What Are You Struggling With?

[Anonymous]

Caryn, are you sure you retired or are you being given a gift of rest for a season or two?

[Caryn LeMurParticipant]

Jo:  thank you for your note.  CFS is one of the toughest things to manage/live with.  Our son #2 had it for a season of time in high school.  After prayer (at a Vineyard, really), he began to feel better.  In college, he either swam or lifted weights.  I cannot imagine how life for him would be if that syndrome had continued.  Our heart goes out to you.  <hugs!>

Kathy:  rest may be in the picture, for sure.  I hope it is simply that.  But… I somewhat miss the anger, frustration, intensity and drive of the earlier years… those emotions created movement and prayer.  I am trying to retrain my mind so that love fills the sails… but eerily miss the old winds as well.

Much love in Christ always and unconditionally; Caryn

[Anonymous]

Caryn – Thanks. I’m glad to hear your son’s CFS was only temporary!

[Ruth AnneParticipant]

Wow guys. Reading everyone’s problems makes me feel strangely comforted – only because I know I’m not the only one struggling. You are the greatest bunch of people – real, authentic, amazing, intelligent, kind, loving. And I hate to say this, but I don’t think people become so very cool without having gone through the crap of life and worked through it. A life without problems breeds shallowness. (altho maybe we might trade our pain for some good sweet shallow bliss).

I understand the chronic illness thing… the overweight thing…the depression thing… the loneliness thing and I struggle to live a life that I want to lead. I’m kind of on a “rejuvination” period of my life. Decided I couldn’t fight all the pain so I would tack just ONE thing that is really bothering me and that’s my weight. I’ve done all kinds of diets and exercise in the past that didn’t touch the weight so I went total vegan. The weight is coming off REALLY slowly and I exercise like a fiend too but I see a tiny bit of progress and I feel better about that area or my life. I know that next year, when I look in the mirror THAT ONE problem will be over if I keep eating my healthy food choices. That is the only thing I feel like I have any control over at this point. It is helping with the depression and the anxiety about having high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes or cancer. Just one thing to lighten the load. But it’s hard, especially through the holidays. I invited everyone over for dessert the other night and I drank a v-8… So I went shopping last night and tried on dresses to make myself feel better. But I have a long road ahead…. fat multiplies quickly and disappears really slowly.

And yet this weekend, after the tragedy in Newtown, it all feels so trite. I just struggle with words for all this. There are no answers. This is life and it’s really hard. Just know that I appreciate every one of you. Your beauty shines way brighter than your pain.

 

[RenParticipant]

I’m struggling with the idea of family and choosing love of self over acceptance by others, even if that acceptance is marginal at best.

There are many situations in my life where I should have chosen myself.. but didn’t know how to.. even thought it was selfish and evil.

And I have been made to pay for it by people who didn’t give a damn about me in the first place.

These people include my family and people who should have been my friends, but … I don’t know what happened.

I’ve learned that being the “nice”  person makes you a target. Why? I have no idea. I was always taught to consider others ahead of myself. Now I just wonder if it was another emotional trap and not actually sound advice.

There are winding roads and pits that are associated with my racial/cultural background, so I’ve essentially had to rethink myself from the ground up. Nothing -including my heritage– can be made intrinsically relevant in a world where everything about you is seen as a fatal flaw by the people you live with every day.

I have to free myself from all of the “mothers and fathers and family” I have ever known, whether physical, spiritual, social, or ancestral. I guess I’ll find my way back to them eventually. But to stat with, I must no longer consider them until I can acknowledge them without them being used as successful weapons against me.

[Author]

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