I let her tell me things that had been going on in her life and I shared a little bit about our trip to Fiji and the conversation went on from there. Towards the end of the conversation she looked me in the eyes and said "You know you can tell me anything" (or something along those lines). Suddenly, I couldn't hold back the tears and I knew I could not get away with pretending everything was ok.
Previously in the conversation she had said to me that she often looks at me and thinks I have it all together. I guess it can seem like that. I have a happy marriage, happy kids, I study, I blog and I do all the things I need to at church. I am a pretty positive person, so I try not to complain too much about things. Her comment surprised me because I had held the opinion of myself that I am honest about my struggles. The whole reason for starting this blog was to share my struggles and be honest about where I fail to appreciate the blessings in my life. Her comment made me realise that in the past couple of months I had not been honest about what I was going through.
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| We really had a great time, but some of the time I just felt lonely |
I think being the minister's wife is a position that can be difficult to balance. On one hand you want to be a good role model to peers and those who you lead. However on the other hand, it is vitally important that you are honest about the struggles you are having because that is actually a good model of how to live.
In recent weeks I had forgotten the second part. Something had changed inside of me and I knew I didn't want anyone to know. I had become discontent with my life, I was feeling lonely, I was feeling old and unlovable and I was trying to find fulfillment with the wrong things.
As I am pretty transparent, my closer friends could see something wasn't right but there was no way I was going to tell them the thoughts that were going through my head.
I'm not sure if you believe Satan exists but I do and there was an almost audible voice in my head telling me that I could never tell anyone. I thought I could handle it myself and things would get better. Things didn't get better, things got worse. Only ever in my head, but the discontentment was so strong.
Things had improved slightly before I met with my friend in the cafe. One night, not being able to hold it in anymore I confessed my struggles to a friend. She had encouraged me to talk to my husband and in doing that I immediately felted the burden lift. Somehow the thoughts lost their power. However, it was not long until I started to slowly spiral down again. This time though I was too ashamed to say that I was going through the same thing again. So I kept it to myself.
It was only in the cafe that what was going on in my head bubbled to the surface again, and while we might not have gone into details, letting a good friend see that I wasn't going so well was really helpful. My friend convinced me that I needed to talk to my husband again and I did.
It has only been in the last week (and after more conversations with my amazingly loving and supportive husband) have I felt I am myself again. I am enjoying life and getting back into my relationship with God (because of course I didn't really want His input into my situation at the time).
Why do I share this with you? Well, because my friend (from the cafe) made me realise that I do create a picture of a perfect life. I honestly don't mean to but sometimes it is easier than sharing what is really going on. It is not always important to go into details, but telling some you are not coping is so important (and sometimes you need to tell them more than once).
Hopefully it can help even one person to see the benefits of telling others what is going on instead of trying to manage it yourself. Even if you have done something really stupid, don't keep it bottled up. Find a trusted friend or your partner and get some support. Or if it is really bad call Lifeline or a counselling service.
You are never too bad or too far from forgiveness.
Is there something that you are holding onto that you need to talk about?
