Joy

Joy is solid.  It doesn't melt, or get washed away with circumstances.  It is steady, an anchor.  It doesn't always have a smile, isn't reduced to niceness, but has a quiet hope.  It laughs easily, I believe.    It has wonder in the light of hard circumstances.  It is the strength to grieve.

"The Joy of the Lord is my strength."

I'm thankful, so thankful for the joy I have.  That's been mined in the darkest of valleys and is being refined with the piles of laundry that I now have the STRENGTH to do, praise Jesus.  Laundry does get old, but I'm thankful for the lightness that I never thought I would have.  For the laughter that I have again. For the ability to be present. Amen and thank you Jesus!  I feel like I've won a gold medal.

Retrain the Brain

I want to talk about "parts" again.  To survive tough stuff, especially in childhood, the brain actually divides into different parts to helps you to survive and stay calm and protected.  The problem is, though, this often sticks into adulthood.  People who have survived trauma have complicated thought patterns that have protected them.  I am learning to literally retrain my brain.  To help it think in the here and now.

I am learning to be gentle with myself.  I have been harsh with myself and with my brain for years now.  I am actually learning to accept my brain as good.

All of the different parts that have acted out in psychosis had a purpose...to protect and keep me safe from pain, from shame.  When a psychotic thought pops up, I just say..."Oh there you are.  Thank you so much for helping me...you helped me survive a lot of really hard things.  Bless you.  Now can you just help me make these peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for my kids?"  And this WORKS!  It is amazing.

My Unlikely Tattoo

The summer of 2014 I would have rage.  So much rage that I didn't really know what to do with it.  I would hop in the minivan and listen to chick metal. Then one day, while in Asheville (in a fit of both anger and believing I was an "infinite one" I googled, angrily, "hebrew word for infinite one."  Up popped an image.  Perfect.  I'll drive to the closest tattoo parlor and get that image on my arm.  That will show everyone.

Let me now introduce the traumatized brain, as it has been explained to me by my doctor and therapist.

When I was fourteen, the FBI raided my house in search of my daddy who I really loved.  Long story short, he turned himself in.  That would be the end of our relationship.

For several years leading up to that, he would confide in me.  He would tell me secrets...grand secrets...and tell me not to tell anyone, not even my mother.  I felt special.

Because of these things (all traumatic and abusive) my brain helped me to survive by developing "parts."  For example, I have a missionary part that helps save the world (On the day that the FBI came, that story line started in my head and continued for many years).  I also have an angry middle schooler (who got the tattoo).  I am in the process of helping these parts heal, retraining them...letting them know that it is safe now.  They are free to just help me raise my kids.

So...my tattoo.  I'm not a tattoo person, but then...when I came out of the psychosis, I had this tattoo...which was actually misspelled in Hebrew and it doesn't even mean anything.  So I felt shame for several months.  Until I realized that I needed to love and care for that part...who didn't know what else to do.  So I have an unlikely, but now loved, tattoo.

It makes me angry that so many people who are considered mentally ill are probably just traumatized (that's what my doc tells me).  They really can get well...because after 10 years of horror, I am getting well.

For 10 Years

I was pretty sick mentally for 10 years.  I had five psychotic breaks during this time with the last one ending up in the hospital.

This kind of sickness is the worst.  During the ten years, I was birthing and raising four kids.  Looking back, I felt pain, lots of pain during this time and I didn't know what it was from or what to do with it.  I developed some addictions.  I just wanted this massive amount of pain and shame gone. As the years progressed, hope began to elude me.  I didn't feel that comfortable with church.  Or the medical community.  I was told by several doctors that how I felt (which was horrible) would just be my plight in life.  No wonder people commit suicide.  People with mental illness already feel horrible.  Then there is the stigma which can really do you in.

I wanted those close to me to just ask me how I was doing.  To listen. To treat me with respect. To ask  questions. 

I'm grateful for the handful of friends and family who did just that.  Now that I am feeling better and can think about others a little better, I'm really grateful for those close to me who were patient.  And for those who prayed.  This has gotten me to the place I am now.  My husband and family and friends were like farmers.  Gently tending and loving, watching and waiting.

And God.  Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit.  They heard.  They were present.  I cried out, it didn't fall on deaf ears although it sure felt like it.  God's ways are higher.  Much higher.

I have hope.  I don't just have to be mentally ill.  

6-4-16

I have been sick for the past two summers.  Two summers ago I was psychotic for four months.  But really for the past ten years I haven't been well.

Today I'm thankful.  Through my amazing therapist, I am learning that my psychosis came from trauma...and then from further trauma from being sick all those years.  Thoughts that would have terrified me years even months ago, I am learning to master.  These thoughts came from parts inside me that developed in order to survive horrible trauma.  I would have never believed that I would feel this great, this normal, this at peace.  It's been work...feeling pain, confronting things that were really hard, but I am getting better.

Everyone around me sees it too.  Thankful that I'm sitting here...with my awesome campfire candle...having gotten through another summer day (which is usually my worst time).

Some Hope for the Darkest Dark

"Natalee, you have bipolar."  I was sitting on a couch next to Wes in this psychiatrist's office.  It was 2005 and I had just come out of a three week psychotic episode.  Wes, who doesn't cry much, started crying and I sat there in unbelief.  Blood was pulsing through my veins because I really didn't believe her.

Over the next 10 years, amidst having a generous handful of kids (4) I would get psychotic every few years.  These times were devastating to our brood of six.  Each one of these events were horrific...especially coming out of them.  I felt alone.  My doctors told me that I would always be like this, offering little explanation for why they were happening.  Not once did any doctor ask me questions about the trauma I suffered in childhood.  They quickly wrote me a script and in 15 minute consults proclaimed a sentence of mental illness over my life.

Yet I had four kids, and I was trying to be a good mom, but the pain I was in was tremendous.  I was like a big old gunshot wound walking around trying to act normal.  I had little hope of getting better so I just drank a little more than was healthy and smoked more.  I mean, what else was I going to do with the fact that I thought my husband was Jesus for three months?  And waved my arms in a crazy way and shouted on the sidewalks of my street?

The summer of 2014 I came to my absolute end.  My doctors just kept upping my meds and barely retured my phone calls, which seems to be common practice.  I was fighting off psychosis but not successfully.  My marriage was struggling after years of  my instability.  After being psychotic for four months, I cried out to God.  "What is wrong with me?  Please help me!"  I was at my end.  I began looking up for healing mental illness naturally and ended up finding a holistic psychiatrist through a friend.  I was willing to do anything she told me to do.  I had lost hope in traditional psychiatry.

First of all, my new doctor spent three hours with me.  This had never happened before.  I left many psychiatrist offices in the past feeling empty and misunderstood.  She told me that healing was possible. She put me on a paleo-ish diet and some supplements and two weeks later, after feeling totally abnormal for ten years, I began to feel normal.  I started organizing my house.  I had energy.  Everyone around me was in shock.  It was like the static that was chronic in my head just stopped. I started to laugh again.  Jesus was right there doing His thing too...of bringing gentle healing and restoration to my soul.  He began to work repentance, but it was so kind and gentle because He knew my suffering.  He knows how to tailor healing to each one of His kids.

For two years now, I've been following the paleo diet and it helps me so much.  I have gotten my life back in ways I could have never imagined.  I've had amazing people around me, primarily Wes, who never gave up on me.  My family has been patient with me, even though it's been super hard.

I am working with an amazing therapist who specializes in childhood trauma.  The way I think is changing.  My diagnosis has actually changed to PTSD (which can look like bipolar).  I finally feel heard.  Listened to.  I just want to shout from the mountain tops that healing is possible for even the very worst cases.