I am going to admit it.
This life is difficult and we will face challenges.
The past two days, I have been very hypervigilant, particularly in the
afternoon. Very jumpy. I jump at the slightest clap or loud noise.
But the greatest thing is that I was able to control my hypervigilance for the first time yesterday. I stopped it before it became a bigger issue.
How?
I reminded myself that God was with me. I said Psalm 23 over and over in my head. Whenever I’ve been
having flashbacks lately, I have been reminding myself that God is there and He
will never let me go, never leave me, never abandon me.
As I’ve mentioned before in previous posts, I grew up in a
very difficult family situation. I grew up knowing almost every police officer.
I grew up hearing “You have the right to remain
silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”
I grew up watching my family being torn apart by violence. Threats. Punching
walls. Stealing to pay for drugs. You name it, I saw it.
Part of my hypervigilance comes from not being understood or believed. This stems from feeling alone my entire life. I felt like nobody had my back, except for God.
I clung to Scripture because it has always
given me so much hope, even in the darkest times in my life. When I felt alone, when I cried myself to sleep, I
clung to the hope found in the Bible. I clung to the hope that there really is a God who loves me and my pastors at my church were really telling the truth. I decorated my room with Scripture. I
read my Bible day and night as a teenager. I even gave a children’s sermon at my
church on Youth Sunday. I went to church when nobody else in my family wanted
to go.
Why?
Because there is so much power in God,
Christ and the Holy Spirit. There is so much grace and mercy found in Jesus.
I broke down this morning. I was praying at
church during a 24 hour prayer time as I looked up at a cross.
It really spoke to me. Christ humbled himself and suffered for all of us. There is so much power in that. I do not
know if I can really get it across in a blog post how truly magnificent and
powerful that is. God loved us so much that He sacrificed His son.
Through my anxiety and the different issues
I deal with on a daily basis, much of which is a result of my upbringing, I
realize that we are truly never alone. No matter how alone you feel, no matter
how dark your life feels, no matter how bad you think you cannot go on any
longer, know that there is a God who loves you unconditionally. No matter what
you’ve done or not done.
And he understands you…
I wrote this poem a few years ago when I
felt very misunderstood.
I am
Was
Will be
Misunderstood
The pain
No one understands
The tears
No one understands
The fear
No one understands
The nightmares
No one understands
The flashbacks
No one understands
Reliving day after day
What made me
Different
What made me feel
weird
disgusting
Misunderstood
No one understands
But God
I can say all I want about God, but honestly I do not know
everything about Him. What I have said in this blog comes from years and years of studying
the Bible, listening to sermons, attending and leading Bible studies and just
being in the presence of God.
But His Word, His truth, His strength, and His presence in my life is what has carried me this far.
It honestly is not by my strength. Yes, I’ve worked hard to get to where I
am. But God has continually saved my life, literally. He has been and always will be the
only stable thing in my life.
When all else fails, He understands, He cares, He loves, He
forgives, and most importantly, He helps me continue to move forward.
And He does the same for you.
“If God be for us, who can be against us?” –Romans 8:31 (KJV)
No matter what you’re going through, I hope
you know that you can continue to fight, knowing that God is with you every
step of the way.
There have been many songs on my playlist
that have been on replay, specifically about overcoming fear so I wanted to
share one of my favorites: Unafraid by Joy Williams
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