Make Me Whole

Day 59.

There are days when I think I’ll never get over this stupid depression.  Seriously, I sometimes hear or read about other people’s experiences and every time they use the word “years” it’s almost enough to set off a panic attack.  Sometimes I just want to pretend like it’s not happening.  Like I’m not feeling what I’m feeling.  Like I’m not experiencing what I’m experiencing.  Like it doesn’t hurt.  I try and force it out of my mind, and go on with my day, doing whatever it is that I would have done on a “normal” day before everything crashed.  I try and force it out of my body, acting as if it never happened, like if I just keep pushing it down, down, down it will all go away.  Sometimes I think, if I could just wake up from this nightmare and start July all over again, I’d do everything differently and maybe, just maybe, I wouldn’t get sick…so very sick.

Days like today, I live on the prayers of my godly support system.  I know they’re reaching Heaven on my behalf and as the burden begins to ease (ever so slightly) I start to think clearly again.  Even though there’s a piece of me that wishes I could hit the redo button on the last three months, I know that if I didn’t go through the valley, I wouldn’t be able to stand on the mountain with God.  I have to accept that as much as I hate being a victim of circumstances, there are things about the situation I’m in that I cannot change.  Though I can move forward in recovery, I can’t will myself out of clinical depression.  I can’t fix things that are broken, even if I didn’t break them on purpose.  I can’t make sense of senselessness.  I can’t even get out of bed in my own strength.  It is on days like these where I feel the need for Jesus the strongest.

In my mind, I can acknowledge that God is with me.  I know that He is holding me up.  I know that He is drawing me close to Him.  This is where faith goes from handsome theology to haggard practice.  It is no longer folded nicely on the shelf, but crumbled up in my trembling hands, worn and tattered as I rework it over and over, pulling at the seams.  It is tear-stained and dirty from this drag through the mud; still I wrap it around me as a shield against the world.

I know that I am going to get through this.  I know that even though this has dramatically altered my life, not to mention all my future dreams for myself, I will be okay again.  Everything has been filtered through God’s loving hands and He is faithful.  He has bigger plans for me than I could ever have for myself.  So even though I can’t see it, I rely on the evidence.  I rely on the substance of things hoped for.  Yes, even today, I believe my faith will make be whole.