My mind was distant as I looked out of the sliding glass doors and into the backyard. I don’t know if I was actually seeing anything. Had I been, I would have seen the large, carpeted patio, the pool, and the yard stretching out beyond it. The backyard held a swing set, a sandbox, a basketball court, and a two-story treehouse. Several cats and plants of every color and variety joined the family-friendly scene. But my mind was not on the patio, the pool, or the backyard. It was far away, wondering what was wrong with me — why I had such a melancholy disposition. Of course, if you had said the word “melancholy” or “disposition” to me, I would have had no idea what you were talking about. I was only around five years old.
I can’t remember if I was kneeling or standing on the chair. We called it the “dizzy chair” because it turned 360 degrees either way and my brothers and I would spin each other around until we got so dizzy, we couldn’t walk straight. Anyway, I remember feeling off – different, bored. But I could have never put it into those words. I’m only now assigning words to the feelings that I had — going back over 30 years, it’s kind of difficult to remember. When I use the word “bored” I don’t mean it in the whiney little kid “I’m bored” kind of way. It was like I was already bored of life. I was deeply sad on a level that no child should be – although I know there are many who are. That moment in the dizzy chair is my first memory of the depression that would be my shadow for the foreseeable future.
When I was four years old, I had asked Jesus into my heart. I remember it was a Sunday and my mom was tucking me into bed for my after-church nap. She asked if I wanted Jesus to live in my heart and I said “Yes.” I wanted to please my mom and make her happy, I didn’t know what it meant though, not really. I’m not sure any four-year-old would. But I enjoyed the Bible stories I heard in Sunday School and was fairly sincere in my prayer. I was unknowingly embarking on a path that would not only bring searing pain but also joy and purpose. Of course, life brings us pain whether we have asked Jesus into our hearts or not. It’s the joy and purpose that redemption brings that makes the Christian life different. That’s what my entire story is about. Redemption. Beautiful, painful, joyful redemption. I don’t have it all figured out. Indeed, in the words of Philippians 2:12, I’m still “work[ing] out [my] salvation with fear and trembling.” The beautiful part is that I’m not alone. The very next verse says, “For it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13). God is the one doing the work, I simply submit to His will — which really isn’t simple at all. More on that in a later post.
I grew up in the late eighties and early nineties. At that point in time, most people didn’t understand mental illness. The churches I attended didn’t address it at all that I remember — even into the new millennium. The one place that mentioned it was the nondenominational fundamentalist organization that my family was a part of (it has since been called out as a cult by various people in the media). The teaching within this organization was that there was no such thing as depression except if you had something wrong with your thyroid (go figure). According to them, depression was caused by a lack of faith and unconfessed sin in your life. When I first heard this teaching, I was about 11 or 12 years old. By that time, I had had several bouts of severe depression and anxiety that caused unimaginable false guilt, obsessive-compulsive tendencies, and insomnia.
As a child, when I connected the dots in my mind, I figured I was living in an immense amount of unconfessed/unforgiven sin (seeing as I didn’t have a thyroid issue). This seemed to make sense. The self-hatred started so early that I can’t even put a date on it. But I do remember my Sunday School teacher talking about loving our neighbors as ourselves; and I thought, Well, I guess I don’t have to love my neighbor because I hate myself. I was maybe in first grade. By the time I reached middle school, I thought it was righteous and spiritual to hate myself. I thought it was what God wanted. Even if it wasn’t, I wanted to show Him how much I hated myself so that He could see that I didn’t like my horrible sinfulness that was causing the depression and anxiety any more than He did. After all, wasn’t the depression and anxiety a sign that God wasn’t pleased with me? If He didn’t like me, then I wouldn’t like me either. Like a child wanting to please an emotionally distant father, I began a life of hard work to gain the acceptance of my heavenly Father. Have you ever felt this way? Like you had to earn God’s love or like God was up in heaven ready to pounce when you turn the wrong way?
Fast forward about 16 years.
My hand was on the doorknob, and I heard God speaking in my spirit, “Just give it one more shot. If you’re still miserable, I’ll take you home to be with me.” I was leaving my bedroom to go get a knife from the kitchen. After years of ups and downs in my mental health, along with bad choices in my personal life, I was ready to be done. I just wanted out. I was a ministry student on a mission to gain God’s love. But I was done. I don’t know that I really would have killed myself or even tried, but I was definitely going to hold the knife in my hands and just feel what it might be like to run the sharp metal across my skin. To feel the pain physically on the outside, like I could feel the pain emotionally on the inside. I had previously begged God on several occasions to take me home to heaven. Instead, during this moment, He asked me to try one more time, to give it all I had one more time. If I was still miserable after that, then He would bring me home to be with Him. Of course, taking me to heaven was never His plan. I decided to try one more time, asking for help from my parents, pastors, counselors, and medical professionals.
Fast forward another 16 years.
Today, I know there’s NOTHING I can do to earn God’s love. Through the blood of Jesus, I’m righteous. Through the baptism of the Holy Spirit, I can walk in step with Him every day. I know that I have hope even if I don’t feel it. I know that I have a beautiful future even if I’m tired. I know that He is my Shepherd. He loves me, wants good things for me, and will guide me to those things when I walk with Him, submitted to His will. I’m not perfect, but when I stumble, I run right back to Him, apologize, and keep moving forward. I don’t beat myself up and I don’t spiral into depression or anxiety. I look at what’s ahead instead of what’s behind. It’s freeing (although it can also be difficult) to put my life in His hands and not have to feel like I need to control it. Nothing I have belongs to me. Not my physical body, not my money, not my car, nothing. It’s all His and He is a much better manager of me than I am.
A lot happened in each of those 16-year stretches. Ups and downs, medication changes (I highly recommend getting genetic testing to find out which Rx works best), and lots of Christian counseling. I’ll get into more of those stories in the future. In the meantime, if you’re struggling with feelings of anxiety or depression, I urge you to get solid Christian counseling. Start with your local church, or check out this faith-based counseling program from BetterHelp.com (I recently saw this online, but I’ve never used their services myself).
Below is a picture of me, my brothers, and my cousins at one of the many fundamentalist seminars we attended. Farther below is one of the songs I found to be impactful during my difficult seasons.
