Monday, August 31, 2009

At the "End" of our World

So, today is the first day of school here...(I hear moms "yahoo-ing" from all directions!) Already, I've received one 5:20 a.m. email inviting me to coffee to celebrate the big day. But my heart is sad. You see, I sit here, with no one to wake up and no one to “encourage” going to the bus stop this morning. Instead we will meet with her via phone at 9:00 for another phone conference with her therapist at the hospital where she is currently staying. I am sorry that she will miss the excitement of the first day and will instead have to have her first day well into the first weeks of school instead.

I haven't posted here for a while. It's been hard to find things to say that are relevant and encouraging to others; things that are not completely specific to my own situation and struggles at the moment. And yet I want to keep the contact, between those of you who read this blog and myself, going. Maybe my situation is not as unique as I think or feel like it is. I’m sure there are other moms who feel sad and separated from the events of “real life” going on around them, made a reality because they can only see their child during visiting hours in some institution or other. Or maybe, there are those of you, who ALWAYS feel this distance between yourselves and the moms of other kids…because there is very little about your life or your relationship with your child that is “normal.”

And maybe there are those of you who struggle to keep your marriage healthy or even alive because of the stresses of mental illness on your spouse and your marriage. In my house, the stress comes as a result of my daughter’s hospitalization and traveling long miles and hours to see her on the weekends—and also from my own struggles with mental illness. My husband feels himself surrounded by it…and he is now wrestling with his desire to be free of it … and really, there’s no where to run. (So instead, he has invited ME to take a walk!)

So what words of wisdom do I have for you? What kind of encouragement? Well, I will offer you the same words that I offer myself: You (we) are not alone. Not only are there countless families who hurt like this; but our Lord is with us and will never leave us to deal with it alone. He feels our pain, weeps with our silent midnight tears, and wants you to know that His arms are around you now, wherever you are and in whatever situation….just as they are around me. This image brings tears to my cheeks now as I write this… His words resound in my mind. “I am with you always. I will never leave you nor forsake you – even until the end of the earth.”

So to you and to me, who sit together at the “ends of our earth”—let us take comfort in the fact that HE KNOWS all about it. He sees what goes on behind your closed doors and in your hearts. And He has promised that, if you are His beloved, He will work even that mess out for your benefit. (Romans 8:28).

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Patient\Parent

Today we had our first family meeting with my daughter and her therapist as they spoke to my husband and I via a conference call from the therapists office in the treatment center where my daughter is currently staying. I have to say that this was an odd, and difficult moment for me; all of my experience has really been as the patient: the one being protected by the therapist and encouraged to speak out to the other family members. Well, today, I was instead in the "hot seat" as my daughter merged forces with my husband to discuss issues she has with me that make overcoming her eating disorder more difficult.
This morning just prior to our conference, I was spending time with the Lord in prayer and I asked Him to show me the passage in His Word which he would have me look at today. Immediately the verse, "Commit your way unto the Lord; Trust also in Him and he will do this:" I had to look up the verse in my concordance because its reference was lost in my memory... I also wondered why God had pointed this verse out in particular.
Here are the following verses in context:
Commit your way to the LORD;
trust in him and he will do this:
He will make your
righteousness shine like the dawn,
the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.

Psalm 37:5-6 NIV
I've read and memorized those verses in the past, but never before noticed the colon at the end of verse 5. Trust in the Lord and He will do what? He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn. I read those verses and the one following:
Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when men succeed in their ways,

Now my daughter and husband are not the enemies that David had to deal with in his life who were literally out to destroy him...but the point was the same. God was saying to me:
"Be quiet my child, You are resting in my arms and you don't need to defend yourself. If there is defending to be done, I will take care of it. DO not fret. Roll onto my back all of the responsibility for how things turn out...I will handle it. Your job is to be still and wait and to trust me."
I can attest to you that I was not one hundred percent successful at being quiet and still during this session...But the words and the loving tone of my Father's voice repeatedly rang in my mind's ears and kept me from running with the feeling of being attacked or defensive. It is one thing to try to clarify the truth and another to try to evade responsibility...but I confess that the line can be a thin one and in such a setting emotions (on both sides of the coin) can run hot.
I never before fully appreciated how difficult it must have been for my parents to come to those family sessions. I remember being terrified and filled with anxiety prior to them...but my fear was not for myself but for upsetting the proverbial applecart. To put your cards on the table, as a mentally ill "child" is a scary thing and feels more risky than it really is. For some reason, as children, we can never understand how secure we are in the arms of love our parents have for us. We feel that it is conditional, fragile,....and we don't understand, until we ourselves are parents, how great and strong that love really is.
As a mom, in the therapy setting, the thing I most wanted to defend was my love for my daughter. As a mentally ill parent, it was difficult not to try to defend also my behavior in other regards...especially when I can honestly say that some of the pictures painted and statements made, may have been altered to some degree by the emotions and perceptions of the participants in the session. But that is not the important thing. My job there was to assure my daughter of my love for her and my willingness to do whatever it takes to help her recover. My task before God was to rest and trust and NOT TO FRET over the outcome. It is His to work out in the way He desires it to go.

Sunday, August 23, 2009

The Treasure of Calamity

ISAIAH 45

Treasure Found in Calamity

2"I will go before you and make the rough places smooth;
I will shatter the doors of bronze and cut through their iron bars.
3"I will give you the treasures of darkness
And hidden wealth of secret places,
So that you may know that it is I,
The LORD, the God of Israel, who calls you by your name
6That men may know from the rising to the setting of the sun
That there is no one besides Me.
I am the LORD, and there is no other,
7The One forming light and creating darkness,
Causing well-being and creating calamity;
I am the LORD who does all these. (NASB)

8Let fall in showers, you heavens, from above, and let the skies rain down righteousness [the pure, spiritual, heaven-born possibilities that have their foundation in the holy being of God]; let the earth open, and let them [skies and earth] sprout forth salvation, and let righteousness germinate and spring up [as plants do] together; I the Lord have created it. (AMP)
“What sorrow awaits those who argue with their Creator.
Does a clay pot argue with its maker?
Does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it, saying,
‘Stop, you’re doing it wrong!’ Does the pot exclaim,
'‘How clumsy can you be?’
10 How terrible it would be if a newborn baby said to its father,
‘Why was I born?’
or if it said to its mother,
‘Why did you make me this way?’” (NLT)



My Comments:

God chose Cyrus, a king who was not one of His “chosen people”…and chose to bless him and give him power and to use him for God’s own purposes. He worked out blessing for His own people by the way He chose to use Cyrus.

God is Sovereign and reigns supreme. We cannot question how He chooses to work. We cannot look at ourselves and ask Him why He made us the way we are. He is God. It is His place to create, empower, and to destroy. It is our place to do His bidding without question. This completely goes against our prideful grain. It goes against our spirit of independence. We fail to understand the fact of our “createdness.”
As a result of our being obedient to yield in this manner and to acknowledge His supremacy and His right to do as He wishes with us, as a result of our being obedient to His call, He will destroy that which holds us in bondage; He will allow us into the depths of His secret places and there we will find great treasure and blessing. Out of the darkness of our lives; out of our physical and mental suffering, He will bring great treasures. This is contingent on our being obedient and submissive to the way in which He has chosen to make and to use us. God uses calamity and difficulty as well as blessing to accomplish His purposes in our lives and on this earth. We have no idea about what He is up to; nor should we pretend or presume we do.

Vs 8 talks about the ways in which God uses the duet of physical circumstance and heavenly purpose to accomplish His will for His creatures and to pour out His benefit to us…sometimes masked in suffering. We do not know Him. He is God and we are not. Let Him use us as He will. Trust yourselves to His wisdom, knowledge and love. The result will be freedom from the captivity of circumstance and freedom from the bitterness of suffering without purpose. It will also be a deeper knowledge of the mysteries of our sovereign God.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Spirit over Body and Mind

You know the expression : "Mind over Body"? Well, it's true that to a degree a person can talk himself out of pain or fatigue and, by force of will, get things done. But there comes a point when the anguish of the body screams too loudly to be ignored or pushed to the background.

I've been at that point in the past couple of weeks. I have an aggressive case of a relatively rare form of psoriatic arthritis (PsA) and because of a potentially lethal set of side effects, I'd gone off of one of my medications that had been muffling my symptoms a bit. So my illness went unimpeded and it roared over me like a runaway locomotive. All I've been able to do is to go from my hospital bed to my recliner trying to get into a position where my body did not protest quite so loudly. My house has been unkempt as has my person.

If you've been following this blog you will realize that my own family has been going through struggles unrelated to me, due to my daughter's eating disorder. This has necessitated a LONG car trip to Philadelphia as well as the washing of many loads of laundry and going shopping to buy her the things she needs during her treatment. It has taken all of my willpower not to complain about the pain I've been in or not to refuse to get out of my recliner...and there came a time when my willpower and my "mind-over-matter" abilities paled and then vanished.

That's where my spirit, empowered by the Spirit of God, had to kick in and rule over my agonized body and my recalcitrant mind. It is that Spirit which enabled me to put my own discomfort into the background and to attend to my daughter's needs. Now I know, and she would loudly attest to the fact, that my attentiveness and energy was still limited...but I was able to not make MY needs the focal point and to not complain with every painful step I had to take. This limitation of my attention was also probably created by the limitation of my reliance on God's strength; but fully relying on His power does not always mean that our struggles will disappear or their effects be removed from us.

So, when the mind buckles; when the body protests too loudly to be ignored; when cirucumstances demand our full attention--these are the times when I must fully depend on God's Spirit... No, I want to amend that statement: If we are ALWAYS fully relying on God, then there will never come times when our progress depends on the efforts of our will, mind or body. As God says in His Word, "My strength is perfected in weakness" and therefore "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength."

So as parents of hurting children, beginning with the first "midnight cries" of our little bundles and going all the way through, in some cases, the first emergence of mental illness in their young adulthood, it is often necessary for us to put out more than we really have in ourselves. This is why we cannot not "trust (in) the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name."

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Eating Dirt


There is an expression that I heard when my daughter was very young. As I jumped up in the park to keep her from sticking a handful of dirt into her mouth along with a clover she'd picked, my friend said to me: "Don't you know that all babies have to eat a pound of dirt before they're two?" I am not sure if that's a well-published truism or whether she was being creative at the time...but that expression came to my mind this morning as a friend and I were talking while we rode in her car.

My friend today was talking about the escapades of her son and his friends, who are in their early twenties and are stretching the leashes of their careful upbringing and doing what is commonly called: sowing their wild oats. I laughed as I said, "You know K..., just like babies have to eat a pound of dirt, I think kids have to find some trouble to get into when they are at that age. It's a requirement." I know I did it as did most of my peers.

But the really frightening thing is that this is also the age at which many mental illnesses begin to emerge. Schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, and bipolar disorder all very often appear in the person's early twenties, or late teens. Combine those symptoms with the wild oats syndrome and you have a prescription for parental anguish. Parents have to watch as their beloved child falls into an illness where there may be no common ground for the parent to have empathy. Because the child is not a minor any longer, parents are often helpless observers as the child's bad choices combine with frightening symptoms. Sometimes the parent has to hope that the child will get into trouble with the law, just so they will be forced to get help. I know that my parents had to lay sleepless and frightened for a number of years,dreading the sound of the phone ringing, because night time calls could only mean bad things.

We are just entering this phase of life with my daughter...and she is going through some mental health struggles of her own... Honestly, sometimes I wish I could simply take the dirt from those little fists and bring her back home.

It is time to put the real rubber to the road in terms of trusting God. I know that there is really very little I can do, on my own, to help her now--other than to remain available and to continue to love her NO MATTER WHAT. But the greatest factor in my favor is the weapon of prayer. Prayer is not a last ditch effort. It's not "all I can do" but it is really: ALL I CAN DO- There is no greater power; no means more effective than to connect to the power of an all-powerful Father who loves your and my kids with an infinite passion.

That doesn't mean it will be easy to see them making decisions that are harmful or at the very least,unwise. But we CAN rest secure in the knowledge that He loves them even more than we do and that they are never out of His sight. When we cannot be there to protect and love them; God sends His people and angels to guard their ways and to be His hands of love to reach them...

What we cannot do; He can do. What we do not know; He knows. We need to trust Him to take care of our "little" ones as they fly from the nest into uncertain and sometimes fearful situations. And it is my firm conviction that, for those He's called to be His own and their children; God will keep their lives safe in His hands, regardless of their determination to end it, until the time when they willingly return to His embrace.

Our job as parents is to trust that God will keep His promises and act in accordance with His character as He cares for and guides our children. If there is any way that I can be of help...as either a person with mental illness or as a parent who knows what it feels like, please email me at cynthialottvogel@gmail.com or comment on this article and I will respond to you...or at the very "least," pray for you.

Monday, August 17, 2009

When God is Silent:

I Choose JOY!

There is a blog that has meant a lot to me in my journey through the past few months… (http://gitzengirl.blogspot.com) Sara Frankl has a disease that is quite similar to my Psoriatic Arthritis --only her disease is more advanced than mine is right now…But, despite her suffering, she has a motto that is one that I’d really discovered myself some years ago ( I think that Sara is a bit better at living it out than I have been). That motto is “Choose Joy” and when asked by one of her blog readers to define joy, this is what Sara came up with:
Joy: the unwavering trust that God knows what He’s doing and has blessed me with the opportunity to be a part of it… not despite what’s happening in my life but
because of it. When everything earthly feels heavy He gives me an internal lightness that can’t be touched
.


Recently, I was talking to a young woman whom I’d met it the psych hospital during my last stay. This lady was in the pits of despondancy and feeling like her life is not worth living or that she has any ability to continue to face life because of some pain that she has recently been experiencing due to headaches. She questioned me on the degree of my pain and then asked how I can get through my days and not feel suicidal any more.


Oddly, it was over twenty years ago when I felt most suicidal and determined to die and that was BEFORE I’d experienced any of the physical pain with which God has seen fit to entrust me since then. How is it that I was able to get through those times and am now experiencing days of constant pain and struggle and yet not sliding back into that morass of depression? Well, to answer the first question: the way I got through those days was not my own choice–I attempted several times to vacate my existence on earth…but God saw fit to rescue me each time, preserving my life because He knew that there was more that He desired to accomplish in me and with me before I get to the end of my earthly journey.


I told my friend on the phone today this, “In this world, there will almost always be some sort of suffering and pain…this world is cursed by sin and is under the jurisdiction of one who hates us and desires to see us suffer. But God is bigger than he is and has more authority, and God allows us to have pain for a while here, on earth…he is the real authority in what happens to his children…and God takes what Evil meant to be destructive and completely negative, and turns it into something that hones and refines us; something that gives us the ability to “comfort others with the comfort that we ourselves have received.”(as Paul says in the the Bible).


God teaches us sweet and valuable things through our pain…like how to curl up on his lap and cry on his shoulder when everything else has failed to comfort us…and how to see the small but scintillatingly beautiful things that surround us here and now…and how to look forward to what he has in store for us after this life is over to reward us and to make right all that was wrong here in this world!! …. I would never, ever have the longing or the appreciation for heaven that I now have, should I have been successful at ending my life when I was in my twenties.


My friend said repeatedly on the phone last night, “But I just can’t take it! It’s not worth it! I can’t enjoy anything anymore!” I tried to describe to her some of my other friend, Sara’s approach to life. Joy is a choice. This world will always have suffering. We have the option of facing the suffering with bravery and dependance on God’s strength and with joy; or we can whine and moan and feel sorry for ourselves…and make everyone else desire to not hang around us for very long! No one wants to be around someone who is so caught up in their pain that they can’t enjoy life! Self pity makes for a very lonely existence… Pain is bad enough, suffering isolates us enough…but we NEED the presence and help and comfort of others to encourage us…and if we chase everyone away by clinging to our misery, it will make it all that much harder to get through.


I understand that depression is an illness and that a person cannot turn it off by being told to “just choose joy.” I can’t do that either…but let me explain to you the difference between joy and happiness, as I see it. Joy is something that is a solid fact…it is something like the foundation of your house. The condition of your house— the color of it, or whether it’s clean or dirty etc. – does not affect the foundation. The foundation always is there, always supports the house. And in the event of a catastrophe, the foundation will hold fast and remain. Emotions will come and go but joy remains and is the groundwork upon which we build. I think that Joy is the result of a trio: “Faith, Hope, and Love. When we have the faith to know God exists, and experience His love, that gives us hope and the consequence is JOY!! But we need to live out the truth of that sentence before we be able to know and maintain will a life of joy.


Joy IS a choice… I am not perfect at always choosing joy and there are times when I do a bit of moaning… but ultimately, my life is built on and sustained by what Sara Frankl has attempted to define above. I’ve said to people, “I do not always FEEL joy; but I always HAVE joy!” Feelings are fleeting and undependable and they change from moment to moment…our CHOICES make up the bedrock that holds us and supports us through the crashing waves and storms of emotion. The choice is based on what we believe deep down to be true about God…and about this life. I do not believe that we can really be trusting God if we are simultaneously rejecting His path for us! If you really trust Him, you will go where He leads you; you will take whatever His hand holds out to you….because you implicitly trust his motives and desires for you…you KNOW and BELIEVE that He is working good through all things that He brings to you. You KNOW and BELIEVE that unimaginably great things are coming…and because of these things…you CHOOSE to live a life of joy.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Peace Despite Pain

There were several years, back some maybe 7 years from now, when I had a terrible problem with anxiety and worry. This was not really a "free-floating anxiety" but was a nightly event of focused panic over the impending unknown. I would go to bed; and then it would hit--a barrage of fear over finances, housing, job, America's future...anything that there was to be worried about, I was worried about it.

I see this fear now at work in my husband. He lies awake at night stressing over things about which he has no control.... trying to think of solutions and panicking when he cannot. A large part of the reason that he is so afraid, is due to my illness. Medical expenses are and have been, enormous. Much of the burden of taking care of things has fallen on his shoulders, because I can no longer do them. (I know that, when I write, I seem fairly normal and coherent, but in person, my illness is much more evident.) And he worries about what will happen to me and my daughter should he no longer be around.

It is a miserable feeling, that fear. For a long time during my years of struggling with this problem, I read everything I could find about anxiety and worry, especially from a Christian perspective and from Scripture. But nothing seemed to really help.

Do you know what finally solved my problem? It was several things. For one thing, I thought back over my life and wrote down every problem that I had faced where things could have gone terribly wrong, or when I had some great need. Years of financial need; illness, problems with housing etc....all were met, by one means or another...but all by my Father in Heaven. Some of those needs were enormous--but they were no problem to my Adonai.

Gradually, I started to relax into His hands; recognizing that the great Love which had cared for me before, would care for me in the future...regardless of what that future would bring. And He has done exactly that. Yes, I have big issues: pain, illness and psychiatric problems--but it has never been anything that leveled me for long. Every need has, one way or another, (sometimes miraculously) been met. And God is the same, Yesterday, Today and Forever. That's a promise. He takes care of His kids...and He will continue to do so!

So, the result?? PEACE. Jesus said He came in order to give us an incomprehensible peace...and it's true: He does. People have said to me: HOW CAN YOU BE SO CALM AT A TIME LIKE THIS?? And I laugh to myself, because before I'd entered the darkness, I did not have the treasure of Peace. And God has given it to me because He has given me Himself. And with a Dad like that; a girl just can't worry.

Saturday, August 15, 2009

A Grateful Heart

The following is a re-post from a blog which I deleted a while ago, but thought that maybe you might find it helpful.


I have been exploring the "Treasures" that God has given me in the midst of Darkness. This blog post discussed the treasure of Gratitude. For more on that topic--a different and more current take on it, see the following link from my "other" blog: http://lunamosity.wordpress.com/2009/08/15/grace-or-gross-injustice/


This is one of those times when I feel compelled to post, motivated by some kind of obligation or sense of duty rimmed with a restless creative ambition, and have absolutely no idea what I will find coming out of these fingers to land on your screen. So then, you and I are taking this journey together--the voyage into my mind--on completely equal footing...hand in hand, neither one leading or being led and neither of us knowing where we will land.


I'm home from the hospital. Returning to our small Pocono mountain town with it's specialty shops, art galleries and antique shops laced with convenience stores and smattering of churches yesterday felt to me like a precious gift. To own a home, to have a husband who is employed and to be able to survive in times which for many others, are laced with hardship is an incomparable gift... But somehow my sense of being blessed surpassed all of those factors.


I have terrible health problems of the kind which make anticipating where I will find myself from one day to the next impossible; frequent hospitalizations and times when I have such trouble breathing that I am afraid to go to sleep because I do not know if I will wake. I deal with constant severe pain and a crippling disease that is destroying all my joints and my spine. This, too, renders the future unknown and makes it one I probably do not want to foretell.


But yesterday, driving up the winding mountain road to my home, I was bowled over by a sense of blessing. Right this moment, I can breathe. Right this moment, I can walk--even if it is with difficulty. Right this moment, my family waits for me to pull into the driveway. I can go into the house and chose a meal to prepare, I can go outside into my garden if I like... '


Maybe some of you are not GETTING this; not relating to why these things are so special. But if you've ever been a prisoner; if you've ever been held hostage by your own body; if you've ever been institutionalized for a long period of time--then you might get a glimmer of the joy that coursed through my soul yesterday and continues today. There is no such thing as an insignificant freedom...The only freedom that is diminished into unnoteworthiness, is a freedom that is not acknowledged, loved and greeted with gratitude.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Joy in the Mourning

The following post was written last May and it is a re-post from a prior blog. I hope it grants you the Light of illumination and the Joy that can only come after having experienced the depths of sorrow. This Joy is one of the greatest "Treasures from Darkness."

A day or two ago, I was having my time with God in the morning. I call these times: "Penuel", because it means "the Face of God." It is in these times that God most often shows me more of His face. I would like to share what I wrote on that morning, particularly because it relates to the theme of my blog. I suffer from a mental illness, a part of which contains the diagnosis of bipolar disorder. So my life is an extreme example of what, I think, most people experience: one day we are flying and the next finds us in a mud puddle, face down. Here are my thoughts about that:


Joy comes in the morning.
Joy comes through the mourning.

If the clouds are full of rain
(and) they empty themselves on the earth,...
Then the light will be sweet,
and it will be a pleasure to see the sun.
For if a person lives many years,
let him take joy in them all;
yet remembering that there will be many days of darkness,...
Ecclesisastes 11:3a,7-8


This verse combined with Oswald Chambers’ Daily Thoughts for Disciples' entry for May 15th, talk about how life is meant to be enjoyed. Oddly, before I read the above passages, I read one by Thomas a Kempis which was all about “compunction” and having a proper “mirthless” attitude toward life…to embrace mourning and tears and not to waste time in enjoying yourself.
...........................................This disturbed me…ran wrongly across my grain.
Then I read Ps. 80, especially vv.: 5-7 and 11-12.

“The Lord bestows favor and honor:
no good thing does he withhold from
those whose walk is blameless…

BLESSED is the man who trusts in you.”

So? Conclusion?
God wants us to take from our times of sorrow and hardship, despair and difficulty, the ability to appreciate the joys and beauty of life as they can only be viewed after having suffered its heartaches. He wants us to view the heavens from the depths of the canyon…He wants us to rejoice and drink wine in our gladness (not to drink in our sorrow); to enjoy the fruit of the vine and of life and to celebrate it.
Then I read one of the Puritan prayers in Valley of Vision pp 282-283 which contrasts our fallenness with God's perfection, our weakness with His strength, etc. We come to God in our weakness, failure, inconsistency, dishonesty etc….But we dare approach Him with Christ’s purity, strength, victory, steadfastness and honesty etc. We can rejoice because of Christ. We can be victorious in Christ’s victory and we can only appreciate that having a full knowledge of our own sin and failure.
So, yes: have compunction. Yes: despair over your own inability and weakness—then REJOICE because you have the fullness of Christ and therefore, also share the companionship and favor of God. God wants you to enjoy the good things he has given you…. Do this with the eyes of the impoverished! Delight in the feast with the hunger of the starving.I guess that is all I have to say.


I come to the Valley of Baca (which means suffering or distress). And it becomes for me a place of nourishment and refreshment. The valley of suffering teaches me to take from life its good and to savor it completely.

Mindfulness and Purity of Heart

A fellow blogger on Blogspot (one that I follow who can be found at http://clinicallyclueless.blogspot.com/ or by clicking on that link in my list of blogs that I follow), wrote a post on the topic of mindfulness. Rightfully, she called it one of the buzzwords of our time and then discussed its application in Eastern philosophy and then how it applies to us as believers.

I am currently at work on a manuscript that encompasses this very topic. I would like to share here some of my thoughts along these lines:

I believe that this concept that originates in Yahweh (the God of Israel and of the followers of Christ) and that all other versions are responses to this innate truth that God has built into us as His creation. I also believe that this concept is central in Scripture. There is one Hebrew word for it and one Greek word; but translators have used many to convey it to us in English...Purity, pure of heart, single, unity, united, integrity, single-mindedness, etc...and this has diluted the impact of the concept for us.


Mindfulness plays a big part in being single of heart and purpose...We need to know for what we are aiming and whether or not we deviate from that path on a moment by moment basis. It also involves a comprehension or knowledge of ourselves: what we were created for in general and also in specific. How many of us KNOW why God placed us, in our particular set of circumstances and personality, on this earth...and what does He want us to do with that understanding?


Singleness of heart must also play a part in our prayer life. (How often do we pray mindlessly-- "God bless so and so" or "please heal so and so" but then not really expect that He will?) Our requests to God must match the level of faith that we have and our whole being needs to be engaged and united in the focus of our prayer. Look at this passage from James chapter one:

If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does. (James 1:5-8 NIV )

Although speaking of double-mindedness, it is also a comment on God's view of single- mindedness. Plus there is Jesus' statement in the list of those people who are blessed or happy: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Have you ever really meditated on what it means to be pure of heart? ...or asked God to reveal it to you in your circumstances to show you what that virtue should look like in your own life? To do this is the first step in a mindful life.

We need to have our entire beings: mind, soul, strength (our actions and our physical beings), and heart , all focused on the pursuit of that which God has entrusted to us to accomplish with our lives; to be in His presence; and to arrive at someday when we enter His kingdom. (By the way, you may recognize here that we are to LOVE God with our entirety; that is all of our main goal...but how do we each do that by obeying His calling to us? That is my question to you.) This DOING has much to do with BEING and also with BECOMING. It is all one. And we need to be "one" as well. That's the whole point.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

An Insane Faith

I want to share with you some of my personal story. It is, ultimately, a testament of God's protection; his mercy; his patience; and his refusal to give up on me.

My first visit to a psychiatrist occurred in my senior year of high school when my parents took me to a nearby Christian psychiatric center for an evaluation because I had begun to exhibit some signs which alerted them to the fact that something was wrong. I sat in the chair next to the psychiatrist’s desk and we casually talked…or at least, he talked; I was casual. Excusing himself, he left the room for a moment and then re-entered. I had picked up a small sculpture in onyx of an elephant during his absence and hastily set it down as I heard his footsteps returning.

The young doctor asked me –oh so offhandedly—“What were you just thinking while I was gone?” I laughed to myself because the whole disappearance and re-entry followed by this off-hand, matter-of-fact question was such an obvious and such an awkwardly accomplished set-up. Without missing a beat, I said, “I’m thinking about onyx elephants.”
“Onyx elephants?” said the poor man, probably thinking he’d stumbled over a classic thought disorder.
“Yes,” I said emphatically. “I collect onyx and this elephant of yours is rather nice.”
The disappointment on the doctor’s face made me want to laugh. If he thought he was going to find something wrong with me…he had another thought coming!

It was years later that my parents divulged to me the results of that conversation and the barrage of psychiatric testing that I’d undergone. The doctor’s conclusion?...That I had a serious psychiatric illness, but was too guarded to undergo treatment at that point. So it seems that I was the chump that day and not him!

It was toward the end of my freshman year in college that the thread to which I was clinging snapped and I tumbled headfirst into an abyss of despair unlike anything I’d yet experienced. My depression was so profound that continuing to breathe seemed to take more energy and commitment than I felt I had in me.

I, who had always been a straight-A student, now found it difficult to attend classes and even more difficult to care about the consequences of missing them. I got into frequent clashes with my roommate which ultimately concluded with her moving out of the dorm room to another one and telling everyone that I “had a problem.” I remembered praying and begging God to lift this despair and to help me to regain my footing…but the air in that dorm room rang with Sovereign silence.

Ultimately, I lost the battle with the insanity that I was fighting so desperately. I took a bottle of pills one day…a pathetic attempt which failed miserably…yet which landed me in a medical hospital and ultimately in a psych hospital for the ensuing six months. While there, any pretense of my being in control of myself was abandoned and most of the time I sat motionless as a statue –lost in a hopelessness and a lack of energy that was too painful to be called apathy. There were times when, overcome by rage and fear, I was not in control of myself and needed to be restrained.

All pretenses of being a follower of God fell away, and I was lost, tumbling head over heels down, what I now refer to as: “the rabbit-hole” (a la Alice in Wonderland.) This was a free-fall with which I was to become very familiar in the following years. I went from one hospitalization to another: short-term and long-term…the longest being 14 months in one facility…then I would be out and “free” for a short time, and then some episode or psychotic break would occur and I would be readmitted.

Throughout that time, my grip on reality became thinner and more tenuous until there was very little doubt that I had a psychotic disorder. I was diagnosed, first with “depression with psychosis,” then with “chronic paranoid schizophrenia,” and ultimately in the past couple of years, with “schizoaffective disorder” which is really a combination of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

I was very blessed to have a period of about 14 years which extended from the time of my daughter’s birth until she was a teenager, where I was fairly “normal”…(at least as far as people with my diagnosis go). Because of my illness, however, I fairly continually experienced paranoid thinking and also was not exceedingly affectionate with my family or friends… I tended toward a flat, expressionless face and a distance in my relationships which my family had to struggle to accept. Finally several years ago, all pretenses of normalcy were stripped away as I once again plummeted into psychosis and tumbled again from one hospitalization to the next.

The major difference between these years and the ones several decades ago is that I am now in love with the Lord Jesus and his love for me keeps me grounded on a rock foundation despite the high waves and howling winds of psychosis. Now, once I get done throwing chairs and conversing with people whom no one but I can see, I am able to be a light of God’s love to the suffering people in those psych wards. And my periods of psychosis only last for a few weeks instead of for months or even years.

Some people in the Church have unintentionally made me feel as though there is something wrong with me spiritually because I have a mental illness. They have confused a physical disease with a mind and heart-set of despair and instability…and also with demon possession. I cannot emphasize strongly enough my plea for the Church to understand and integrate the knowledge of and education about mental illness in its genetic and biological reality. The self-doubt caused by such an inference is horrible to undergo…especially to someone who does not have an integrated sense of him or herself to begin with.

It gives me great joy to report, however, that the majority of the people in my present home church have embraced me and exhibit great love and acceptance toward me…despite the fact that I have had some singular “melt-downs” in their presence. This is the first church where I have not felt like an outcast or the church’s resident psychopath! I am glad to say, from the pastor down to the attendees, most of the people here are loving and gracious toward me.

As in any other medical problem, God can heal and sometimes does…but a “failure” on his part to do so, should be understood as part of his omniscient and wise plan for that individual’s life…a means by which he plans to “help and not to harm (them); to give (them) a hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11) Yes! That promise is aimed at the mentally ill as well! Who are we to second guess God or to condemn those whom he loves? God does not condemn them; who are we, the Church to do so? As in the cases of cancer where healing does not occur, God is in sovereign control and we cannot claim to have a grasp on or understanding of all of his reasons…but there are times when we can get a glimpse of them… Just be thankful for those times and surrender the other times to his keeping as I must do every day as I wake to recurring symptoms.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

A Short Hello...

My house is a mess. I'm in pain. All I feel like doing is sitting here on this stupid laptop....or maybe sleeping.

I woke up this morning -awakened by pain- but dreaming of heaven. How cool is that? And wouldn't it be AWESOME to wake up one morning and really find myself there??

This entry is going to be short; and it is also a bit more personal than my others...but I can't always be on my soapbox. If you don't get to know me; you won't know that I am still struggling with mental and physical illnesses...and that might make my other articles less "real." So here I am, sitting on my recliner in my pajamas where I've been sitting for the last three hours and the last three days before that....writing to you which is only a tad better than talking to myself...which I also tend to do.

I really think that if I want to remain married; (and I do) that I need to give this house some attention...so that will be my goal for today. Whether or not it happens, is another story...which I will tell later.

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

A Strong Thread of Hope....

"Anyone familiar with mental illness knows that recovery is not a singular event, but a multi-dimensional, multi-linear journey characterized more by the mindset of the one taking it than by his or her condition at any given moment along the way.

"Understanding recovery as having several dimensions makes its uneven course easier to accept. Much as we don't blame the cancer patient for dying of invasive tumors, we can't condemn a consumer whose symptoms overtake his or her best efforts to manage illness."
These lines I've quoted here are from NAMI's (National Alliance for the Mentally Ill) website. (http://www.nami.org/) I like the second part of the first paragraph in particular. It means that every individual is unique and the path that one person with mental illness takes in their attempt to recover, will be different from that of another. You cannot lump all people who have a single diagnosis together and expect that the illness will define their actions and progress in the same way. Progress is instead, determined by personality: each person's environment, faith or lack thereof, level of motivation, education, family situation: in short, all the things that comprise every person's personality and ability to reach his or her goals.
And the second paragraph is equally true. Recovery is a bumpy road...with many detours. And speaking as someone who has frequently thought, "Hmmm, I'm doing pretty well now," only to, days later, find myself hospitalized again; I have found myself facing frequent discouragement. And now I find that my family also experiences hope alternating with despair and disillusionment. I know that they try (most of the time with success) to not give optimism a place in their hearts because frankly, it just hurts too much to be disappointed AGAIN. But when they give up on me, it only makes it harder for me to keep striving for a goal that can seem unobtainable. When I come up with new ambitions or new ideas for undertakings that I want to attempt to accomplish; they frequently discourage me from getting my hopes up. I know that this is not really a manifestation of their lack of faith in my abilities and talents, but more, a statement of their awareness of the severity of my illness.
But I would like to say a word to you families and friends of the mentally ill. Remember: your family member or friend is an individual, not a diagnosis. And the higher you help them to aim, the higher they will shoot. This doesn't mean that there will not be disappointments and setbacks. But do not give up! Your loved one will sense very clearly that you no longer believe in them or in their abillity to overcome...and will stop trying. And if they are a follower of God, you must remember that "Greater is He who is in" them, than their diagnosis!
Determine to be an encourager. Determine to be willing to have setbacks. Determine to expose yourself to the risks of HOPE.... and when there are failures; determine to be a comforter and then to re-instill in the "consumer" (to borrow the language of NAMI), the motivation to go on...even if they have to use some of YOUR faith in them while they try to rebuild their own faith in themselves. Cling to the God of Hope and ask Him to fill you with that resource, when you run out of your own supply. He will do it!

Monday, August 10, 2009

He loves me; loves me not...

"I've been living out of sanity
I've been splitting hairs and blurring lines
I'm a house that is divided
in my heart and in my mind
I USE ONE HAND TO PULL YOU CLOSER
THE OTHER TO PUSH YOU AWAY..."

Jars of Clay has to be my all-time favorite band. I love how every album of theirs is a style unique to that album, and yet their band maintains an identifiable sound. The above quotation is from their newest ablum and I found these lyrics from the song, "Two Hands," compelling.


It appealed to me for three reasons really:

  1. It speaks to the human condition, doesn't it? We are born with indecision and doublemindedness. Now we want it; now we don't. Now I love you; now I don't. It takes a work of God to unite our hearts and make us pure in heart, or singleminded...and that is a process we should work to facilitate.
  2. Part of my diagnosis is that I am Bipolar. So the "push-me-pull-you" aspect of my mind works overtime. And I struggle with this, not only in relationships with people, but also with God. Hot or Cold. Full of energy or completely lacking in ambition. That's me. (According to the book of Revelation, that's better than being lukewarm!) There is a quote from some famous theologian (and I am not evading giving him the credit for it; but my mind is a complete blank on where I heard this.) It says something like: we are never in a holding pattern with God. At all times we are either growing closer or pulling away.
  3. I am currently working on a manuscript about the process of becoming Single-hearted. So anything in this vein draws my attention. It is our nature (human nature) to be divided in our heart and mind...but God desires that we be: in constant pursuit of him; solely focused on pleasing him and carrying out his goals for us; more passionate about our love for him than for any other person or thing. "Blessed are the pure in heart"--this is what this verse is talking about.

Being hot and then cold is a difficult way to live....because we can undertake some big, ambitious projects when we are "hot" and energetic...But then we burn out and die down to a cool stagnation, don't we? I do, that's for sure. Then suddenly we find ourselves unable to finish what we started--in fact we cannot recall what its appeal was in the first place! And my family finds it hard to live with me in this cycle also. I'll tear the house apart in a huge burst of energy to reorganize and clean; and then it will get left a mess because my enthusiasm didn't last long enough for me to complete the job. I'll be interested in them and full of affection one day and then for the next week, want nothing but to hide in my basement room and not see anyone.

Maybe you recognize this tendency in your family member who suffers from mental illness. I know that this cycle is difficult to live with in myself; it must be really a challenge for someone from a perspective farther removed than mine who has to deal with me! One thing you need to know: your loved one always loves you the same way they do or did at their most ardent display of it. It is the illness that creates this apathy; this distance; and the flatness of "affect" (as psychiatrists refer to the expressionlessness of many patients with psychotic disorders). Somewhere in their hearts or in the place where their true selves are hiding out; they love and need you intensely...It just somehow gets lost in the trip from heart to face. And, if they are like me, they recognize this failure in their wiring, and feel guilty about it and are powerless to change it.

Perfected Weakness

I just received the following link from my father who knew I’d be interested in this article: http://www.crosswalk.com/spirituallife/11607116/page0/

I know that it may or may not be relevant to mentally ill people; but it is definitely relevant to creative people and since I am a writer as well as a visual artist, this article says things that are of importance. Please also note that the things stated here are, for the most part, important to all of us, because they tell us how to remain in greater contact with the power and voice of the Holy Spirit…and what person does not need that?

In the paragraph labeled “Maintain a Listening Lifestyle” there was one sentence that really jumped out at me: “Ask God to help you look beyond who you think you are to more clearly see who you really are.” This particular point has maybe a greater impact on the mentally ill, than it would for the “healthy” person. We all tend to label ourselves according to our own self-perception. We think of ourselves as fat, unattractive, stupid, slow…or a multitude of other possibilities. At the very least, we may have a fairly healthy self image, but can feel that a particular “assignment” given by the Spirit to be too ambitious or impossible for us to accomplish. But for the mentally ill, this is a huge obstacle. Once a person defines him or her self by the diagnosis they have been given, it becomes unlikely that they will ever accomplish anything beyond the parameters expected for their illness.

It was a huge step for me to understand that
“"My (God speaking) grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I (The Apostle Paul and us) will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." (2 Corinthians 12:9, NIV version)

God is NOT LIMITED by MY limitations!! Therefore, if he tells me that he wants me to be a missionary, or write a best-seller, or any other thing that would seem to be impossible in the eyes of my doctors or family…then God absolutely can and will provide from the resource of his own strength, the ability for me to accomplish that goal.

It was the delivering of this verse to me by a strange encounter with a woman in a bookstore, who out of the blue, walked up to me and handed me a devotional in a book based on this very verse; which convinced me to finally begin to write the book that God had been calling me to write. I had procrastinated; held back by my fear and by my view of myself as only some “crazy” person that no one would want to listen to—and God had to get me beyond my self-limitation to trust that it is HIS strength and wisdom that will accomplish the task; not mine.

So if you are the loved one of someone who is mentally ill; and if that person has a knowledge of Jesus personally; I would encourage you to encourage them to take the time and to find the courage to hear what GOD’S plan is for his or her life…and to instill in them the knowledge that God’s strength works best in those people who fully understand their human weaknesses and limitations and who rely fully on HIM to get it all done.

Needs: Found and Lost

The following article is on that I have re-posted from
a prior blog of mine.
It was written about a week prior to my being admitted
once more to the hospital.
I hope you find it helpful.



I had two very interesting conversations recently, one with a fellow-blogger, a single believer, trying to find that balance between faith and the nitty gritty need of real life and flesh. The other was with my daughter...actually it was the compilation of numerous conversations that led me to recognize some great and deep truths about us: as humans, as believers, as unbelievers...My daughter is back in her angry, cynical expectation of me leaving her again to go into the hospital… I love her very much and it hurts me to be the cause of her pain. She seems to need me intensely, even as a late teen. She attributes it to my many times away in hospitals, but I don't think that is the only reason. I don’t know why there is no bottom to her need…. Well, really I do…but she would never hear the answer from my lips.She told me the other day that she never feels content…ALWAYS feels some great sense of underlying NEED or WANT of something. I can definitely understand that, having suffered that wordless, aching need for many, many years.

“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not WANT.” I do not lack anything. If you feel the love of your Father in heaven, that is constantly in you, constantly listening to you and surrounding you, that incredible NEED is satiated and there is that “peace that passes understanding” which cannot be disturbed even by illness or threat of more hospitals. This great dependence we have on our heavenly Father, really gives us independence here on earth. We can tolerate any loss, any “lack” because we have our most basic need filled by Him and His love. That does not mean I love my family any less (I love them MORE) but it means that my sense of well-being doesn’t come from or rely on them. Nor does it free us from the responsibility of taking action to help others, the helpless and destitute with their needs. That is why we are here...to be "God's hand of help and healing to a lost and hurting world," as my church fellowship states it.

For my other friend, it's maybe both harder and easier...Easier because he already has that constant Presence of his Lover/Lord, but he is without the warm body next to him and the listening ear he dreams that a marriage or relationship would give him. Well, several words in that direction: 1) marriage often leaves you lonlier than if you were alone 2) In my marriage, I've had to rely most often on my heavenly Husband even more. To wit: we are all essentially alone, regardless of our level of popularity, integration in a Body of Believers, or relationships...Once we seek and find that God's hand holds ours as we stumble along through our need and hardship, however, we can truly sing with David, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall lack no good thing.

Proverbs 24:16

"for though a righteous man falls seven times, he rises again,

but the wicked are brought down by calamity.

Ps 37:24

When he falls, he will not be hurled headlong,

Because the LORD is the One who holds his hand.

Seeds of Choice



Funny how God ties things into packages in our minds... Takes a sentence here, a paragraph there, a Scripture passage, a comment, a blog, an incident.... and weaves a tapestry of meaning for us. People often are in doubt as to how to hear God's voice and how to know it is Him speaking. For me, this question is difficult to understand.... He is really pretty persistent when He wants to make a point. He will say it in a thousand ways...each time adding a new dimension to our understanding until we finally "get it." But getting it is only half the battle... and this aspect of my line of thought here, is precisely the package God has been handing me to open and use.
Once we understand what God is telling us, we then have to act on it - or make a decision based on that information which will have a huge impact on our future path. So many times, even this morning: I saw the signs, heard the bells and alarms....and chose wrongly. Sometimes we can try to brush these failures under the rug, thinking that it was a small mistake and no one will ever notice and it will not have an effect on our tomorrow... but God has shown me just today, that, as the Bible says, "sin is crouching at your door, it longs to have you." Give an inch and before you know it, you are miles away from where you know you should be...and truly want to be. And sometimes those miles are irretrievable. You cannot trace your path back and undo what you've done.
I chose this picture of the milkweed to accompany this post because it reminds me of myself.... Intricately and beautifully designed...with many seeds of potential...yet so fragile that a puff of wind can send those seeds and scatter them in all directions. I cannot forget my fragility... I cannot think myself independent of my Designer. And when the wind comes, I need to lean hard on Him to guide where my seeds land.
Listen. Hear. Trust. Obey.
It really is not complicated, but without the Trust, it is impossible.