Becoming Undone (from my journal in November 2019)

When you have a small view of suffering, the tiniest stub of the toe could be the worst pain of your life. The older you get, the more likely you are to experience suffering worse than a stubbed toe. That fact used to terrify me. Pain, sorrow, and even inconveniences were outside of my control and I felt like I was always waiting for the cloud of pain to billow on my horizon. Some of the happiest days of my life were impacted by my own fear of the unknown future. The first few weeks of our marriage was plagued by crippling anxiety. What if something happened to Xavier? What if he died, or worse, what if we someday stopped loving each other? I found myself frantically calling him while he was at school to make sure he was okay. I grew anxious if he didn’t respond to my texts right away. The ‘what ifs’ were robbing me of the moments that were really taking place. I kept thinking that it was all too good to be true and that the good times couldn’t last. I had finally reached what I thought would make me happy. After all, part one of my plan to become a mom was to become a wife. I had done that but instead of feeling like I had gained more control, I somehow felt like I had less. I often found myself in deep anxiety spirals, brooding over the endless possibilities for each day. Being hopeful and happy are vulnerable positions and I still wasn’t fully willing to admit that I had no control over my life. Having a godly, sweet husband was no longer enough. I needed to know that the rest of our lives would end with “happily ever after”. I said I trusted God with my mouth, but my actions declared loud and clear that I was only trying to trust myself. Projecting the worst case scenario in my own life was a way of self-defense. Avoiding and hiding was another. When it came to other people’s pain, I tried to turn away as much as possible. I turned my head when I heard of broken marriages, I closed my eyes to mental illnesses, I tried to keep people who were facing death and illnesses at arm’s length. I had my ideals and comfortable spaces and I kept trying to feel safe in the growing tension between my horrible life ‘what if’ predictions and the truly beautiful life around me. 

I was driving on the expressway when she called me and stepped into my what ifs. I hadn’t stepped into her hurt with her, but my dear friend stepped into mine. A friend who didn’t just demonstrate a Christlike love to me by coming into my mess, but she was bold enough to challenge me in it. Reeling with the endless possibilities of things that could come and steal my happiness, she confronted my anxiety and asked me if I truly believed what I said about God. Did I believe He is all powerful, all knowing, all good? She recalled the ways God had walked with me in past hurts and sorrows and said something I still repeat to myself every day, “God gives grace one day at a time.” After years of attempting to write the story I wanted, I was suddenly aware that my desire for and lack of control was only producing anxiety, fear, and despair in my life. One happy ending or happy moment was never enough. I would always be vainly searching for more. I cried in her laundry room as she prayed for me to truly trust God.

“Anxiety is wanting to be God, without His wisdom, power, or knowledge.” – Paul Miller

While it didn’t drastically change my actions right away, I do think that God began to work in that moment. The progress was slow and sometimes the results were invisible, but my pursuit of control was shifting. 

After our honeymoon, I had gone back to work and my online classes and Xavier had returned to school. I was working a steady job as a marketing assistant as a small local bank. It was a fairly easy job and I had been starting to cautiously book more weddings and family sessions on the side to fill up my free time with photography. School, work, photography and weekends with my husband began to flow into a normal rhythm. Ten months went by and we bought our first home. Xavier had decided to attend graduate school at MSU which meant we would get to be in the Lansing area for at least five more years. We talked off and on about our future family and decided that we would wait until Xavier was closer to getting a job to begin to think about babies. While it had always been my goal and dream, I was beginning to wonder if kids would truly fulfill me. I was afraid to accomplish the last step of making my dream a reality because I was afraid. I thought there were a lot of what ifs surrounding marriage, but the what ifs surrounding children and family were insurmountable. What if I found out that I couldn’t have kids? What if my kids inherited all the things about me that I didn’t want them to inherit? What if I did have kids and then they didn’t love Jesus? What if my methods weren’t actually all that great and I turned out to be a bad mom? What if kids destroyed my marriage? What if my kids walked away from God? The long standing methods and ways I was going to train my kids didn’t seem as fail proof as they once did and I was more than content to wait for a while to become a mom. 

One month after our first anniversary, and two months after moving into our house, the threads of my perfect story and happy ending began to unravel even more. Betrayal, rejection of God, and divorce entered into both of our extended families all at once. It felt like God had given us a two bedroom house at just the right time to help out some family members and yet, I was wrestling. This wasn’t the story I wanted. I wanted a legacy of stability, happy marriages, and no broken families. Even my pessimistic what ifs had not prepared me for this onslaught and no amount of running away was going to help me.

For months, I had been trying to cover my ears, bury my face, and not accept the truth. I had been trying to love my husband and decode his feelings as we processed the spiral that was happening outside of our home. I was mad at everything and everyone. Deep down I was upset with God. Didn’t He know this wasn’t the right way? The idea of control was slipping further and further out of my reach but I was still grasping at it, getting more and more exasperated as it eluded me.

I love the effect that band aids have on little kids. Band aids are pretty and sparkly and they cover up little yucky wounds. When I slap a band aid on a boo boo and don’t have to look at it anymore, I feel like I’ve healed the child. Sure, it doesn’t really heal the wound, but it’s a quick, pretty, and easy fix. God knows my deepest fears and most severe weaknesses. He knows I will run away when things start to look ugly. He knows I want to be the quick fixer that slaps a band aid on without getting dirty and moves on toward my goals. But God also knew that no amount of character themed band aids would make the wounds in our families disappear. No amount of sparkles or favorite colors. These were more than scratches. These were massive, ugly, horrific injuries. Even if they healed, the reminder of the hurts would always be clearly visible in the jagged scars. Both of our family situations felt hopeless and heartbreaking so I wanted to close the door and just be us… But God opened our door and for eighteen months, I wrestled. I tried to cover other people’s wounds with pretty stickers of trite words hoping I could be the healer so I could get back to my happy little life. For a year and a half, I gritted my teeth, strapped on my fix it cape, and picked up my list of ways I was going to remedy our broken life. I thought I could help overcome lies by putting cheerful notes in lunchboxes. I thought I could fix people by pointing out their mistakes and offering my plans for recovery. I thought I could pass the pain I was feeling onto the people that had been at the root of the situations by ignoring them completely and cutting them out of our lives. My master plan of a legacy and my dream of a happy ending were hanging in the balance. I kept trying to rewrite the ending but it was way harder to rewrite real life than it had been as a kid to rewrite Where the Red Fern Grows.

Driving to work I’d grip the steering wheel, I can still fix this. Driving home, I’d grit my teeth, It’s all going to work out. My faith was floundering between what I knew to be true about God and what I was feeling in this chaos. All things work together for the good of those who love Him? All things? Rejection of God? How is this mess working together for my good? This is not good. It is broken. God, this is ugly. Xav and I were loving married life and it was such a relief to do life with each other, but it felt like everything outside of us things was crumbling and pressing in on us from every side.

Throwing myself into work has always been an escape for me.

2016 was no different. Instead of hiding in my closet or being trapped with stories I never wanted to hear, I could hide in my studio and spend my time setting up for Christmas shoots. I knew I had some newborn shoots coming up after the New Year so I rotated between setting up lights in my studio and working on making custom props in the garage. It was a way to escape the reality of life… I went all in. At the bank I wanted to be as busy as possible so that I wouldn’t have time to think about life. At home, I wanted the same and photography was my outlet. As the weather turned colder, I did what I always did around Christmas, I chatted with my friend Nicole about Christmas photos. This year, she wanted to push their session into January so that I could do their newborn photos of baby #3 and planning her newborn session became my fixation. I didn’t have to be sad if I was planning a newborn session. I didn’t have to face reality if I was prepping for photos. I threw myself into the studio for hours to “set up” and of course, not think.

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“Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when His glory is revealed.” 1 Peter 4:12-13

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In a matter of just a few short months I had come face to face with some of my biggest fears in ways that I was unable to avoid. The cracks in my perfect plan for life were compounding rapidly but I was still trying to piece it all back together. It was evident that divorce and denial were very real and none of them were fixable with my band aid approach. My avoidance method was not working great and I was spiraling. I couldn’t escape the pain or do what I had done before and ignore it. The possibility of a perfect life and my dream of a happy ending continued to unravel as I became more and more undone.