Dismantling Shame

I want to talk about some past experiences that I have learned from, and gained insight into as the years have passed by. A few years ago, I was on the receiving end of a very bitter dissolving of a friendship. I had reached out to a friend after the passing of my mother, and decided to be vulnerable and let her know what my needs were. This was a HUGE step for me in my healing process, and something I would have never done before. I knew that she could say no, and I made my peace with that. I was prepared for her to not be able to be there for me. What I did not expect however, was to be told that I wasn't allowed to have needs, and that my needs were inappropriate and wrong, and that I was only to take those deep things to Jesus. Now- there is a God sized hole that we all have in our lives, and there are certain areas that only he can feel. But we cannot deny the need for community and relationship- we were designed for it. And in many regards, we only heal from past relationship disasters through healthy relationship interactions.

Now, a healthy person may be on the receiving end of this and say "well...that is a load of poop! I don't believe a word you say!" That was not my reaction, however.

You may be wondering as the reader, why did it stick? Why did I believe it? Shouldn't I, a grown adult woman, know what is true of myself? Well, not necessarily. For starters, I was raised in an environment where my intuition, my feelings and perceptions were constantly in question. I was rarely validated, and thus I never learned the importance of validating myself. As I've said in many previous posts, my mother suffered from Borderline personality disorder. It was pervasive and permeated every corner of her life, and subsequently our lives. I was wired for dysfunction, to put it lightly. I tend to feel that I am responsible for the reactions and responses of others, because that's how I was raised. It was my fault if my mother flew into a rage. It was my fault if she was sad, or distressed or just didn't want to be a mom that day. As I got older, and TRIED to individuate and differentiate,  as children are meant to do, my every move, and intention was questioned if it did not suit her needs. This made me feel crazy. I was told, on a regular basis, how I ought to feel, that my feelings were not normal, that I was crazy and incapable of making decisions, etc. These were all projections, but I believed for the majority of my life that there was something was profoundly wrong with me on a very basic level. I was raised to believe I was incapable of handling life. 

Fast forward, and what do you get? I was terribly anxious about making decisions...even little decisions, like where to go to eat. I would look around at the reactions and responses of others who would be affected by my decision.  God seemed to strategically put people in my life who would challenge this and force me to make decisions, and I'm grateful he did! I believed the lie that I couldn't handle the outcome of my choices  and thus would just sit like a paralyzed goat, unable to move or think. 

In healthy relationships, this wouldn't  be a problem because I would be surrounded by people who believed in me more than I believed in myself and thus "called out the gold", so to speak. I began to slowly believe that I was capable of making decisions, and thus my anxiety diminished. I began to create a new history of making good decisions and being able to handle it if I made a poor one. The same has been true for trusting my perceptions. When you are raised in an environment where you are made to feel crazy for how you feel, think and process, when you are told that certain traumatizing events never happened and that you just made it up, you find it nearly impossible to trust your own perceptions and intuition, which is our  God-given gps system.  Again in healthy relationship, this wouldn't be a problem because I was surrounded by people who worked as hard to understand me as I did them. There was mutual respect and a desire to grow and be the best humans we can be. 

What happens when this is challenged? When you are told that your perceptions are wrong, your feelings are invalid, and therefore you don't deserve to be in relationship because you are somehow so terribly flawed? If there is a giant crack in your foundation, as I had in mine, you will feel profound shame, and perhaps even self hatred.  I believed the lie that on a very basic level, I was flawed and therefore unfit for relationship. That I didn't deserve kindness, comfort or nurturing. My big question at that time is "why do I believe this lie"? It had to come from somewhere. And sure enough...it did. Not just one time, but many times through the course of my life. I had been kicked out, for lack of a better term, and deemed unfit. Not worth fighting for. Easily discarded. It's no wonder I believed that I deserved the treatment from this friend at a time when I genuinely needed someone. 

I began to look at my shame and decided I didn't want it there anymore. I was kicking it out- no matter how long it took me. I began the slow and grueling process of dismantling shame. This is not an easy task, and for me required me to look at my past and get healing from some hurts that I was unknowingly carrying around. I believed the lie that if I showed all of myself, even my flawed parts, that I would be rejected. And I was- by humans. But I have never been rejected by God. And through this, I have found pieces of my identity that were hiding underneath my fear.  The fear of losing that caused me conform or become a chameleon. I see some areas where I began to hide my true self out of fear of being rejected or misunderstood. Times where I was teetering on the edge of allowing myself to be controlled for another persons comfort. Don't get me wrong- there is nothing worse than betrayal or rejection. It HURTS. It has been one of the most painful experiences of my life, but I also see some strength emerging that was not there before. I am no longer willing to NOT be fully myself. Brene Brown talks a lot about this in her book "I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't!)". You cannot have courage without vulnerability, and I am not willing to pretend to be perfect in order to avoid rejection. I am not willing to be less of myself in order to make others happy or comfortable. 

So, how do we heal? How do we face our insecurities and fears and not hide from the world when that seems like the easiest solution? 

For starters, throughout this whole ordeal of losing one of my closest friends during a time of need, God has been faithfully speaking and ministering to me through dreams and scripture. I would often wake up with a verse floating through my mind. I have learned to plant myself there and craft prayers out of those verses. I would stay there until he dropped another thought or dream into my head. As Graham Cooke says "I'm going to get a lot of mileage out of this problem." I became determined to heal. To not walk around with this undercurrent of fear and shame. I have learned the value of process. That God isn't asking us to be stoic or perfect. I think the Psalms  are a perfect indication that we are permitted to process. That it is necessary! To cry out to God in our distress, lack, misery and as we turn ourselves to him, He heals and restores, and shows us more of himself. I will be honest and say that at times it has felt like what he has given me has not been enough. 

One thing that I have been SEVERELY challenged by is that God often gives me a word that is in direct opposition of how I feel. For example, the day after "the incident", I woke up to Psalm 63 floating in my mind, specifically the verse that talks about being satisfied with marrow and fatness. I thought "ha! yeah right...all I feel right now is loss and lack and absence and I'm afraid it might just consume me."  So I have learned, however begrudgingly, to follow His lead and even if all I can do is whisper the promise- I do. I declare it. I WILL be satisfied. I WILL lack no Good thing. It may not be today- but always eventually.

I would HIGHLY encourage you to buy or rent from the library Brene Brown's books...any of them. They are pure gold! 

Jesus LOVES your process

I know I've written before about accepting that my journey has been so very different from others. Or so it seems, anyway. Accepting that I can't force it to fit the mold of anyone else's life or process. I often fear that others won't accept me because my life is too intense for them. I'm leaning to care less what other's think, but it has not been easy as I tend to fall very easily into the trap of people pleasing.

Can I just say- grief sucks. I hate it. I feel like I've been grieving for years- the loss of my father, the loss of my mother to mental illness, and the loss of relationships with two of my siblings due to their disagreement with my life choices (aka going no-contact with an abuser). Sometimes it all catches up to me and I lose my breath. I feel I've been taken out more times than I could possibly recover from, and if I look at the wounds through my eyes and for too long, I quickly become overwhelmed. I quickly lose sight of Jesus, and the fact that He is carrying me through (Psalm 71:20). If I look too long at how weak and tired I am, I quickly forget that His spirit is STRONG in me. I forget that He is more invested in my healing than I am. I forget that He is furiously more passionate about my recovery and wholeness than I am, and I don't have to convince him to complete the work he started!

And this is what I'm learning. I've spent a fair amount of time feeling like I need to convince him of what I need. I approach the throne of grace tentatively, thinking that maybe I'm asking for too much or maybe he doesn't want to give that to me. Maybe I don't deserve another child or maybe I'm not good enough for x y or z. We beg him for love, friendship, healing and restoration. And you know what? we don't have to! I think most of us (myself included) have yet to realize the length that God has already gone to to insure victory for us. My wholeness is already paid for. Yours is too! God looks at us and says, without reservation, "I'm wholly committed to this one." And it is full of excitement and joy and not a hint of obligation. Yet, we feel we need to beg him for what he has already given freely and without hesitation. I am just now starting to grasp how much God loves our process. How much he loves PERIOD.  He knew all of my days before there was yet one of them (Psalm 139:16). He knew the trouble that would come to me at a young age. He knew the suffering I would endure for years. He knew the persecution and loss that I would face trying to get free. He knew the babies I would lose, and EVERY OTHER BAD THING I will ever face and he has made a provision for every single one of those things. That provision has been made through the blood of Jesus, and all of my losses are being recovered through relationship with the Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

That doesn't mean it has been easy or that it will get easier. Although victory has been paid in full, it is not without effort on my part (Ephesians 6). I still have to learn how to take up my weapons and fight for it because there is a vicious enemy who wants nothing more than to see me destroyed. He doesn't want to see me whole because I have a story that will be unleashed that will set the captives free. I still have to cooperate with Jesus when he shows me again that the path I'm walking is steep and dangerous and that I will have to confront more fears and giants. I'm learning perspective, because so often, His goal is different than mine. I want comfort-He wants character. He wants to produce in me a faith that is of more worth than gold and I want to step away from the flames. This is where I'm learning to get comfortable forgetting my own strength and leaning into His.

I pray that he would open our eyes, ears, and spirits to experience him daily. To experience how good his heart and thoughts are towards us- even in the midst of suffering and hardship. That we would experience the love that has made every provision for us.

I'll leave you with this to think on:
Romans 8:31-39 "31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;
    we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”[j]

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[k] neither the present nor the future,nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Never a dull moment

I was enjoying the quiet. I'd made some pretty radical and scary decisions in regards to my family.  I needed a break. I seemed to be having somewhat of a PTSD response to my mother, and even my brothers- just the whole issue of being harassed whenever I would make a decision that went against what the family unit wanted to do.  I decided to do what was best for me- which was to miss a few unnecessary events so I could work on my emotional processing and see if the Lord would show me what was causing this panic. And, of course, I was harassed for this.  "You're breaking mom's heart, nobody else has any problems with mom, so I don't understand what your problem is." All of a sudden, a light bulb went on.  I realized that there was a scary dynamic going on within my family that no one else was really seeming to acknowledge: there was one persons opinion, needs, and wants that are favored or rather, feared above all others- my mother's. Everyone is expected to do what makes her happy and suits her at the cost of yourself and your purpose. I realized that most families, at least the healthy ones, have respect and value for each individual and the strengths that they bring to the family. My family is not this way- it is heavily lopsided, and in my opinion, very unhealthy and wrong.  Since when is it considered the "Christian" thing to do to forsake yourself, your marriage, children, and even God himself for the wantan desires of a tyrant? It's not.

Even though it was painful, I learned something very valuable here, and it came from a revelation of who God is, and who He desires to be for me. "Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty..." (2 Cor. 3:17), and "perfect love drives out fear" (1 John 4:8).  When fear, guilt, shame, or humiliation are present, you can be certain that there are some evil intentions in place. We are not to use manipulation or control to get our needs met, or force others to do what we want. We are to seek the ONE as the source of all those things, and we can count on Him to supply- whether that be through people, jobs, gifted money, whatever. What I learned was to recognize those internal signals. To take a look at what I'm motivated by in a situation- why am I afraid of saying no? Is it because I want to please people? Or because I'm afraid of what they will do or say about me? Is it because I've been shamed in some way? There are many different reasons.

So, I had just gotten to this place of enjoying peace. Boundaries were high up, set in place where I could finally relax and then my mom called. I didn't answer, but she left me a voicemail saying they had found a mass in her abdomen and the next day, it was confirmed as stage 3 ovarian cancer. Of course, I was hit with the news, and was immediately overwhelmed- not in concern for her health, per se, but with worry for what this meant for our relationship. Does this mean I have to get close to her again? Does this mean I change my boundaries? What will other people say (close family) if I am seldom present? And what I absolutely dread the most- that she will use this as another way to get the attention she needs, manipulating the sympathies of others. I can't be the judge of that, but I am rightfully concerned. This would not be the first time she has used a situation to her advantage, and truthfully, I don't even let myself think about it anymore because it makes me sick to my stomach. And, my decision really is no longer about her. I am protecting a healing wound, and I don't want to jump back in too quickly when the nerves are still fresh with pain.

If my mom truly has borderline personality disorder, this situation could become messy very quickly. It could also put her in the position to get a diagnosis as many people will be involved in her care. I really don't know how this is going to go. 

I used to live to please her- every move was dictated by her actions and responses. Part of the intensity and mess was because of my sensitive personality- it seems to have affected me more than the other three kids, but untangling those actions and responses, tracing them back to their roots is, to say the least...very difficult- not to mention time consuming. It's like a construction worker doing some demolition on an old, outdated building. When he knocks through the walls, he finds a mess of wires going to and fro throughout the house, untangling them one by one to trace them to their original source. It is a lengthy upheaval. But, in the end, the power will move more smoothly throughout the house, the electric bill will probably drop, and there won't be as many power shortages- if you catch my drift- it will be well worth it.

And, I am not doing this alone. Where I once viewed myself as a child begging their parent to meet their needs, I now see myself in the Father's affection- I know that in Him, my needs have ALREADY been met. It is His great love for me that pursues me, it follows me, surrounds me on every side. He is the example of parenting that I was lacking in so many ways.

I is still scary. I'm not going to lie. I still have a lot of work to do, and on top of that, I have a toddler, a husband, a job...one day at a time.