Feeling Older - Something New For Me.

I wrote this the day I turned 49, almost a year ago.... last week. I have waited so long to post it. I am not sure why I needed the time ... between the words spilling out and feeling comfortable publishing the post.

But since I have just read over the words and like I am reading someone else's memory... I guess it is safely time to post.

And last week I turned 50, just another happy day.

____________________________________________________

I received a birthday present today. I am forty-nine.

While I don't feel old in my soul or spirt - not even my mind (except for the fact that I have read so much, I have to be old), I can now see OLD when I look in the mirror.

 I wonder if this happens to every person that lives a long time.

For such so many years, I had a permanent internal picture of what I looked like. I didn't age a day past 20. When I looked into the mirror, I looked like me - the young me I had always known.

It must be telling that I had the ability to perceive beyond the present, or more accurately to see the past instead of the present each time I thought I was viewing a mirror image.

I recall the surprise, even shock, when I started to see my actual reflection in the mirror. My chin and neck seemed to join as one. It was no longer slender. My arms and back had extra bubble padding, and my waist looked like a circular floaty was concealed beneath my shirt.

When did that happen? Who is that women in the mirror? (Have you been there long?)

My age has never been a problem for me. We all grow older everyday, that is, until we die. I guess that is a positive contemplation: if I am aging, I am living.

So I had to look, and stare and examine.
But finally I had to accept, embrace and practice loving myself as I am.

-----------------------

My husband took me out for an early birthday lunch with our teenage daughter. At the restaurant, she paused at the table before she sat down. I noticed her sleek shape draped with her lovely long black hair. In self-acceptance, she smiled knowingly, from the inside out. She was genuinely happy, and it showed. We talked and laughed, and so enjoyed sharing. Being together was what I relished most.

_______________

And now, I pause, taking time to I reflect upon the day: 

Don't we always want to look our best? But since we must age, we hope it can be gracefully.

Yet, what I find more enduring is not how I look in the mirror, but the fact of life that appearance is not what is lasting.

So this day -I think- I recognized more deeply, that as my self-concept of my outward image changes, that it is not as important as I thought it might be.

I am -beyond a doubt -blessed in an ever beautiful way: to know others intimately, lovingly.

In my nearly fifty years, I am beginning to experience seasons of happy memories, a result of wholeness, that becomes more frequent after great healing.

I choose to ponder these pictures of life in my heart, because moments of thought, like these, can't be captured in a still-life photo. They can only be cherished spontaneously, enjoying times together.

May I always notice precious people in my life.

A New Low - No WORDS

Life has been very hard recently... many incredibly painful life situations:

• a suicide of a very young man - planning to be married to a dear friends' daughter
• releasing go of my son and learning how to be a military mom
• my young daughter has been sick with heart issues for 3 months and continuing
• rejection that regularly comes with living boldly
• the death of my husband's dad - the agony of seeing him shriveled up 
• a criminal who robbed my husband's family home and took everything and
• family members who lashed out at my husband regarding funeral matters.

My heart is heavy... I cry inside without a sound. 

Why do I feel so deeply?

I can't go backwards... I can't stuff or put my emotions on a shelf to deal with later... I can't compartmentalize like so many can.

I simply feel deeply. What I see, people's words, actions and even non-actions... they scream loud and clear to my soul. 

Overloaded. Saturated. 

I was at a loss of words... I had nothing to say. And I wanted to pick up nothing to read.

Writing has been what I could do when the bottom fell out of my world, when I was spinning out of control or longing to be gone, forever gone.

Writing kept me in a state of being connected and alive. I wrote to stay alive. I wrote to remain human, to have something to communicate even if no one listened, read or heard. 

But now I have experienced a new depth of agony, the day I felt the words stop. The end of a road - I had nothing to say. 

And even as I write today- at this very moment - I don't much feel connected to the words being pressed out of my mind and onto the page by the tapping of the plastic keys. They come but not with passion, need - a sense of MUST... I MUST speak, I MUST write, I MUST be heard.

I have experienced the day in life that the music stopped, the continual rhythmical beat of life became still and the need to be faded into the grey shades of indifference, doubt and even despair.

Nothingness. 

No need. 

No want. 

No message. 

No thought.

Writing and Reading is a form of relationship, people intertwined through words over miles and ages that otherwise they would have never met. One day the song may return ... and the words might need to flow, but for now I will be content to breathe.

I Am In Pain - People Hurt Me - Looking Forward to Death

Leave me alone, I am in pain.

I don't need to be around people, I am in pain.

People hurt me, I am in pain.

I do not get hurt by books, by food, by clouds and rainbows. Or cats, and clothes, or trees that blow in the wind....

No,  just by those I think are friends.

People hurt me; they don't understand me.

My arms feel so heavy underneath, I know this is the first sign of overload.
My heart has a hole, pierced one to many times in life.
My eyes are filled with drops of sorrow, sadness and regret.
My mouth is tight, clenched, frozen, no words want to go.

Why am I different?
Why do I have to hurt so much, all the time, so easily, by so many....

So many days, so many people, so many ways.

When does my cup of torment forever filled up to be more than "enough"?
Is it because I so love You, God, that I am such a target of your enemy?

"But you have not endured blood sweat tears," the wise one jeers.
"God will never give you more than you can handle," says another.
"All things work for good for those who love the Lord" is the promise that we quote.

Why do some people in life get more suffering than most?
Some people get more money, others get more travel, and another gets more pleasure.
Some get more talents, another gets more intelligence and some get more pain.

How do You - God - pick out the child of Yours that needs more pain to be transformed into the likeness of Jesus? Or do you let Satan sift through those who claim to be your followers? Do you let him choose the "best"? Wouldn't it be better for him to pick those who are iffy about you... you know those pew warmers? Wouldn't they be easier to sway?

If all your children end up in heaven anyway, perfected in Your presence, why must some endure more evil to be transformed to good?

We will all be good in Your sight - in the fullness of Jesus - even, already are.... spiritually.

Why then must some people be thrown into the den of lions, another left at her captor's feet, and one lives all his days on earth in a slum? While others called Your children, float in fancy pools, and travel to the spectacular resorts in the world, and taste on the finest foods?

One child of Yours gets slapped, yelled at and put to shame,
the other is hugged, praised and awarded with acclaim.

Why? Did one receive hardship and the other given a lighter journey in life?

I don't understand the justice of this system. I know we are all different - nothing is equal or the same, but I have always rested on Your Word's of justice, truth, mercy, and grace. I never overlooked sorrow, suffering that brings sickness and insanity-- tormented by the demons, taunted by their words, ridiculed, trapped, and discarded.

One day I will be resurrected.
One day I will know joy. It is the hope within each breathe,
I walk by faith and not by sight, I believe every Word You've ever said.

Daddy, I want to come home. I want my life of hurt to end. I want to come home. I am waiting for Your call.

I praise you today, Your mercies are new each morning, but I will praise the day when I am dead,

Because I am so often in pain. The day I die I will finally be in eternal paradise with You and all my true brothers and sisters! I will be loved, appreciated, understood.

How can I not look forward to those days!

Weak and Selfish - I am That Girl

The preacher says we are all the body of Christ...that each member is necessary, a part that functions in unison with all others, but God, in this life--in our time spent on earth--in present day local churches, this is not really true.

It sounds good, repeated over and over, because the Bible says so and therefore we all should.

But churches seek the best,
the ones that fit their mold,
the ones who meet their mission,
the one that helps their goal.
They keep track of numbers,
saving all the souls,
running them through baptism,
collecting them in the fold.

But those of us with broken parts,
not shiny like the rest,
we hear what no one else hears,
we feel words with our soul,
we sense when something isn't right,
therefore we get left out in the cold.

Who wants to work with such a pain,
she is trouble where she goes,
she stirs the pot and sifts for truth,
she sees the thorns and not the rose.

Why can't she just be silent, "if you don't like it, go away," 'give a try another church," "we can't use you .... we have to protect the flock from you."

They call her weak and selfish. They don't care to know her name.

I am that girl. I know her pain.
I feel her sorry. I walk her shame.
I'll never be able to be "normal"
 - a mother or a friend.

So I keep doing what I do best,
I slowly bleed out drops love,
as I write - it is who I am.

Hurt and Angered - I take Psychiatric Medication

I am hurt.

I am angered.

I take Psychiatric Medication.

I don't take it because I WANT to take it.

I take it because it is the one thing in the world that I have found to stabilize my body and mental functions.

People whose body functions normally can shrug off or reject this medication as simply 'all in the mind' and not really necessary. (Sure you can because it doesn't effect you personally. You know not what you speak about.)

But people like me - who have tried everything - who have suffered greatly - more deeply than most will  ever be able to understand or even empathize with.

People who function completely by their mental and physical strength - often known as willpower-  look at others who can't as weak or less of a persons.

But NO, it is quite the opposite!

Someone who is willing to face their own weaknesses and able to go completely against the stigma and strong current of accepted social and religious philosophy,
and to squarely make a choice to take medication because it is what helps them - it makes them function better so that they can love and be part of others lives,
instead of being a dysfunctional person, an erratic emotionally individual,
that is  prone to hurt themselves and others -

THIS TAKES GREAT INNER FORTITUDE and faith IN GOD that He is still on the throne even if HE has not chosen to heal them of their bodily need.

I have begged God - prayed - believed and still continued on in my faith in Him - STILL He has not determined it is within His perfect will for my life here on earth to be healed of this condition effecting my brain pathways, chemicals, and bodily/mental responses... He in His love and wisdom has chosen to allow me and others like me to have to walk through illness - And thus -like Habakuk - I see it all and live it all and STILL I choose to say, "

Though my body may not be healed, though I may suffer from pain, panic and bizarre  emotional, mental and psychological effects, 

Though I might say and do things in public and private that I am deeply grieved about and regret,

Though I might not be stable to others and therefore shunned or rejected because I am deemed troubled, psychotic, unstable, 'not right',

Though I must take psychiatric medication to find a level of normality that I can be of use to God and to love my family and those who choose to be my friend, 

Though I don't ever get to be part of normal groups - like church, clubs and community organizations - because I respond differently and appear childish, sinful or a problem, 

"Yet, I will EXULT the LORD,I will rejoice in the God of my salvation.The Lord God is my strength,and He has made my feet like hinds' feet,And makes me walk on high places." ( Habakkuk 3: 18-19)

And this day,
I proclaim to myself and my God,

that I accept my situation, my life and my condition;
and I will serve Him in every way to the best of my ability regardless of taking medication or my body/mind limitations.
Also I will not allow critical voices and naysayers to put me down, to make me think less of myself than God thinks of me,
Nor will I let them clip my wings--to keep me from soaring instead of being the breathe beneath my wings!
I will still love those who hurt me but I will not give them the ability to direct my life.
I choose this day to live surrendered to God alone and to do what HE asks me to do regardless of my weaknesses and imperfections.
And His approval is all I need.

AMEN!

I am so Angry - I am Heartbroken

It has been a long time since I have written a post in Shattered Glass Life.

This is like my personal cave - where I let out my secrets of secrets - the raw rumblings that are ugly sometimes, hateful, and other things that socially trained people know they must hide from the world and often even from themselves.

I AM SO ANGRY!

I am in pain.

I am hurting so deeply, feeling like I have been stabbed in the emotional heart by the sharpest of points. He aimed rightly and pierced me in the most delicate place of my feeling heart.

I now know why I don't allow anyone to get in - to release myself to fully embrace another living soul with undying love. When the one you love is careless with the delicate gift you have entrusted them with, when they speak words or even worse speak nothing at all - void of emotion - Oh, I have a hurting heart.

Not like the broken and shattered one of my childhood, the emptiness of never having been loved, the brokeness of being beat so many times it no longer hurt or being scared to death that you or another family member might be murdered. That is not so much a broken heart- love was never there... a heart that felt nothing but pain, fear and anger - can not be broken the same way.

This is so different 

To have a heart once filled and overflowing with love pouring out from the deepest part of our soul - to have given another everything possible within that you, literally, are able to give - to hold back nothing...

When this heart is pierced and tossed away, simply like you don't matter. And all you have lived, all you have given, does not add up to one ounce of kindness in return. Oh, the agony of unrequited love - and that of not a lover, but a child. It aches my soul - it quakes me. I crumble to implosion of all that I had thought we held and cherished - to know that my love was so easy twisted and treated with disregard is a pain I think I have never felt, because I have never loved as I have this one.

I feel reduced in size.

I have lost a part of me - of who I thought I was - of my self-worth - of my delight - of my joy.

How is it that the meanest people can be given so much, forgiven so much, tolerated and even loved, but the very one that is afraid but dares to try, that never once intended any harm, that has always taken responsibility for her sins and quickly confessed any known error or unintended hurts, can be treated with distant lukewarmness, as though I do not feel - like I am not a real person who deserves not to be so hurt.

How can someone toss away the love of a mother - when so many others hunger to know and feel the hug of a mother's arms just once in a lifetime?

I am sure this season will pass as all others do - but in this world of disconnect - the internet age of texting, tumblr, pintrest, Facebook, and so much other digital imitation style relationships - maybe this is a result of immersion in the cold tapping of the keys, the ability to just not reply or to walk away when you don't want to hear or say anything more - maybe this is how people are learning to treat one another.

We can instantly be unfriended or deleted - is this what relationships have come to? To treat the one who loves and holds you as though they are not human but a screen that you no longer want to look into - oh, what are we doing to relationships.

I looked into her eyes and saw nothing in return. Flat, one dimensional eyes, like glass that had dulled. Emotionless, unwired to the soul, life and joy had dripped away one day, some time ago, and I had not noticed the stream of tears. I spoke my heart into her eyes and the letters of my words dropped one by one simply falling down - unheard. It was like they hit a wall that I had not seen go up - how did I not know - how did I not feel this coming.

God, may we learn 

to treat others with the love that we so desire for ourselves. May we value the relationships we do have and never walk callously away in total disregard to all we have shared between each other.

And then I can not help but feel the fool! Maybe I did not really connect and the one I so thought I loved did not feel so loved.

Maybe I never connect - Why do people stare? What do they know that I don't know?

Maybe my sin, my weaknesses, my lack of skill and 'trauma mess' leftover from the abuse tainted all my love. Maybe it was not to her so pure - to her it was tormented, twisted, sick and simply tolerated for what pathetically it really was - a psudeo-love. I do not think I will ever know real human love or truly be able to give it unconditionally to another. I have tricked myself to thinking I was something and had something - I really did not.

How worthless I feel! How worthless all the days of my life have been!

And once again I struggle to believe I have any purpose or reason to live and don't understand why God will not bring me home to Him. How long must I be tortured here in this life? Is not 50 years long enough of a sentence? Is there not justice in the Kingdom of Heaven? Father, I am so distraught. I don't understand why you allowed me to be born and then to live - it makes no sense to me at all - I truly long to die. Our time on earth is horrifically painful and filled with agony, injustice and grief.

But I know I am your servant, your handmaiden, so I bow my heart and spirit before you with a tear-stained face, and ask, Father what would you have me do for you and your glory, for it is the only reason I breath, for any other reason is worthless indeed. Forgive me for being so selfish, and for expecting so much from others and help me to rely wholly on YOU! For it is with You alone I am protected from all pain - hold me closely, never let me go!

Heal the sadness in my veins and turn the pain into forgiveness and the forgiveness into grace to enable me to respond in unconditional love regardless. For the kingdom and power and glory is Yours forever and ever AMEN!

Change me. And start deep within. 

I Want To Be Normal

I want to help others but I can't help myself. I love and know God and trust Him too, but that doesn't stop my brain from being a jumbled mess. 

Jumbled thoughts can be pretty!

Scattered thoughts keep bombarding me. 

I feel like a rattle-head. 

I think I wrote once about this before, being a rattle-head. And it was the least read post...Even I couldn't relate to it much after the episode passed.

I have cried out to God for help this morning, and for the past two days. I have gone to others for prayer and careful, with exercising great inner control tried to explain to my family of three teens and my dear husband (I almost didn't want to say dear, oh, how hard it can be on a marriage--to twirl out of control and to not know why or how to make the top stop spinning).

I don't know what pushed the top into its first spin. 

And that is part of the problem I can't think clearly. I can't remember even simple things. 

It is like the filing part of my brain has gone on vacation. Like the secretary or office worker that does this clerical job is on vacation... and her office is getting messy very quickly. Manilla folders are scattered about the surface space, the counter tops and her desk. A few have fallen to the floor, and someone has dropped a couple in the trash. 

But the "organizer" has left, gone on a holiday, I don't know when she will return. She didn't leave a message or post a note.

And my brain runs down this trail......

(Post a note - oh, I love those little colorful sticky notes. They come in so many colors, shapes and sizes. They are so much fun. Who ever thought of making a note that sticks but unsticks was quite clever. I like the idea of being able to drop my thoughts little pieces at a time on a little square box. Once out it is safe for keeping it until it is or might be needed in the future.)

Have you have seen Beautiful Mind-the movie? You know the shed with all the papers on the wall and how they are tied together by lines. His mind thinks it has found a clever pattern, an insight that others simply can't see. It is obvious to him, even an obsession. But others are clueless, normal. Others don't see the patterns, how events connect. I am sure God sees how, it all connects to Him. He must have a super large brain with a very elaborate filling system. How does He process it all?

He sees everything! He knows when sparrow falls from a tree or looses a feather. He has not only numbered the stars in the sky - He knows them by name. 

And again my brain runs.....

(Oh, I just saw two shooting stars this past weekend visiting my family/friends. It was magical, mysterious, a gift from God. I love their home that I often call a homestead... they do too sometimes I think. I know they call it a farm. It is a family farm for 11, but don't get a picture of just a bunch of rows of crops. No, this is a full functioning family farm with chickens (hens and rooster) giving forth fresh eggs for delicious meals. And the milk comes straight from the dairy. It is so rich and filling. I love the grits. I can make them at home but nobody else will eat them, so I don't like to waste a large pot of them. Funny thing is my family will eat those little bags of instant grits, but not the yummy polenta grits by Red Mill organic foods. I can eat a few plates... more if I didn't stop myself. Why do I like them so much? Does it matter? A comfort food doesn't have to have a reason.)

The sky was so beautiful - gift from God!

(Oh, the shooting stars! The first I have ever seen in my life, and to top that we saw two! One flew from east to west and a few moments later probably a minute or two, one flew from west to east! The sky was so incredibly bright. It was a chilly winter night, like many I have been there before. But on this night when five of us walked from the main house to the guest house it was like someone turned on the LED lit planetarium. Crisp, sleek black so distinctly contrasted the beaming bright little lights! Some seemed to twinkle. Do stars really twinkle but we can't normally seek them dance on and off in the sky because the atmosphere gets in the way or too much light from the homes limit our view? The children ran inside to get a camera - one with 14 megapixels- a new camera - a Christmas gift to my daughter. And I stayed outside, me and God or God and me. And I praised Him! I thanked Him for the beauty and how delightful it was to experience His sky and two shooting stars. And in response I heard, "You know, I know each star by name?" Marvel, speechless I gazed about even tilting my head back knowing the stars I saw were without numbers... and awed at God that He knows them by name. My eyes wet with the thought of such grandeur.)

Do I need to write? Is it not something I do but something I need? Is it therapy? What keeps me sane, normal?

I pause and take a deep breathe. Inhaling the air about me in the room slowly, holding, and the release.

Is this like my brain? 

It inhales slowly at first taking in pictures, comments, thoughts about what my eyes see and what my body feels and what I hear. And then in writing-in remembering- it slowly releases some of the chatter, clutter and keeps me from going into overload. 

We left for New Year's Holiday on Friday morning. It has almost been one week. And this-right now- is the first time I have sat at the computer to exhale all the thoughts running about in my head. 

It feels better, my head that is. The wheels, like movement in a clock, in slowing down.

(My brother can repair old pocket watches. He is ten years younger than me but he can do so much. He doesn't know how talented he is. And I was buying a nice silver and pink fake gem guess watch from someone local for $15. I was to meet Nicole in a parking lot, but I had the wrong location. Then when we set up to meet in a grocery store parking lot, I went to the blue car that furthest away from the store as instructed, but there was a man in the blue car. I didn't think he should be a Nicole, and I wasn't going to go up to his window to find out. A trap- it felt like it could be a trap. So I drove up closer to the store and went shopping. I filled my cart with groceries. And in the store I realized I hadn't been in a grocery store for such a long while. I couldn't remember the last time. I told that to my husband on my way home and he agreed that  I had not, but that he liked going grocery shopping. I guess that is why we haven't had a good balance of food, running out of butter, cheese, fresh fruit and veges, and so much else that is simply nourishing food.)

Do you notice the oddness of the way my thoughts run and wander? I do. 

But I also know there is nothing I can do to stop it...  Writing- at least- gets it out of the main frame of my conscious working thought area. 

What is wrong with me? 

I am sure some doctor could give me a new label. 

Have I overloaded my brain, which from school I know this is suppose to be impossible because we are told we use so little of it. Or does too much enter too quickly and then the main drive begins to crash? Do I need more random access memory or maybe a quicker processor? Is there a repair shop I can go to get a reboot or maybe a clean disk... clean disk... a big smile came across my face and another deep breath. Wouldn't that be nice? Even to have a backup disk... you know, a place in the human world cloud that I could download my thoughts for safe keeping and then pick them up if I ever needed them. That could be a cure, if anyone could figure out how. 

And my thoughts return to God. Only He is capable. 

I am moving slower and so is my brain.

My thoughts have slowed, almost stopped.

I feel sane again.

And I feel hugged, more settled, quiet!

So what have I learned... is it that I don't write because I enjoy it (I do enjoy it) but more than that, I write because I must! It is part of remaining sane, to write and unload, a necessary therapy needed so that I can be functionally normal (and again I smile at that - at least, I might appear functionally normal).

We -here - know the inside joke to being normal... it is kind of like the idea of being perfect or being right. A mirage that can never be obtained and still we try to aim. 

Thank you for listening. I want to post even though it might have errors. It is raw... unproofed, but I need to push publish to have it leave my brain and enter the internet cloud for my later retrieval. I don't want to save it... it just doesn't seem like what I need to do. I must let it go... release it to unload and be set free.

I love comments. Any comments help me know all this has a purpose.