when some major church conflicts and threats on my job began in the summer.  This time I didn’t stop sleeping, but it was awfully stressful.  And I was willing to go through it, to not take the easy way out, but more factors circled around and without going into all the sad details, it became clear…it was time to go. 

We were planning to join a different denomination (kinda like the “brand” of church) and since there were smaller numbers of churches and positions in this “brand”  available, we decided my husband would be the one to look for a call.  To our surprise, he quickly jumped to the top of the list at a church in Bigfork, MT.  My first reaction was “Montana?!”  As far as I knew, there was no state more isolated than North Dakota, except maybe Montana! 

But when I started to look online and when we came to visit, all that changed.  Here was a magical land of trees and mountains, of gourmet food and fine theatre, but the safety of a small town.  I quickly became very excited about Montana. 

But the biggest joy about Montana was that here I could do what my heart had been calling me to do for two years.  Here I could be free to focus on my daughter and her care.  Here I could stop missing out on her priceless moments.  Here I could stop feeling so divided all the time.  And what a surprise it has been that this was my heart’s desire!  I thought I was just a career woman, but my daughter has completely changed my life.  She has turned my desires into something completely different.  She has awakened my heart.  There is no place I’d rather be right now than home with her.  And that is a blessing that this time last year I couldn’t have even predicted.

There’s so much more I want to share with you about my life and the journey of motherhood.  So, stay tuned!