Life is hard. Do you ever feel so overwhelmed, so downhearted that you find it hard to literally and figuratively put one foot in front of the other? When doing even the most routine and little things seems impossible or too much to handle? When you can burst into tears at the drop of a hat, or, worse, sink into the isolation of your own mind and cease communicating with others around you because you hurt too much?
Somewhere I read once that depression is the result of unexpressed grief. There is a lot of truth to that definition, I think. I feel a lot of grief today and most days, grief that somehow I can’t express and get out there and purged from my system, like smoke from a smokestack. Would that I could let it out so that it might disperse and lose its grip on me.
I know what is happening in me and around me but still I tend to shut down. I know it is selfish and that’s a bad thing, so I try to get out of the mire but with limited success.
Today I was going to speak at UIUC GSLIS but I canceled my trip early this morning. Michele had a very bad night and it was clear around 3:30a that there was no way that I could go and leave her in that state. My mother-in-law was going to be with Michele most of the day but I would have had to leave at 5a and she wouldn’t have been able to get to our house until 9a at the earliest. Michele was scared and I was, too. I don’t regret the decision for a moment. It was the right thing to do.
Yet I feel like I let others down, especially the Hendersons, the husband and wife team who’ve been such good friends to me and who invite me every year to speak to their class.
So many different thoughts and emotions are swirling around in my head. Why is this happening to us? Will there be an end, a result, a treatment for Michele? Will we need to deal with this for the rest of our lives? How on earth can I keep it all together for her sake and for the sake of our children? Then I think about how fortunate we are, and how blessed. So many other people suffer so much greater hardship, worse than I can imagine. I know there are people who are dealing with loved ones who’ve died, who struggle to find something to eat and go hungry for days, who are in excruciating pain and misery. How selfish is it for me, in contrast, to feel this way?!
Above all else, though, is the certainty in my mind and heart that our God cares, more than I will ever know, and that He will provide us with all we need. Though life is hard, I will trust in Him.
