For those of you that don't know, I've been battling depression since I was about 12 years old, but it was never really diagnosed until I was 18 and decided to go seek therapy for the depressive thoughts and my anxiety. I've struggled with the two together for about 10 years now and some might say it gets easier...I just say you get used to struggling constantly. But I'd like to believe that it can get better; that I can get better.
As you may have noticed the title of this post is called "Recovery, Relapse, and More Recovery" and I called it that because that's how it generally works for me. I have these great periods of time whether it be days, or weeks, where things are fine and I don't feel crippled by my anxiety or depression, that even though they're still there, I can tackle my troubles better equipped for battle, and I even think it's getting better and I'm healing. Then a real bad day hits, and I fall into a slump. And when I'm in a slump, it's bad. Like really really bad. Because unslumping myself is not very easy. I get caught up in dark depressive thoughts, entangled in my anxiety, and all I wanna do I sleep because then the problems I face can't get to me, but it's so hard to sleep when I have so much to think about. So I just go about my days in my slump going back and forth between sleeping and lying awake overthinking everything. But then something manages to set me straight again. And it's always the same thing.
Whenever I'm in my dark days I'm so dragged down by everything that I can hardly breathe, but here is what gets me out of my bed. Here is what gets me out of my slump long enough to catch my breath again and find some solid ground. It is when I have become so broken that I find myself on my knees on the bathroom floor of my college dorm. It is when I have become so broken that I have cried myself to sleep one too many times and now I lay awake this night praying for a change of pace. It is when I have become so broken that I am leaning into the arms of a friend to console me in the reality I have to face that maybe I am just too afraid to get out of my bed.
For it is in my low state of brokenness when God sweeps down and reaches out to me to cradle me in his loving arms.
It is in my brokenness when God tells me "Hush, my sweet sweet child, for you are loved and you are not alone in this."
It is in my brokenness when God is the only thing left standing and left to be whole when it seems like everything else has shattered.
Yesterday I went to church at Hillsong Phoenix to hear Pastor Terry give a sermon that hit home real hard for me. It was about who we are to God and how it doesn't matter what the world has to say about us so long as we know what God says, because he calls us loved, righteous, redeemed, chosen, precious, valuable, and so much more.
I am SO MUCH MORE than my depression.
I am SO MUCH MORE than my anxiety.
I am SO MUCH MORE than my fear.
I am a child of God.
And so are you, friend.
The whole reason for this title is that it is how the cycle seems to go for me. But why didn't I say recovery, relapse, recovery, relapse, ect...? Because it ends with recovery. It ends with healing. It ends with getting better.
I'm not gonna just sit here and wallow in the depths of despair forever. I am not supposed to be this way. I was not created to be defeated. I was created to be VICTORIOUS.
WE were created to be victorious.
So friend, in the midst of my struggles and pain and confusion I tell you this. God is SO good. Okay? And he loves you more than you could ever imagine. I don't know what you're going through personally, but if it's anything like what I've been through and am still going through, then I guess we're in this together. You're doing great. Hang in there. And I will too.
~Abby Lynn
