Sinking

I just can't seem to pull ahead. Lately I've felt so far behind in everything, and now with all the crap going on familial wise, I feel even worse. I've started to feel depressed and I really don't want to go there ever again. I've been there before and it wasn't pretty. I was dangerously close to not making it through. If things continue the way they are, I will continue down the road I really don't want to go down. I was a wife when I was depressed before. I am a wife when I am depressed now; but I am also a mother this time. If for nobody else's sake, I need to pull through this for Janessa's sake. She is my world! Everything I do, I do with her in mind. I need to pull through this and I need to succeed before I sink too low.

Living Stones - Part Two

I usually am not one to be so open and verbalize what's going on in my head, but it's my BLOG and this is one of the reason's why I started this blog... was to BLOG. It's hard for me to do it but it's necessary. If I put something on my blog, that means its not a harbored secret anymore and I can release the anxst about it through my fingers and onto the screen. Once it's there, it's there.
So a continuation of my thoughts here on retreat. Firstly, it had been brewing in my head and heart for several months. Thoughts about my exhusband. Thoughts about how volatile our relationship was. Thoughts about how much he had hurt me. Thoughts about how abusive he was. Thoughts about how could one man set out to destroy one person so badly? Thoughts about how stupid I was.. how blind.. how STUPID.
Then there are the thoughts of hatred for him. I hate him for doing what he did. I hate him for alienating me from my family for so long. I hate him for how he belittled me. I hate him for how he made me lie to everyone about everything so that nobody would challenge him or I or our relationship. I hate him for using me.
I knew that I could no longer hold on to all these thoughts, and all these feelings. Bottling anger and hate in your heart that clearly is someone else's now, just plain doesn't feel good or right. It did not benefit me to hold it in, it did not benefit Owen for holding it in, and it certainly did not benefit my sweet little girl to hold all that crap in. Those thoughts and feelings were robbing me of being the wife and mother I am today. And that was not okay. I needed to let go of it and I needed for it to stay away.


Once I picked up Dawn and we headed towards Retreat, my stomach was already in knots, and I couldn't focus or concentrate. I was that anxious. I was bringing all of my emotional baggage and I did not intend to bring it home with me again. The first evening of Retreat was a huge revealing of how 'rough' the weekend was going to be for me. Tamara started talking and it was like she was talking only to me and was kinda scary. I was already crying within the first half an hour! I was feeling sooo heavy and weighed down and my emotions were already riding high from the stress that I needed to get rid of, and here she was singling me out-sort of. It felt like I was the only one there that she was talking to.
Here is an exerpt from my journal that first night:
"So it's going to be a hard and harsh weekend. I feel like i'ts going to be harsh in the aspect of dealing with issues relating to John. I don't know. I don't think I'm going to like it but it's going to be necessary. I have to and need to let go of everything that is harboured to him. I won't forget him and that I was married to him and things that happened but I need to let go."
The severity of anxiousness of everything had been building up even more, and I had had a very restless night. So naturally the next day was even more intense. Because our theme was living stones, Tamara had brought along some special river stones, some white and some black. On our black ones we were to right things that we wanted to leave behind; things that we wanted to cast off of ourselves. Once we had written on them, we were to pray over them and cast them into the streams outside. The white stones were our encouragers and we were to keep them with us; and do the same thing but on the positive side, and keep them.
I had the rocks into separate pockets of my jeans and I could just FEEL the black one burning in my pocket. It felt like it was getting hot and so I had to take it out. I knew what I wanted to write on my rock, but I just couldn't do it. Writing on this rock meant that I was releasing it and that I wouldn't be harbouring it anymore. That was so painfully hard to realize. And even harder to do.
At one point throughout the day, I took a minute to journal:
"I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I can let go of everything to do with John. I've been dealing with all of it for so long and I just don't know if I can do it."
When you harbour things like this for YEARS, you don't know how to not deal with it. It's hard. It's a little twisted too.
In one of the sessions with Tamara, she was talking about annointing and being annointed. She had an annointing room set up that she would be in and we could go to her if we were wanting to be annointed and prayed over. I thought that that was a great thing that she was offering to us. I also felt that it would be the best way to cleanse me completely of all this stuff with my ex that I had trouble letting go of. Psalm 134: 17-19, "Anoint your head with oil and give your mind to me."
It took most of the day for me to get up my courage to write on my black rock. I filled up that rock with a lot of stuff. I honestly don't remember what I all wrote on that rock. I don't want to remember. All I know is that I let it go and permanently put it on that rock. The next task was to pray over it and throw it away. How does one adequately pray the right prayer of that type of rock? I couldn't do it. I kind of went numb. I just sat there staring at this ugly, full, hate filled black rock. All I knew was that I did not want that rock anywhere near me anymore or near the Retreat centre. I just wanted it gone. I know God can do miracles and I kinda hoped that he would just turn it to dust in front of me!
I had been feeling the pull to go to the annointing room. It was occupied for quite awhile, so it took a bit. But I made it there. When I got in there, I just started shaking. Not like seizure shaking, but kinda like when you're really cold, you shake. So Tamara and I started having a talk. I laid it alllll out. She prayed over me, she prayed for Owen and I, she prayed for Janessa, for our lives together, she prayed for my heart and my mind, she annointed me. I gave her the rock. I told her that I couldn't hold it anymore. I just had to get rid of it. I wrote on it and then I had to get rid of it. I couldn't even bear to look at it anymore. She asked me why I hadn't thrown it away. I told her that I just couldn't physically do it. I also did not want to throw it away at Retreat. I didn't want to come back the next year and know that the rock was there. John had no more power over me and I did not want that rock to still be there and taunt me. So she kept it. She ended up (after we discussed it) giving it to Dawn and Dawn and I somewhere on the road to home, threw our rocks away together.
After I left that annointing room, I felt like I was in space. The feeling of walking on nothing.. floating in the air... light and carefree. My journal entry later that day: "I feel lighter! I met with Tamara in the annointing room and it was pretty incredible! It felt so amazing to let things go and to leave it there! Awesome! Let's pray it stays that way!" So far it has! I continue to pray that the feelings stay away. If someone asks me about him or my past, I can answer them without feeling like I'm going to throw up; I can answer them without feeling nervous and anxious and looking over my shoulder.

On our last morning together, we have sharing circle. In the above two pictures, the top one is of our speaker, Tamara Peterson, and the 2nd one is of a 97 or 98 yr old lady that comes to retreat every year. She's such a sweetheart and she's just amazing! I actually got up to talk in the sharing circle this year, just laying out what was on my mind and what I had gone through during the weekend; also sharing some of my struggles as a woman, and our pregnancy struggle and asked them all for prayer.
I had gone to Retreat this year looking to be changed. I didn't think I was going to be changed as much as I was. For that I am truly grateful.