Why I Write

I know it’s been a while since I wrote last. We've been incredibly busy getting more work done on our home. Plus, two weeks ago, we celebrated our 12th wedding anniversary. It’s by far been my favorite year yet. Near the beginning of it, my husband told me that I reminded him of why he wanted to marry me in the first place. I had thoughts of both of us sharing what we’ve learned so far in marriage, only for this past week to feel like the rug was pulled out from under me. While things happened beyond my control, I was proud of myself for the way I responded and know I haven’t always responded in ways I’ve been happy with in the past. I can’t say it didn’t affect me though. I was already tired from waking up so early to work out and a couple friends and I added on jogging a mile after our really hard boot camp class, and I was just feeling beat up mentally and wishing I could stay in bed all day after that. The endless hours of fixing up our house and the financial strain of it all, feeling like motherhood has just turned into a never ending job of playing referee at this stage in my kids’ lives, my weight staying in the same place the last few months despite all my efforts and sore body, and the news of this situation had me re-thinking about my why and whether anything I write could ever help anyone.

When I first started this blog, it was because I wanted to help people. For so long, I felt stuck. Stuck in bitterness and unforgiveness. Stuck in my marriage and stuck in my life. My health was affected by it, and so was my love. I stopped feeling like the powerful woman God had made me to be. I had been hit hard over and over again, and I didn’t feel like I could get back up anymore. I allowed other people’s toxicity, gaslighting, and false accusations to affect me so much that I felt powerless to be myself around them. I felt powerless to love people who continually rejected me. I allowed other people’s nature to affect my perception of God and myself. Instead of being the bride that makes herself ready, I started feeling like a victim or a damsel in distress waiting for God to rescue me in any way possible. I’ve never been a fan of damsels in distress, am not one who admires self-pity and excuses, and I hated who I had become.

God was already leading me on a journey of forgiving other people, but I had a hard time forgiving myself for not knowing better, for not setting boundaries, for allowing my own nature to be affected so much by others’ actions, and for making excuses in life. For giving up at times and not being the resilient person I used to be. I hated myself for it. This past year, God has just been leading me on a journey to love myself again. In the beginning, the thought of even loving myself was scary. As someone who grew up in church, I was always told how people will become lovers of themselves in the last days as a warning and grew up with an exalted display of false humility that made me excel at denying myself. As a child, I was taught that my only need was to obey, and as a woman, was taught to be a helpmeet for a man. My entire life was always centered around meeting other people’s needs, so I had no idea how to take care of myself when my own needs weren’t being met or have any idea what needs I even had to meet. I always just thought that when you take care of someone else and his needs, your own will be taken care of as well. However, it doesn’t always end up that way. Not to mention, if I have no idea what my own needs are or how to take care of myself, I have no idea why I would expect someone else to know either.

This last pregnancy, we were in a better place than we’ve ever been. However, with my rapidly increasing weight gain from the lowest weight I had gotten since having kids to my highest ever, lack of being able to sleep, throwing out my back the last 3 months because of major ab separation, prolapsed uterus issues from a previous pregnancy, and feeling powerless to do anything about any of it, I was having PTSD-like memories of the last time I was close to the same weight. It was one of the darkest periods of my entire life. Though marriage and kids were my dreams growing up and all I ever wanted was to be like the Proverbs 31 woman and serve God and others with my life, my marriage and life didn’t at all seem to line up with those dreams, though many didn’t know that from an outside stance. My life and marriage were a living hell at the time. The little sleep I was getting was often filled with nightmares of gigantic spiders above me and trying to roll away, yet being stuck, and unable to do so. It was the only time in my life that I can remember multiple times of shooting up out of bed gasping for air. It was the first time I decided enough is enough and built up enough courage to face the shame of divorce. That very day, I was leaving for a women’s retreat that would be my first outing away since being married, only for a marriage counselor to come up to me first thing and tell me how she and her husband were praying and felt like God had shown them that our marriage was going to help out so many others’ marriages. I broke down sobbing and verbally vomited our entire story thus far, and really hope I didn’t discourage her as it seemed we had absolutely no hope and I didn’t hear from her or see her much after that. Her speaking out the vision God gave her and her husband for our marriage in response to God’s leading was what caused me to not give up on my marriage, but it didn’t make it any easier to walk through.

My marriage was the last major event at the time in a long line of difficult situations I went through after praying that God would do whatever it would take to bring me closer to Him and help me to help others with my life. I prayed such a courageous prayer after getting closer to Him than ever before and feeling stronger and more capable than ever after some really hard hits. I “handled” so many of the previous situations well, but over time my perception of God and myself began to change. God had made Himself so real to me since a young age that I could never deny His existence, but the way I thought about Him was not the same. Instead of seeing God as a loving God who wanted the best for me and walking out my Christianity in the freedom of His love and His empowering grace, I started seeing Him as the demanding taskmaster so many others seem to see and tried to live out the Christian life and my marriage out of an insecurity that I had to earn my way to His and my husband’s love. I was left feeling like nothing I ever did or could do would ever be enough, and it was destroying me.

While life circumstances had changed for the better since that time and God had overwhelmingly reminding me of His goodness and love since then, this past pregnancy was a reminder of just how much mindset matters. My incapabilities during this past pregnancy and the weight gain and memories they triggered were absolutely paralyzing at times, and I had so many mental breakdowns inwardly crying out for God to help me. I knew my situation wasn’t the same, but I had such a hard time wrapping my mind around that fact and had to often relive feelings I thought were long gone as though they were still happening. One of the times I was just weeping in my bathroom, and I felt like God was gently whispering to me that I had been in this place before, but during that time, I tried to go through it alone. This time, it wouldn’t be the same, and I wouldn’t be left there. He was going to walk through it with me, carry me during the times I needed it, guide me by His Holy Spirit, and be with me every step of the way so that I could help others who are struggling as well. I felt an undeniable feeling that I was supposed to write and was just responding to what I felt was God’s leading.

There are some things we can change in life, and others we cannot. Mindset is something we can change. I pray that as I share my journey, and how God’s been renewing my mind, it will help others along the way. If it helps even one person, it will all have been worth it to me. That’s my biggest hope, and why I write and will keep writing.