Escape

I want to escape what I am feeling today. Grief brings up a lot of emotions-not just emotions about the here and now but also your past. I am feeling a lot of regret about my college years. I did not have a fun college experience like so many people do. I went through the roughest season of my life during college and the first two years of my marriage. I had an eating disorder for seven years. I started off as an anorexic and then decided to be a bulimic. It was a terrible decision and it robbed me of my life. I robbed myself.

I went into inpatient treatment during my junior year of college and it was the most humiliating thing that I have ever done. I had built my life on building walls, keeping myself from judgement and ridicule. This one step in life made me so vulnerable and so open to judgement that my world shattered. I had prayed for two years that God would fix me. I prayed that He would help me get better and I had no answer (or so I thought). I gave up and in that giving up I despaired. I became suicidal and friends stepped in. They found me help and I went. I felt as though I was floating above my body for three days. I couldn't believe that I was in a psych ward. I was smart. I was a "good" girl. I wanted to follow Jesus with all of my heart and here I was. Broken. Shattered. Unheard.

For 40 days I went to treatment. It was the best thing that happened to me in the long run because it got the healing started. I saw a christian counselor my whole senior year of college and then went to seminary. I met Eric, got married and was bulimic until I got pregnant with Micah.

I felt so ashamed for so long. I couldn't even look at the people in Campus Crusade at my school. I felt like they would always see me as messed up and that is how I felt. I withdrew so much that year and I knew no one by the end except my roommates who I was unkind to most days. I regret the mistakes that I made for so long. I regret losing precious time that I can never get back.

I was snooping on one of my friends facebook pages. I looked through her friends to see if she had friends from college. She still had so many and they still hang out. I wanted to be there. I wanted to be in the pictures. I wanted to have a good past. I wanted a good history but I don't.

The thing that I will say is that that long journey helped reframe my faith. I wanted to trust and depend on God and I wrote a commitment to that. I married Eric on the two year anniversary of that commitment. I still mean it. God still honors that request. I saw how faithful God is. I saw how my time frame doesn't matter to God. I learned that God is not a genie-we don't get what we pray for but He will always give us what we need. Ultimately I am glad that I went through that season of life because God woke me up, washed me off and made me new. I am happy with who I am now and before I hated myself. I had so many rules about God that I didn't see the grace and freedom that God offers. I thought God was fickle and that I had to always work to please Him but He IS LOVE. You can't make God not love you and you can't make him love you more. God loves you because he made you. That brings me a lot of peace.

I feel lonely. I want someone to be with me in life. I wish that it was Eric. I have an opportunity to trust and depend on God in an even deeper way. I swear sometimes I would love to be done growing in my faith-that is-until I am done with that growth spirt and I an rejoice in what only God can do.

I feel a lot better after this blog. Thanks for listening to my somewhat random thoughts.