Revelations & reflections

"Not only so, but we rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love in our hearts."

~ Rom. 5:3&4

I'm not crazy. That may sound like an obvious statement to many of you, but the day I realized what was happening with my body was not in my head but actually happening, it was a revelation. I was really starting to think that I was losing my mind. I was taking my thoughts captive (by that I mean when thoughts like "what if I have terminal cancer & die tomorrow" entered my head I didn't entertain them), reading my bible, seeking the Lord, really being changed in my innermost parts but I was still having these "episodes" that took it out of me for the entire day. I was at a loss, exhausted, still feeling sick and beginning to get discouraged, then I checked my email. I had a friend who had emailed me a week before but I hadn't had a chance to read it. Turns out she had read my blogs and thought what I was going through sounded very similar to her experience with a gallbladder in it's death throes. After reading her email and googling "gallbladder dysfunction" it was like a spotlight turned on in my brain- "THIS IS IT!" I told myself, feeling a glimmer of hope that I might not be sick forever. I'm sure that sounds melodramatic to many of you but those of you who have been sick for a long time without knowing why (or maybe you do) know what I am talking about.

Rather than go through all the details, I'll cut a potentially long story short. I called my ND, asked her to make some appointments to get it tested, learned my gallbladder was functioning at 51% at it's best, saw a surgeon, spent a few hours in outpatient surgery....now, almost two weeks later, I feel incredible. I'm not 100% yet, I was sick for awhile and I don't expect to be bouncing off the walls immediately. Still, I can eat food without getting horrible ill, no corn and wheat, but everything else I want! Even better still, is I learned that the gb had been going out for years (pathology report) which means in another few weeks I should feel better then I have in years! It is so wonderful to have answers and I am so thankful to be on the mend.

Once again I am not sharing to give you reason to have sympathy for me, or just to talk about my health issues (like David's Granny, whom I love but boy oh boy can she talk your ear off about her bodily functions). During the last part of my illness, after learning the cause, and during my recovery I have really reflected on the events of the past few months. A small part of me wondered if I had just given my symptoms to my ND in the first place, rather than diagnose myself with various things (panic attacks included), if she would have been able to figure out the source of my problem sooner. I suspect that she would have, apparently my symptoms are pretty textbook for someone with a gallbladder on the fritz and she is pretty smart. The larger part of me is glad that it took time to diagnose, thankful for the time I thought I was suffering terrible panic attacks. No, I do not enjoy being sick, tired and starving but if I had not spent those weeks at the end of myself I might have continued to stay where I was on the inside. I might not have recognized the areas of my heart I had let get grimy, or seen the mountain of baggage I had stored away in a room in there just waiting to ambush me.

I recently read a small booklet written by the late Charles Haun entitled "The Wilderness of the Red Sea & Shur" where he talked a lot about those times of trial we all go through. Many people are stumped (ourselves included) when Christian's go through hard times. Somewhere along the way there developed a misconception of what Christianity is, surely a kind God would shield His believers from trouble, right? The truth people fail to see is the world we live in is full of trouble, has been since Eve first tasted the fruit, it's not the way God intended it to be but in giving us free will it was a risk He took. Of course, He knew the outcome, so I suppose it wasn't a true risk but to be honest it makes me love Him all the more. He knew we would hurt Him, knew many would turn their backs on Him, all would sin and yet He created us anyway, so that He could restore us, love us, have relationship with us- kinda knocks my socks off.

Anyway, I am getting off topic...sort of. What I loved about the booklet I read is how candid Pastor Haun is about trials, how the truth is sometimes God allows us (even leads us, look at the Israelites out of Egypt) to walk through things in order to reveal to us our true state of being. I don't know if this applies to every trial, the world is full of suffering, Christians don't get a "get out of jail free" card for it, but I know one thing for certain, regardless of the trial God is right there with us, always. Anyway, I believe God allowed me to walk for a time thinking my problem was in my head. I had no idea the gunk hiding in the depths of my heart, nor was I aware of those issues I had. He didn't allow it to condemn me but to bring deliverance for me from those things. Charles Haun said it like this "Why the bitter experience? They are used by God in an attempt to bring us out of unbelief and into perfect trust and rest". It's about restoration, not destruction, God is all about bringing us to a place of pure joy in Him, not sadness in the world. The bible says "it is for freedom He set us free" (Gal. 5:1), plain and simple. A heart restored and set free is free to believe the truth of God's word; what He says about our lives, about His love for us.

The truth of all of this doesn't mean I haven't struggled in the past few months, that I haven't had my mellow dramatic, "woe is me moments". There have been a lot of things changing in my heart and change is sometimes, often times, painful. I have had to recognize areas of hurt in my life, relive emotions I had stuffed way down thinking I had dealt with them. I have had to forgive myself and others, to let go. All of these things can be tough, but what I am gaining is priceless, freedom and the ability to accept the love God has for me, to see myself as He sees me. I am gaining a slow shedding of the filters I have added to my vision over the years that have led me to misinterpret people, misunderstand them or simply misguided me as I walked through this life. We all have them, whether we recognize them or not, I certainly didn't see mine. They are a result of our life's experience and we often slap them on unintentionally, we are human after all and often see our lives as the sum of our experiences. What I am learning is what I've done doesn't make up who I am, who I am is who Christ made me to be and I want to be that girl.

So I urge you, if you are struggling in life to spend some time in prayer/reflection upon it all. Open your heart up fully, lay it all bare. You may see things in there that aren't pretty, hurtful experiences you forgot about. The beautiful thing is that God is right beside you, looking in too, reaching out to take those things from you and replace them with love, truth and freedom.

Panic, nausea & a whole lot of grace

"We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed."

~2 Corinthians 4:8-9

To say the past month has been rough on me is a fairly large understatement. I suffered from panic attacks years & years ago, partially a result of birth control but I hadn't had a full blown one in YEARS before having one on the 21st of May. It came out of nowhere, took me by surprise and sent me reeling for a few weeks. Anxiety begets anxiety in a vicious cycle if you cannot stop it. The first attack was followed by a smaller one Sunday, and 2 more the following Thursday & Friday. Right about when I caught a digestive bug, which wrecked havoc on my body for nearly a week before subsiding. In the middle of all of that my reflux became unbearable leading to near debilitating nausea, (I think it was made worse by the bug)...so that's been my month, at least the tough parts of it.

Before I go further I should clear the air about panic attacks because I think many people who have not experienced them do not understand (even those of us who have don't really). To a degree they are controllable, you can stop yourself from allowing the anxiety, thoughts, etc... from taking hold & resulting in a panic attack. Sometimes, however, your body goes there regardless of your conscious effort to stop it. Your "fight or flight" instinct overrides the rest of your nervous system, adrenaline is dumped and off you go. They aren't fun, they're terrible to say the least and the "fall out" afterward (a result of the adrenaline wearing off) is nearly as bad as the actual attack. They can hit you out of nowhere, whether you are feeling particularly anxious or not. For example, I've had one hit me in the middle of a pleasant dinner with friends, no obvious reason what so ever.

Anyway, I do not share this with you to complain about what I have been through but to share what God has done in my life and heart in the midst of it all. You see, I'm a hypochondriac, there I said it. I am not sure when it began but somewhere along the way I started freaking out at the thought of dying & consequently freaking out about every little thing that may (or may not) be going on with my body. During the first round of panic attacks, in 2001 I think, I was constantly afraid I was going to suffer a brain aneurism and die. I wasn't completely unfounded in thinking something was wrong with my head, my neck turned out to be so out of line it took several visits to the chiropractor to fix it, but the mere fact that my brain assumed it was life threatening was enough. At the time I thought I was losing my mind, because a part of me knew that it was in my head (no pun intended) but I couldn't control my mind from going there. Those of you who were around me at the time know for that month or two I was volatile, emotional, slightly depressed & utterly at a loss as to what was happening. Eventually we learned that the year I had spent on birth control had left me hormonally off balance & suffering heart palpitations, so I got off of it. I spent time in prayer, got some counseling and over time the attacks stopped.

So there, there's where I've been and a little about what I suffered. I imagine you can gather from what I told you above that when my first major panic attack in years struck I was beside myself. It was so bad I had to pull my car over, fortunately I was near a family friend's shop and she was able to pray with me. I was embarrassed, shocked and honestly, ashamed, I had a lot of shame regarding my "issue”. Part of the reason I am sharing now is to push myself past that shame, to allow God to heal me through writing but also to help anyone else who may suffer panic attacks from feeling that same shame. There is nothing to be ashamed of if you suffer panic attacks, the shame will only serve to keep you in the place where you may keep having them, so let it go, you'll feel better for it.

Shortly after the first attack I began to pray, fervently, passionately crying out to God. The truth is in the last several years I have lived a pretty stagnate Christian life. After all God has done for me, after all I have seen, I was as stale as bread left out for a week. I still looked like a Christian from the outside, but on closer inspection I was getting hard & brittle, with little "nutrition" to offer anyone. Some of you may be surprised at this confession, I hid it well, but it's the truth. I had become so distracted by worldly things, face book, tv, books, etc...I had lost sight of my God and as a result, lost sight of who I truly am, who God desires to make me into, all that I could be. I was bitter, frustrated, depressed, more cynical, easier to offend, quicker to anger, essentially of the things that I really am not, but it was what I was becoming. That panic attack was a wake up call, I was drowning and I didn't even know my feet were wet.

I'd like to tell you that my crying out brought instantaneous deliverance, but it didn't. Following my decision to listen to what I felt God was telling me; no more crime tv for awhile, no more secular crime novels (here is where my compromising was really evident, some of the books I read where garbage), no more checking face book 50x a day, get my bootie to Fresh Start, forgive my husband; I had the hardest week I have had in ages. It's like Satan took one look at my rapidly changing heart and said "oh crap, better start chucking the good stuff at her", in an attempt to cut my legs out from under me before I had even fully stood. I had two more panic attacks that next week, big ones and I got sick, real sick. I am not sure how much of my illness was a bug and how much was reflux/anxiety related stuff but boy did I feel terrible. I felt terrible, add to it my flair for the "health dramatic" and I was reeling even more. Here's the thing though, God was there. He did not abandon me the moment I slid right back into my hypochondriac mind, or had another panic attack, he did not wash his hands of my humanity. He stood by me, held me up, gave me scripture and held me close when I needed it. At one point I was so lost as to what to pray for I just opened my bible & read straight from it, only to find the words were exactly what I was feeling. He helped me to begin to see the root of my issues, the areas in my heart that needed a revamping. I did see a doctor for the physical aspect of it, because something truly was going on. I was able to get medicine for my reflux, medical advice on some other issues. The nausea took awhile to subside, I imagine because my reflux was so bad, but slowly I began to feel better.

I did have yet another panic attack, about 10 days after the bad ones, while camping with friends. It felt out of the blue, although it had been an emotionally/physically exhausting day, it happened before I even had a chance to think about what was happening. Thankfully it didn't last long, the "fall out" was rough, adding to the adrenaline was the fact my electrolytes were out of balance from some other digestive "issues". Even worse then that was my disappointment in the fact it happened at all. I was mad, frustrated and ashamed. I felt like I had failed, like wasn't doing what I was supposed to, or I wasn't strong enough to beat it, or maybe God had deserted me after all (I mean it's not like I've been a good friend to him lately). Later that same night I opened a year-long devotional (Beth Moore's Breaking Free) I had recently purchased to the day’s date. This is what it said:

"Here is the endurance & the faith of the saints".~ Revelation 13:10

How does a believer get her thoughts to bow to the truth? By believing, speaking, and applying the truth as a lifestyle. This step is something we live, not just something we do.

We can't just shout "Sit!" and expect the dog to stay there for a week. We've worked long and hard to get that dog to sit, but it's not going to sit forever. We don't achieve victory once and never have to bother with that thought problem again. Our thought life is something we'll be working on the rest of our lives in our desire to be godly.

I have to tell you, I nearly laughed out loud when I read this. Not because it’s funny, but because of how incredible God is. I mean, come on, what are the odds that on that day Beth Moore would address in her devotional (365 pages long) the very thing I was struggling with? My guess is they are pretty high, until you add the "God factor". God speaks in a variety of ways, it isn't always a booming voice from a burning bush (in fact I've never had a "Moses experience") sometimes it's through other people, even people we've never met in a book we'd never heard of until stumbling upon it on amazon.com. Let me tell you what though, I got the message. I've got to be patient, to wait patiently upon God, seeking him, crying out to him, telling him how I feel; whether it's fear, anger, frustration, elation, disappointment, excitement, sadness, joy, etc... He wants me to give it ALL to him, the good, the bad & the ugly. He desires relationship with me, ME- the one who had neglected him for years, ME- who sometimes lets my imagination get the better of me, ME- who let myself become so engrossed in the world I was reading books full of swearing/horrible crimes, ME- who allowed bitterness/anger to change my relationship with my husband, & effect my relationships with friends & family. The truth is he doesn't see me as any of these things, he sees past my failures into my heart, he sees me as he meant for me to be, to who I truly am- not the mess I made of myself. He loves Renee, that's it, no labels just me and I am thankful. Those who don't share my faith may think that it was my strength of character or will that has slowly lifted my feet from the muck I was in, I can assure it was not. My "strength of will" was gone, the only place I was going was down, sinking further into my pit until I lost myself in it.

I am currently in a process, I am not totally free from being a hypochondriac, even today I struggled with wondering what exactly had happened in the pool during the tri. I didn’t entertain the thought, wouldn’t “go there”, I prayed and gave it up to God. What’s the worse case? I have some crazy heart defect that’s going to kill me someday, so what. I trust God, I trust him with my life, I trust him with my family. If I can “settle in the extreme” as my cousin calls it, I take away the very tool the enemy is using to try and destroy me, fear. No, I don’t really think I have a heart defect that is going to kill me, I’m just saying. God is working in me and I have full faith that one day I will be free, God wants to set me free. He doesn’t want to see me bound by fear, but joyous in him. I am excited for what God is doing, the changes he has made in my heart and the impact those changes have already had on my family. I am expectant for great things in my future. Does this mean my life will be roses & chocolate from now on? Certainly not, it never is, but I can find joy in God, always.

"I waited patiently for the Lord, he turned to me and hear my cry.

He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the muck and the mire;

he set my feet upon a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.

He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God.

Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord."

~Psalm 40:1-3