Posted on by ebbnflow08

Upheavel

I started this blog over two years ago. I was going to just let it go.
Two years ago, life changed drastically for our family. It isn’t even about leaving the church we were at for four-ish years. It was a complete upheaval in my belief system. Attempting to pick up pieces, once again I thought I would never have to pick up. Trying to figure out truth and not truth.
Honestly, I wanted no part of it. Church. What even is that? What is church? I really have no idea. I read the Bible, and look at what the church has been since Jesus came. I think it looks nothing like that.
It looks like a people who use the word Church but then bends and molds it to what they want it look like. It looks like a manipulating and an angry place. That dishes out more punishment, than the love I hope I am reading correctly in the Bible.

I also wasn’t sure if I was allowed to write about it. To tell the story. It’s not unlike many others, and I didn’t want to be just another angry voice. Or to come across as trying to get vindication for all that has happened. Lets face it, I have been pretty angry. Trapped inside my own little prison that I am not even sure I can get out. I have felt voiceless and unheard. I would just crawl back deeper into my cave.

It seems though that some of the people have just moved on. The people who caused this have just moved on with their lives, maybe I am somewhat happy for them. However, it does cause anger and confusion. How can the people who have lied, manipulated, and hurt people just be okay? How can they just move on to the next thing as if they have done nothing wrong?

While I am a shell of the person I once was. Sadly, its not all their fault. I allowed them to take pieces of me, so small, that I didn’t notice. When I did start to notice, there were people I trusted telling me that is not what was going on, if I was even talked to at all. Sometimes I was just punished with silence, until I “came around”. Told I was loved and a “daughter” only when I was complying to their way of thinking. When I didn’t, I was met with silence, ignored, and even told it would be better not to partake.

My whole identity has been left in shambles.

See even just writing all of this, feels like I am coming across as an angry person. I guess I still am. Not as much as last year, there has been some healing I hope. How do you begin to rebuild yourself after being completely broken down to a person you don’t recognize? I mean there was never any actual abuse. No physical marks, bruises, or scars. There was no real verbal abuse, I mean maybe. But not like what you would think. The silence was punishment enough. Being told you were loved than ignored, was enough.

Now I find I am trying to move on. Maybe I am, moving on. It just seems slow and painful. It is still hard for me trust my own voice. We have tried going to new churches, and there really isn’t anything wrong with them. It is just hard to trust. Trust the same thing won’t happen again. Trust in who the leadership is truly following. Trust people.

How do you move on from something that has marked you, with no physical evidence? How do you not feel crazy feeling or thinking the way you do. When the people who caused it have been able to slip into a whole new life. Like nothing ever happened.

The hardest part is how do I forgive myself for allowing things to go on for so long? When I knew something wasn’t right. How did I start to believe that silence was the way to be loved? How did I begin to look at a man for acceptance than God alone? When did the man start to stand in front of God, be the voice I was hearing? I don’t know.

This is the worst part. I understand that I am not all to blame. I understand that others are not all to blame. When did I, start to wither into nothing? To just bow and take whatever was ditched out? When did that become okay? When did that become the norm? With a smile, I would just dismiss it and say, “Oh, its just something I need to work on.” Somehow, I let this happen.

That I fear is the part that makes me most angry. At myself. This is the part I worry I won’t be able to forgive. Myself.

Posted on by ebbnflow08

Trusting God’s Protection: A Journey of Faith and Healing

How long have I had this? It has just sat here, all alone.

At first I felt I had something to say, something that others would want to listen too. Something. It is the whole reason I started this up. I thought life was okay and had…something. Then life started to get wacky.

Even though I had a lot to say.
I did not know if I needed to say them.

ENF

I still do not know the answer. In fact, I am not even sure why I am here. I am not a writer. I am not sure I even have anything to say that hasn’t already been said. Or that anyone really wants to hear. Does there really need to be yet another voice out there, when there are so many? So many.

But I am here. Had the urge to get on here, for some reason. To write something inspirational, or just where I am at? Maybe it will help someone else…maybe it is just me writing to the universe.

The last year has not been easy. It has been nothing like I expected.

In fact when I started this blog, as stated, I had thought life was about to finally be okay. Little did I know it was all about to start falling apart, little by little. To the point where a year after my first blog, nothing, was what it once was.

Last night, though, I was told something. In that moment, for what seemed almost like the first time in the midst of all that had happened. I could see the protection of God. I could see His goodness.

In the midst of things, we (my husband and I) were not told the truth. For a long time, we could feel things were off but we just never really knew why, we just kept trying to be faithful in what we believed God had told us, and for awhile He was saying, “Keep showing up.” So we did. We kept showing up.

  • Ha, I feel silly now. I had no idea what other people who knew the truth were actually going through and I remember offering up this tidbit of advice. And they knew way more than I did. Man were they ever gracious with me.

Maybe we were naive. Maybe we believed in something that really wasn’t there. Maybe it did lead us down some paths that we are not proud of. But I believe, that God was telling us that. We were to obedient until He said otherwise.

The thing is, is that we never felt like we fit in. We weren’t really asked to peoples home to form deeper relationships and when we asked to do things with people it never “worked out”. I honestly didn’t know why.

We tried to take these moments, and draw closer to God and to work on ourselves. Seek healing where there needed to be, forgiveness. It wasn’t easy. That feeling of being on the outside looking in, but we kept going.

ENF

There was another time in our lives, that this happened too. We always thought it was because we lived a distance away and was never really able to get close to people.

We just decided, my husband and I, that we would work on ourselves. The result is that we seemed to be moving further away from the group. We began to pray a lot more, and find ourselves making more time for things we loved. Asking God for direction as relationships were less. The feeling of moving on to something else, was becoming greater.

There was still a whole lot we didn’t know and even more we didn’t understand. Until finally, we felt like God said it was time. We left.

Anyway, back to the recent conversation. Some of the why was revealed. I think if I had known this information before, it would have helped us make the decision we needed to a lot sooner. We probably wouldn’t have stayed as long. Idk. Even our response probably would have been pissed and left right then.

When a double standard has been created and compromise is okay for others, not you. Something is wrong.

Knowing it now, I look back over this past year, well probably even years, and just realize how much God protected our hearts from things. How He grew us, our family, closer to Him. Seeking Him more than anyone else. How even in the midst of all of that, He started to lead us away. Not with hearts that were angry or offended. But with hearts that were sad, humbled, and broken.

It’s like all those stories you read in the Bible, where you find out what God was doing behind the scenes. You trusted Him but you never got the answer or the understanding you thought you needed. Until one random moment, having a random conversation.

You are able to see that God didn’t let you get drawn into that. God didn’t let others separate you from your family. God didn’t let your marriage fail. God didn’t allow the enemy to come and destroy what He had been working so beautifully on.

He kept you securely wrapped in His arms. Letting you know just enough, to keep you from falling into the trap that others had set.

I wonder too, if we were suppose to leave a long time ago. But we believed more in man or a vision, than what God was telling us to do. Let me make it known, that there are no hard feelings for people. I think there are relationships forming that are new, even though I have known them for awhile. I am just letting God lead on that. I also pray for what we left. I ask God to intervene all the the time, cause it will only be by Him and not by anything I can do.

Even if that is so, and we were suppose to leave. I believe that there is grace for that. I believe that God can redeem that time and that nothing was wasted.

One of the biggest lessons I have learned, is that any of us are one step away from following a different path. I am fully aware that it is only by the grace of God that I am here.

ENF
  • That I myself haven’t gone down another path where I would be right besides others. I do not boast in anything, I am so humbled by this truth that I pray I keep it with me always, when I start to think I am better than anyone else. I pray God will remind me of this always.

I am amazed by His love. By His protection. By the safety of His arms.

I am thankful for His healing.

The tender way He leads. He is always so faithful, and I hope I never lose sight of that.

Posted on by ebbnflow08

Words

Words are such a funny thing. In one moment they can build you up and make you feel loved. In the next, they can tear you down and make you hate who you are.

There have probably been more than these times but there are always two moments in my life that stand out where the second one took hold of my life. The thing they had in common is that in both times, my character was attacked. It was almost as if these people knew exactly what to say, they knew that deep down I wasn’t these things or I hoped I was but then told in one second I wasn’t what I thought I was.

I think the words that build us up or make us feel loved can be so easily forgotten. Is it easier to believe the negative things people speak over us than it is the positive? Does it play into the insecurities we already have?

One of the said incidents happens many years ago, but the other one was just this year. That one, still plays a toll on me. The words creep in when I least expect it. “I didn’t feel safe”. I have never thought of myself as someone that people couldn’t be safe with. I can go into the details and why I think they said those words. But really I am not so sure that even the situation is important. I am not sure even the person who said them is important in this story. It is that statement that wants to play with me.

It is that statement that pops up in those moments I least expect it. This sentence. This small sentence. Quiets anything else I have to say. I am in shock. It makes me question my own character. I question who I am.

I thought I had it figured out. Forgiven. Let it go.

But just in the small moments, these words are vomited back up. And I wonder how many people have been told that I am unsafe. I wonder how many people have or still think that. And I shut down. I close up. I would much rather be alone than anyone feel that way about me.

And I am. Alone. For reasons I don’t really know. People have been exiting out of my life. Maybe it is because I hadn’t forgiven like I thought. Maybe there has been bitterness that has been contaminating everything I am around. Maybe it is me. And for a little bit, I thought the world would be better without me in it.

But maybe at the same time, its not just me. Maybe a decision was made to just say something that they thought would get them what they wanted. I don’t know if this is what they wanted.

Honestly, I am not sure what to do with what was spoken.

I wish I could remember how I overcame them last time. I think I had help. I had someone who could help me through it. But now, I am not sure who to go too. That is the hardest part of it all.

Posted on by ebbnflow08

Just Thoughts

Been thinking a lot lately. Here is my truth. It may be right. It may be wrong. You may agree. You may disagree. It is okay. It is just what I have been thinking.

There has been a struggle lately in my mind. The hardest part is that is has brought me some very deep depression. As a Christian, it is hard to know if I can actually say that. Will I be condemned because I am depressed? Will there be judgment telling me that I have given God authority over it? But as a Christian, I have been depressed. I was thinking today, if we would change the verbiage from depression to lamenting. Would that change how we look at it? I really don’t know.

Honestly, I was even wondering if that was possible. Could what I have been feeling more of a lamenting then a depression? Because it has been more of a deep ache, a mourning of sorts. A sadness for something that was, that is now potentially gone. Is that even the definition of lament? I should probably look that up. Can you continue to keep your trust in God, to look at his face, and still feel what I have been feeling? I don’t know, but I have been.

One day, I found myself so much in tears that it came from the pit of my stomach. Like I had for so long been holding it all in that it all just came out with just force, almost like a panic attack. But they were tears. A wailing. A deep cry, mourning. My whole body shook. And the words that I was putting on myself were nothing truthful but I couldn’t help but say them. “All of this is my fault. I am the problem. I am the problem. Everyone would be so much better if I were no longer here.”

Mind you, I do not take those words lightly, but I do not believe that I would be one to carry out such a sentence on myself, as well as my family. However, those heavy words were out of my mouth. They floated in the air, until the weight of them made them fall to the floor.

Soon after this, I started to think about why I had said them. What was making me feel this way, and I said another thing I am not sure Christians are suppose to talk about. Feelings. Emotions. Why is it that one moment it is okay to feel and have them. Then the next we are being chastised for having them. It is a crazy thing.

I begin to look at what was making me feel like this, and one of the first things that came up was that I am constantly trying to convince myself that everything is okay. I am okay, this situation or that situation is okay. When in reality, it wasn’t okay. It wasn’t okay or even normal as to what I was feeling. I wasn’t okay that the situations. I was not okay. So why did I keep trying to convince myself that it was okay? Why was being ignored, always looked down, or being told I am not doing things right most of the time, okay? Why did I have to keep this up? I have no idea.

Except, when I would talk to people this would happen. I would be ignored and told I was doing something wrong. There was never any help to work through it or anything. In fact, in one meeting that had me in tears the whole time, I was told I was unsafe to be around. I had never in my life been told that and had no idea that it was how people saw me. Or did they just say so I would back down and be quiet? Because that is exactly what I did.

Yet, everything was suppose to be normal. They had won. I was just suppose to once again go back to chanting “It’s okay. It’s okay.” When it was obviously not okay. Even though I thought maybe it could be.

But slowly, people have started to creep out of my life. People I thought loved me no matter what. People who I thought I could share anything with, only to find out later they have talked with others and not even told the whole truth. I was dealing with the consequences of it all. Maybe I really wasn’t a safe place like that person had said. Maybe I deserved to be ignored. You start to tell yourself these things. Agreeing little by little with lies that people have said over you. You just get smaller and smaller.

This is where it began. Bending over to the whim of others. Trying to please everyone. Hearing over and over how I was the only one in the wrong and it seems I would not ever be out of this. I began to see the same thing happening to my husband, and my kids. I thought well if I wasn’t here, if I was a safer person.

This is where the depression came from. My own character was attacked and began to believe that if I just did everything right, I would be loved. But I wasn’t. As I said, people began to leave. Oh it still looked good on Facebook. Every once in a while a string was dangled in front of me and like a circus cat I would cling to it until the next string.

Until one day, it hit me that I no longer what to live this way.

That pleasing people is no way to live a life, and clinging to bread crumbs do not satisfy anything.

I am tired of trying. You can’t make someone treat you better. You can’t make someone change their opinion of you. I can’t fix anything. You cannot force a relationship, friendship. You can’t making yourself someone you aren’t in hopes to be liked.

Which this realization, it has made things easier. I know to some it probably sounds simple and even like duh, but for me. It has been a painful, tear filled journey of letting things go. Letting God have a lot it, and keeping my eyes on Him. I don’t really feel like I took my gaze off of him but with trying to please everyone else, I really wasn’t looking at him fully. He was always kind of to the side, while everyone else was in front.

I think you can be depressed. I think you can feel your emotions. They were given to us for a reason, however, we must always settle them at the feet of Jesus. We must always be praying to God, asking Him to keep them in check and to not let them control who we are. I wish we could talk more about this, and not be so discounting of them.

I am not sure I have said all I wanted to say. Or if I have not made sense, I am sorry. I feel I am just writing to be writing. Though it sounds good as I am writing it, who really knows.

As I said at the beginning. It is okay if you disagree. All I know is that this what I am going through at this moment, and may God show me where I am wrong if I am so. I just keep praying that He keeps showing up, I keep praying that I keep showing up. Looking at Him, and trusting that He is doing something even if I cannot yet see what it is.

That is what I hold to.

Posted on by ebbnflow08

Hello!

A moment ago a felt inspired and started this whole blog process. Once upon a time I did this at least weekly. Just pouring out recent thoughts to anyone who might read it, which I am not sure anyone really did. However, it helped.

So here we are again, writing. On a blog. I guess I feel I have something to say, that I hope might help someone, or just be honest about where I am at in life right now. I suppose that is always the hope, right, to be able to help others in one way or another. To make one laugh or let them know they are not the only one to experience such things!!

So you might be asking who I am:

My name is Dawna, I live in the Midwest. I have been married for close to 15 years, which is crazy to me, doesn’t feel like that long, but then it does. We dated for 5 years prior, and that my friend was a rocky road. He is a Police Officer, which I never once saw myself as an LEO wife. Never. Nor did I see myself falling for a Marine! It really is amazing who captures your heart! I also couldn’t be more proud to be his wife!

We have three truly amazing kids, although I am sure most parent’s say that about their children. Even on the hard days when teenage hormones are raging and my youngest keeps pushing the boundaries. They are still mine, and I am so grateful for them!

We have three animals: Charlie Sirius Black, our 11 month old Great Pyrenees, Luna Rey Lovegood, our 5 month old Golden retriever, and Gizmo, our 5 yo Tabby Cat! If you cannot tell by the names, we are a Harry Potter/Star Wars loving family.

My husband and I met at our church, got to know each other traveling back and forth for Harp & Bowl and his rough exterior ended up giving way to this kind hearted man who I couldn’t see living without. So you will probably hear a lot about our relationship with God and how that shapes our lives on a daily basis. Cause it is a big part of our lives. Even when we are stubborn and don’t want to hear it!

One more thing you should probably know is that we are a homeschooling family. I have been homeschooling my kiddos for about 10 years, geez, another no way moment for me!! That, my friend, has also been a road I didn’t think I would walk, it has been a journey all it’s own!

Anyway, I am sure there is more I could say. But I feel that is all I have for now!

Thanks for reading!