There once was a little mennonite girl who had a dream. A dream that one day she would be grown up, married, and have children. That was her whole dream. That little mennonite girls dream came true on February 16, 1999 and that is when her world started falling apart.
She had a son, a beautiful son, but when he was born the attention shifted from her to him. How do you love a squirmy, demanding child who steals all the limelight? And when it's a defenseless infant where can all that anger go?
So she took her anger, her confusion, her hopelessness and FEAR and swallowed it whole.
Only problem was it kept bubbling up. Insomnia, anxiety, depression, need for control, Perfectionism, prescription drugs: zoloft, trazadone, celexa, ambien, paxil, effexor, seroquel, wellbutrin, xanax, invega, lamictal, multiple daily doses of 1 mg xanax.
Life was lived; crippled, limping along.
In May of 2007 the little mennonite girl became suicidal.
She found the number for the Meier clinic in Wheaton Illinois, 7 hours away, called them, they offered a 3 week program. She would need to stay in a hotel there would be no meals provided and it was very expensive. She looked at the calendar and saw that June would be used up and her eyes filled with tears again. Her children ages 8 and 3 were used to this sight. Mommy had tears a lot. She was a shaking, constipated, terrified, heavily medicated, suicidal little mennonite woman when she went.
"I'm afraid I'm not fixable." Was the fear that she finally voiced to the clinic counselor. She was diagnosed as being a boiling cauldron of anger, bitterness, and resentment. This little mennonite woman was pissed off.
Then the cauldron boiled over. The anger hit many targets - This is my dad's fault! Well, no. This is my mom's fault! Not quite. This is my husbands fault! Keep going. This is my fault! One more step. This is God's fault! Yes. This was God's fault.
What I learned at the Meier clinic was that I was clueless when it came to the things of God. I didn't know his character. I didn't know the way he works, I did not know him. I was certainly not a christian.
To a 30 year old mennonite woman who grew up in a church, who had always attended Sunday school and Bible school and who now taught Sunday school, Bible school, who had helped start a Women's Ministry at her church, who had been youth group president as a teen, who had taught the ladies Sunday school class, who had faithfully attended every service possible, went to the church sewing, served on committees; and whose husband was now an elder in the church, whose brother in law was now the head pastor of the church, this came as a bit of a shock.
I definitely, if it would be possible in a mennonite church, should have had Jesus living inside me, I had certainly asked him in - many times!
Well, I set God up in the crosshairs and I fired round after round after round at him. How dare he let me get this miserable? How dare he take me from my children for 3 weeks? Who did He think He was? I was mouthy, disrespectful, defiant, rude, and I taunted God and yelled and gave him heck. I told him in no uncertain terms where he could stick his high and mighty, Lori ignoring ways AND Lightning did not strike me.
I started emptying out the anger, bitterness, and resentment. I found out I was selfish, I had serious entitlement issues (pride), and I was desperately afraid.
Afraid of being alone. Afraid of disappointing my mom and dad. Afraid of going crazy. FEAR ruled my life.
A Sample of my thoughts: Grow up you little wretch. Stop being such an entitled wimp. Don't you know how good you have it? You are a stay at home mom of one little son how hard can that be? Yeah, you better have sex again when your baby is only 4 weeks old or Allen will leave you to. I don't know how he puts up with such a weepy, emotional mess every day. How hard is it to sleep? Come on stupid, lay down and close your eyes, are you so abnormal, so messed up that you can't even sleep? That is so not normal. You are such a freak. Are you gonna wimp out like your grandma? She was always going to bed. Women were a mistake, it started with Eve and just kept going downhill. God must feel like just throwing me up. Useless, unworthy little dreamer who just can't hack it. You don't deserve to be loved. You deserve to be punished. You deserve to be torn down. You don't deserve Allen. You don't deserve to go to heaven. You are hopeless and wretched. You are small and conniving and desperate. Just shut up, nobody understands you. You are abnormal, faulty, sick, vain, weak, deformed, ruined before you started, unfixable, unlovable. You know Quinn will always feel you didn't want him at birth, He will always know you don't really love him. You are diseased and messed up. You are a little black hunk of garbage, you deserve to be kicked and spat upon you little wretch. Who feels like this? Christian girls don't so you just better cover up a core that is that black. Sex is dirty. You know it should only be done to make a baby. Are you kidding? You thought that was a gift?! Look again sister. That's what wives do for their husbands. All wives do it and they do it better than you. Allen probably had better sex with his girlfriends. Don't you know Allen is gonna see how filthy and black you are inside and he is gonna leave. He's an elder in the church so buck up. He's gonna have meetings in the evenings and you might go crazy after being with the rugrats all day. What if you would go crazy? What if you would hurt yourself? What if you really, really would go crazy? You think God wants this mess? Don't kid yourself, he's pretty big, but he ain't that big. Just shut up. Weak sickly loser. Can't do anything right has the easiest job in the world. Who can't be a wife and mother - most women do that and have a job. You shouldn't spend any money. You sure don't bring any in. You won't ever get off your medicines. You are permanently wacko. Get real, let's live in the real world here. Stay focused stupid. Your dad was so right about you. You are faulty merchandise. Faulty to the core. Miserable, selfish wench. Can't do anything because it will mess up your precious sleep. Don't you know how selfish that is? Don't you know you are permanently harming your kids? Jeanne should have them. She's more capable than you anyways. You have got to stop being so emotional and weak, it disgusts people. You are just a fake, you look real, and you sometimes act real, but we know what's really in that package of yours. Garbage, complete useless garbage.
My counselor said this is spiritual warfare on paper. Gotta go.