I never knew ‘til now
Everything I’ve been through has opened my eyes bigger and wider to so much I was missing before. I had no idea how bad pain could be. How it consumes SO much of your mental capacity… how it becomes something that you get to KNOW… how it has onsets… how it can rest, but just long enough for you to grab a strand of hope… and then tries to punish you for hoping.
I never knew about the drugs… the ones the prescribe QUICK to “help you”. The ones the never REALLY warn you about. The ones that can take the remainder of your mental space and turn it against you, allegedly “helping” with pain AND depression but ACTUALLY distracting you from pain and keeping you from feeling happiness, at all. “It’ll help with the depression but make it impossible for you to feel happy… in some people.”
I never really understood addiction. To be completely honest. In my life, the majority of my “addictions” have really been more like “obsessions”. But I can understand how someone can get addicted to “not feeling life” anymore. Life can make you feel like roadkill sometimes. “Wow. That sucks for that guy. Better not let it get too close to me” as they drive by in their Facebook. As you bleed out… in front of the world. Thankfully… I’ve been able to keep addiction to the prescribed meds at bay. Either by quitting them, altogether and enduring the pain, or by verbally checking in with a medical professional regularly. Thank you God for protecting me in that way.
This season has led me understand my father a little more. While parts of me still stay overly judge mental about some of the things that he did to me and my family, I understand the physical pain he was in. Very well, now. I feel sorry for him for what he felt in his body. I feel sorry that he did so much damage because he lived so much I healed trauma. I pray that one day he really let’s go and let’s God…
I never ever thought that I’d be so lonely in my life. Im kind of a hermit, writer, dad, pastor… that’s in pain most of the day. I never understood how life can just tailspin and when it stops… or at least slows for you to get a glance… it’s just not what you’d thought it was gonna be. But I understand it now.
I have my eyes open to grief. To loss. To sadness. In the world. I used to be able to hear it in someone’s voice… now I can pick up on in a text. Or if I’m in community with them… I can feel it… even if you haven’t told me.
I don’t know why God has been changing me so drastically over the last few years, but I’m not who you met when we became FB friends, anymore. I’m a lot more tender. I can see what most people try to hide from the world. I can feel it. I WANT to. Maybe that’s the biggest change… I want to see people who need to be seen. Not that want to be seen… but the ones that NEED to be seen. To feel loved. To feel heard. Wanted. Needed.
And you know the best part… I don’t have to fix em. There’s no pressure on me to give em an answer. I can trust God to do all that… I just have to keep listening. Holding space. Asking God… what’s next.
With fresh eyes …