lover

Anxiety is a funny thing and by funny I mean awful. I remember being in my last year of college, laying the driver's seat back, feeling like I couldn't inhale enough air, thinking I'm going to die here in my car in the Sun Dome parking lot and because USF sucks and everyone sucks and life sucks no one will even come to help me. Just saying it again makes me sick. I was having a panic attack. I'd had them before but I didn't know what they were (I just thought I was crazy) and they were never that bad. I had been experiencing numbness and tingling sensations in my arms and legs. I wasn't sleeping well. Nothing made me happy. I felt lost, alone, purposeless. I was living at home still and after a year of feeling this way my parents finally decided to make me one million doctor appointments. I saw the pediatrician first, at 19 I saw a pediatrician. He wasn't the normal one I saw, but he was kind and liked my jokes. He referred me to a neurologist who sent me for an echo of my heart, an MRI of my head and neck, and a ton of blood work. Good news- everything came back fine! Bad news- I still felt like shit.

I'm not sure exactly when I started to feel better. Dan and I got married a few months later and there would be nights in our first apartment when I couldn't sleep and I felt frantic and we'd walk the blocks around our house late into the night. At some point, though, I started to feel better and so I moved on and didn't think about anxiety. I had a baby less than a year after that so all my attention went there, to Emma and to trying to sleep and to making sure I kept her alive. I was fine for four-ish years except that I never addressed any of the anxiety I had felt and I had very few emotional supporters besides my husband and I still tried to live the life I was "supposed" to live- happy, working/contributing, super-mom, world's best wife, cleanest house, rested, full of energy. BLAHBLAHBLAH. So, as to be expected with anxiety it showed up unexpectedly again in January 2015 and tried to take my life.

I traveled to Missouri in January to visit some old, very dear friends. I flew ALONE for the first time. And I even had connecting flights. I made it. I was a little nervous I wouldn't given my emotional and mental state, but I made it. Another thing about anxiety, it robs you of all other feelings. And when you feel anxious all your attention is there on the things that make you afraid, not on the actual, beautiful things that are right in front of you. Anxiety robs us of the best gift we have in life- the present moment. And I hate that. Over a year of my life was stolen by anxiety. Panic attacks by day, fearful thoughts about this being the end of my life at night. Nothing made me happy, nothing made sense, nothing added meaning to my life. I was anxious, depressed, and suicidal. Me. A 26 year-old stay-at-home-mom living in sunny Florida.

At the time we had one car and I was trapped at home with our then four year-old daughter most days. I would get a ride most Thursdays to church to attend a women's Bible study group. There was childcare and there were other adults to talk to- I was in! One of my favorite people was there too, friend of my heart, more like a sister than anything. We sat together, huddled, talking about the things that were most important to us and the things that hurt us. It was the best part of every week for me during the high anxiety time. In February my sister-friend asked me to see a therapist. She always prefaces her requests with "no pressure" because she knows I need permission to say or do whatever I want when it comes to making hard calls. She gave me the name and number of her therapist, told me she was local and I could get in as soon as possible. I held onto the number for another month in denial. The mental mixtape playing songs like, "I shouldn't be having a meltdown because I have a beautiful life" and "What will my family think when they find out I'm going to therapy?"

Aside: this is 100% difficult to write. I'm not that far removed from the high anxiety time. I'm afraid that if I write about it and remember it and feel all the feels, anxiety will overthrow love and grace and rule over my life again. I literally just asked Dan to pray with me. When I don't feel strong enough, I rally my people. Usually we pray. Prayer is my first line of defense in the war to believe truth over lies. I am safe, held by God because Psalm 139:5 says, "You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me." I am not ruled by fear because 2 Timothy 1:7 says, "God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." So, I continue to do hard things. Because God is with me and he will never let me go.

Back to therapy. I finally called after holding the therapist's (let's call her Erica) number tight for over a month. I filled out ALL the paperwork and scheduled my first session online. The day of my first session came and I was beyond nervous to say to someone Hi, I have a problem and then ask for help. I waited for Dan to come home from work and then I drove myself in our one car to therapy. When I got there Erica was still with another client so I sat in the waiting room, sweating and stressing about all the things that could possibly go horribly wrong during my session. You know, normal people things. But Erica came to get me wearing a big snuggly cardigan and the kindest smile and I knew I'd be ok. I think I cried more than anything else during that first session. I remember focusing my attention on my senses and detailing all the things I could hear, taste, smell, touch (my eyes were closed). At the end of that exercise I felt so relaxed. I even asked if I could sleep on her couch in her office. She got me. And at a time when I needed a support system but didn't have a very functional one in my real life, Erica stepped in for me. We did battle together. We prayed and fought against "the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" that oppressed me (more on that later if you have questions). She helped me get my life back.

I went to see Erica every week in the beginning for the first two months, I think. In one of those first few sessions we talked about my name. I'm sure I was rattling off all the things I was upset about with my life, how nothing was fulfilling, how trapped I felt. Erica did this thing that she doesn't normally do- she interrupted me. She said something like, "I think you're being called by the wrong name. I want you to ask God what name he's given you. All these things you're focusing on, all the things you're trying to be and do, they're ill-fitting. They're not what he has for you." So I did the eye roll thing I do and I was like, "Fine. I'll ask him." And she was like, "No. Do it right now. And ask aloud." So I rolled my eyes again, believing that God would hear me but probably not give me a straight answer because sometimes following God feels like stumbling through a labyrinth in the dark. I asked aloud what name he had for me. Erica said we'd wait as long as it took, but that didn't matter because I immediately knew what my name was. The one God gave me when he was forming me in the dark and in utter seclusion, as he knit me together in my mother's womb (see Psalm 139). Lover. I heard it so clearly in my mind and felt it so strongly in my heart. Lover. And when I said it aloud it felt a little silly, like true things often do after you've been mucking about in the lies for so long. But my name is perfect. It's so fitting. Of course it is; God knew. He continues to know what he's doing even when I don't.

As I become more of myself, more Lover and less everything else, I see that the high anxiety time was necessary. It was necessary for shaking off all my old identifiers, all the pressures and expectations that had been heaped on me by others or often by myself. God's been holding my hand the whole time while the old, untrue things fall off and away. The one thing I'm left with is my unshakeable core, the truth that undergirds everything- I am me, no more, no less, and I am God's, held and loved by him forever. Sometimes I still feel afraid. Some days are long and I crawl to my bed exhausted by 7:30 pm. But now I am brave, which means doing hard things even if I feel scared. And now I am empowered because I know God is making me more and more into my Lover-self, he's making me new. My new creation-self is my Lover-self is my self. And I'm so happy about this I could cry (I mean, let's face it, I probably will cry). I'm so grateful God didn't give up on me. Neither did Dan or Erica or my sweet sister-friend. And I couldn't have done any of this without them. Thank you. THANK YOU!

Maybe believing in any god at all is hard for you. Maybe believing that the God of people who claim to be Jesus followers is hard for you. I hope that wherever you wander, your heart finds peace. Sometimes you have to just wait and let the truth wash over you and over you and over you. This song has soothed my heart and been my prayer almost every day for the last month. Maybe it will be yours too.

I love you, friends. Go bravely and listen carefully for your true name.

May grace and peace be with you today.

Love,
Leah