Day 18: Somehow

I’m absolutely not sorry for how many times f*** and s*** appear here. I’ve surprised myself how many times they have come out these past two days but apparently that’s what happens when I don’t care! At all. I don’t care. I would’ve written it out each time but just to avoid offending some people too much I guess.

God (I don’t really know anymore what I believe about you but nonetheless I will address this to you),

What the f*** is going on? This is the sixth full week of this s*** and Day 18 of this supposed “you’re healing me” s***. I am so confused by you, I don’t know what I think about you anymore. People claim I’m always so solid, so faithful, so strong, so reliable, so trusting in God, blah blah blah. Well world, look at me now. This really sucks. I’m pretty furious at you. I mean, you’ve seen the way I’ve exploded in my room. And I know you can take it. I think that anger has now become a calmer fury, but I’m definitely still mad. I can’t feel anything. But when my heart softens or whatever the f*** it is doing and I feel something, I want to hit something and I get so angry sometimes I just give up and cry. All those questions people have about whether you’re good? I know the theology and I know the truth that you are good. That you don’t allow suffering to just happen to your kids. Then why am I wondering these same questions? Why the hell is this healing thing not really going anywhere? Yeah okay supposedly I don’t even know what baby steps I’ve been taking. This past week I’ve been floating along, surrendered to let you just be you. To let you just work your magic and I’ll just see the results. But if it was f****** possible things got harder. How the HELL have I hit like 3 rock bottoms now? Every time I think I got as far down as I could go, something else shot me down. This really sucks, God, and I know all the stuff you say about me, but I don’t really believe any of it.

I don’t know where I went. I don’t know where my heart is. I guess I gave it to you, but it really doesn’t look like you really care. I know you care more than anyone, but I don’t feel any of it. I’m confused, floating along, distant from everything, scared, numb. This depression is really f***** up. People can tell something’s wrong with me….and the most loaded question ever is “how are you?” I hate that question. Yet what feels like ages ago that is the one question I wished people would really ask me. Now I avoid interactions to avoid that difficult question. I can’t even lie and just say “good!” because it’s so far from the truth. I just don’t know anymore. Why even try? When I stopped trying this past week and just let you do your thing, I was able to at least get school work done, but inside nothing is happening. Floating along did not work. At least in my eyes.

I want to say I hate you, but I know inside I love you. It’s just the hate part of the love-HATE relationship that is more obvious to me right now.

I want to say I don’t care what people will think about me and the stuff I’m writing here, but I do care. I feel like the ultimate hypocrite. Always preaching on this blog about how you just “need to let God love you” and “it’s so easy when you just trust Him!” I must have been so annoying to some of you. I just don’t know how to deal with this huge mess that I feel I’ve made of my perspective of God.

How did I lose all this trust in you?

When I had a million questions and was about to just stare at the ceiling wondering what waiting one more whole week before my appointment at mental health would be like, you heard my one true desire. I just wanted to hold my friend. That was so confusingly beautiful that it makes me angry at you in a different way. What the f*** was that all about? I’m just gonna leave it at that for now. That was so overwhelming I just can’t.

I really don’t like you right now. Not sure if that’s a really sincere “I don’t like you” or a “I know you’re up to something and I know I love you somewhere inside of me so I’m just kinda angry at how things are playing out in such a confusing and painful way” I don’t like you.

I just want to be happy again. I don’t remember what that feels like and that’s scary as s***. I just want to be myself again. Obviously that’s getting redefined so I just want to have some sense of myself again. I want my friends back. I want them to know who they are too so we can be ourselves together. I want to love them back to themselves because love protects and no matter how s***y I feel or how f***** up I feel, I want to see them be themselves again. Love protects, but what the f*** is that doing to me? If you’re Love, I don’t really feel very protected by you. But maybe I would be in deeper s*** hole if you weren’t protecting me somehow. I have no f****** idea how you are protecting me, but I guess I have a really really tiny sense that you are holding me tight and getting me through this somehow. Somehow.

I don’t really like all these songs that come from a perspective of faith, because I don’t feel like I have much faith in any of the things that are important to me anymore, but here’s a song anyways.

Context/earlier posts:

Happenings

Day 1

Day 3

Day 8

Day 1

These posts are going to be incredibly intimate because I’m in a very fragile, vulnerable state. My heart is raw. I’m barely keeping my head above the water, but now, at least I’m trying. This morning, I realized that I had no other option but to turn back to God. I had to or I was going to get worse which was hard to imagine. Because I had hit rock bottom. Completely and utterly exhausted, lost, confused, broken, and worn. I don’t know how it got this bad. I had to let God talk to me though I had been refusing to entertain His still, small voice whispering “Anisha?” for over a week. As appealing as it was to just let myself sink deeper and deeper into the darkness, I knew I would not be able to even begin to navigate my way out if I didn’t do something today. So. I tried.

Why am I even sharing these intimate thoughts straight from my journal? Because God said so. Because I think….me not being all together on this blog and just writing here how God is helping me heal will show a lot to you that I can’t show you through normal posts. It’ll show you more of His character than I could ever do on my own. I imagine I’ll post every so often with how this healing process is going. It’s going to be really challenging to keep walking, but baby steps.

My brother told me that God told him “Out of these ashes, beauty will rise.” That though I am holding on my the thinnest thread, I might have to just let go of the thread and trust I’ll fall into His arms. That the scariest part is the hang time in the air of uncertainty, but it’s actually my imagination because I’ll realize I never really left His arms.

I hope so and think I will heal completely, because this morning, I felt more of myself dying. Now, I can feel again.

_____

Day 1.

Dad=God

All of these conversation bits are what I remember from the two hours I spent talking to Him.

_____

Dad: I’m really proud of you and I love you. You have to be patient with yourself.

Me: Why can’t and why haven’t you already healed me quickly? I know you can, why does this have to take so long? I just want to be myself again now.

Dad: Anisha, this pain runs deep. It would be a shock to your system if I healed it all now. Like when they revive someone’s heart with electrical shocks? Your heart can’t take that right now. We have to take this one step at a time.

Me: How long is this gonna take?

Dad: It doesn’t matter. Days, months, years, all that matter is that I am here. Are you ready?

Me: No….

Dad: take your time. I’m here. When you’re ready, I have a question. I love you. Thank you for letting me back in. It’s going to be okay.

[after some time elapsed]

Me: Okay, I’m ready. [Sigh]

Dad: Alright, love. Can you trust me? I promise to lift you up. I know that you don’t understand what parts of all this was me teaching you and what was satan tricking and manipulating your raw heart, but you have to trust me. I never let you go, but you have let go of me. I know it feels hard, but we can’t go anywhere until you trust me. [He reaches His hand down towards me]. I’ll wait.

[I struggle for some time]

Dad: I know it’s hard to believe right now, but I believe in you. You don’t have to do anything, just receive the faith I am giving to you. It’s a gift. I love you.

Me: I don’t think I can say “I love you” yet.

Dad: you don’t have to and I don’t expect you to. “We love because He first loved us.” Anisha, your love has to come from me and we’re just getting started on you receiving it again for yourself. Don’t rush, it will never change the love I have for you. Just like it hasn’t changed the love your best friend has for you.

[I sigh and eventually reach up into the air and grab His hand]

Dad: Now, don’t worry about what parts we will work on, just trust me. [much of the reason I haven't let Him in earlier is because it just seems like such a daunting task to even begin addressing everything that's going inside, I didn't even want to start] I know your heart is very tired. I know it feels ripped apart. So it’s time, if you can handle it tonight, to let me take our heart. You’ve tried to fix your heart on your own, but the thing is, Anisha, your heart is my heart. That’s why I said our heart. So don’t worry. I’ll put all your heart strings back together. Can you trust me now with your heart? Let me revive it? I’ll take care of it, I promise.

Me: that’s gonna take some time

Dad: That’s okay, we can work on that later then.

Me: no, I can’t stand this feeling….or rather numbness anymore.

[my brother sent me this song this morning and...like many songs lately, puts into words what I can't quite articulate]

Feel Again by OneRepublic

It’s been a long time coming since I’ve seen your face

I’ve been everywhere and back trying to replace

Everything that I had ’til my feet went numb

Praying like a fool that’s been on the run (verse 2: praying like a fool just shy of a gun)

Heart’s still beating but it’s not working

It’s like a million dollar phone that you just can’t ring

I reached out trying to love but I feel nothing

Yeah, my heart is numb

But with you I feel again

Yeah with you I feel again

I’m feeling better ever since you know me

I was a lonely soul but that’s the old me

[I physically make the motion of grabbing my heart and presenting it to Him with my hands]

Dad: thank you.

Me: for what?

Dad: for the orange peanut! [reference to a bad lip reading video of the NFL...basically He's just joking with me and I chuckle] For trusting me. I’ll take good care of your heart, I promise. I’m really proud of you, dear. [kisses my forehead] Now be patient with yourself and we will take this one step at a time. We’ll get you back to yourself and you’ll be stronger and your love for people will be even more beautiful. I love you. Now you did a very good job today, let your heart rest.

_____

So that’s that for now. After that Jesus therapy session, I was just laying on the bed listening to songs Jesus recommended me to listen to. I found that my heart beat was loud, so full inside. I don’t know how to describe it, but I felt like my heart was more alive. A heart of flesh. Something I haven’t felt in a while….it was tiring but relieving too.

We’ll see what tomorrow brings.

_____

Dear Bubble Buddy,

Thank you for loving me as you have. I can’t imagine how much worse I would be if you weren’t there so faithfully, so patiently. I think this whole situation has exemplified what I mean when I say you being you is more than enough love for me. Nothing more, nothing less. I tried to reach out to love you and felt nothing as much as I wanted to feel everything, but I’m getting there and I know I am definitely starting to feel again. Because of you.

I love you.

Happenings

I haven’t posted in almost two months which is kind of crazy because SO SO SO much has been happening in my life, so my apologies to those who benefit from the words God uses on this blog. However, I simply found no desire to post yet….the timing was never quite right, even when I had posts ready in my head just because God is cool.

So it’s interesting that now He wants me to share. Not even 3 weeks ago I was the happiest person in the world, realizing that it really is true that whom the Son sets free is free indeed! I could have skipped around campus telling all of the freedom I finally understood, finally felt. Before that moment I had thought my heart was free, but there was a nasty little thumbtack still stuck on my heart that Jesus patiently helped me release. “Anisha, it’s time to heal.”

Oh but that changed quickly. Probably because Satan didn’t like how I was doing too much. So everything started pulling out from under me. Slowly but surely, I felt like I was losing a grasp on the world. Everything had been pure joy. I knew I was also learning a hard lesson on how to love myself….but something was wrong.

Now I’m going to ramble and it might not make sense, but I need an outlet that’s not just my brain and not just my best friend’s wonderful listening ears.

Love God, love yourself, love others. The unified, harmonious three elements of love, all from an outflow of knowing the Father’s love. God told me that I struggle with loving myself, but I didn’t know how to let that happen. I knew I naturally just loved people because I truly love being there for people whenever they need me. It’s so easy for me to love God because He’s just so awesome. Then it’s so easy to love people because of the overflow, but I guess God’s saying that I don’t really let the love sink into me. I just receive and push it back out without second thought. With people, it’s probably mainly my fault, but I don’t really let people love me the way I want to be loved. And when I do give them the chance, they completely miss it. I love people the way I want to be loved…am I just not getting what friendship means? It feels so selfish for me to ask people to do something for me, but if they just treated me like how I treated them/would treat them without me having to say so, I don’t think I’d be having so many relationship struggles. But that’s so unfair to expect that of people. How are they supposed to know if I don’t tell them? But why does no one ever really ask? And when people ask now, I can’t let them in because I can’t trust them anymore. Maybe my “need to be needed” is a dangerous thing. When I pondered it though, what if the way I feel most loved by people is when they need me? Is that bad? Is linking the two wrong? I don’t think so, but I’m having a really difficult time figuring out what that looks like. So…how do I love myself by letting others love me?

After a series of events and things, I suddenly found myself empty. Completely gave out all of me, completely exhausted. Unsure about what to do next but to just heal. It hurts a ton, and I wish I could just get my act together. I’m not being patient with myself. God told me to trust people again even though I have a hard time with that because of my past. So I did. Because I trust Him. But now it hurts even more because I trusted people but no one was there when I needed them. God told me that I let myself trust IN people not just trust people. I am only supposed to trust IN God. So when He could see that I was straying, why didn’t He just tell me before people got in too deep? It’s not like I don’t hear His voice. So I trusted God to let myself trust people again, and now that it hurts even more, I am having a hard time really trusting Him while I’m confused. So things are proving quite difficult when I don’t know how to trust in Him again because He’s usually my go-to. I don’t know where to turn.

I don’t know how to let God love me, let alone people. I don’t have to explain my heart or thoughts to God, so it’s easier to try to trust God again. He’s being very tender and very patient with my very raw and hypersensitive heart right now, but I’m just super cynical of people right now. Which isn’t good. Which I don’t know how to fix either. I could just hide, cut myself off from people again, not let anyone in. That strategy worked pretty well in grade school. Though, if I hadn’t tried again in college, I wouldn’t have all of these blessings of people in my life. So I’m caught somewhere in the middle now.

Sorry if this post makes you sad or worried, but it is my blog and is my current status so not sorry at the same time haha. This whole post (so how I have been for the past ~2 weeks) is so unlike me, which scares me. I think I’ve lost myself. I don’t know how to get myself back either. I know the Truth in my head that I am beloved, that I am on the Solid Rock, that Mr. Joy lives inside of me. I knowwwww. I just don’t know at the same time. An additionally difficult aspect of all of this is that I KNOW the truth about what Jesus says about me and I know which thoughts in my head are lies from the enemy. So the fact that I’m struggling almost makes me disappointed in myself, which isn’t fair to myself. mehhhhh.

And it’s spring break. The point was to enjoy all these people’s company as my last semester at Tufts wraps up and to have the best of times. Fill it with memories to hold on to, but as you can imagine, all I want to do is hide in a corner and let God hold me.

Perfect love casts out fear. I guess the main task ahead is to let Perfect Love aka God do His thing in me.

there are more thoughts, but right now, I don’t think it’s going to help to just tell you all of them.

“Ain’t no mountain high enough/Ain’t no valley low enough/Ain’t no river wide enough/to keep me from the love of Jesus”

Basically, His love never fails. repeat.