April 28, 2012 Greetings My Friend, I was thinking that having a “do over” button would be really nice. You know if I would have known I would have never done….. For me I would go back to my teenage years and I would stay away from drugs and alcohol. I would want to date a Christian boy and not enter into sex until I was married. I would also want to do some things different in my parenting. For each decade of life I have things I would want to do over. As I became divorced my children were young adults. They were marrying and having children. I took a “time out” for some of the holiday/family gatherings. Many were at my ex-husband’s place and I found it very painful to be near him so I did not go. As I grew stronger I re-entered into the gatherings and found that customs were formed in my absence. More often than not these days I feel a deep sadness as holidays come around. I feel very much alone. I have grown in my faith and as the holiday arrives and passes I do fine. For me it is those days leading to the holiday that I struggle. Each year God holds me and shows me that He is all I truly need. Still those days leading to the holiday are about the loneliest I feel. I also realize somewhere deep in me that these moments are what shape me. I also realize that my struggles are what allow me to reach out to others and offer them hope. I do find a peace when I can offer hope to someone else. M comes to mind. I worked with her for 10 years before I retired. As I was retiring she wrote me an e-mail that had me in tears. She was being abused by her boyfriend. Her husband had died and this man entered her life. He was nice and treated her so wonderfully in the beginning. After he moved in with her he began to be angry and then he began abusing her. M had heard me talk about my abuse and she reached out to me. We went to Celebrate Recovery and she has stayed away from abusive relationships. God has used my struggles. These struggles allow me to give others the hope I have. Before a strong walk with Jesus….I had no hope. Now I can offer a true hope. When I am shopping sometimes I tell people my first husband liked to use me for a punching bag, this husband has never hit me. I don’t say this to get sympathy, although I often do get it. I say it for the one person who needs to know that we don’t have to stay in that relationship. Often times a lady will say something like “I am just getting out of that.” I tell her that there will be a day where life won’t hurt. I tell about Jesus. I feel God lies on my heart what I need to say. As I went through cancer I often had people say that they were a so many year survivor. That gave me so much hope that I could live beyond cancer. That is what I am trying to tell another person when I tell them of my abuse and surviving it. I also tell people about my bouts of depression again not to get attention but to offer the hope I have. My hope is Jesus. Jesus has held me so tenderly at times and as I come out of my depression I feel able to face the struggles that want to suffocate me. I am also finding that by telling I am finding hope as well. I am reminding myself of where I was and where I am now. The “Janet” of 30 years ago is not the “Janet” now. I am able to make decisions and move about life easier. Yes I have my moments but somewhere in those moments now I know that I know life will be better. In many of the Psalms and throughout the Bible I find that the people would remember. They remembered when God brought them out of Egypt out of bonds of slavery. They remembered when God provided for them. For me telling is a way of remembering how God has helped me and continues to help me. As I go in and out of depression now many times I will know/remember that God will help me. I even learn how to turn to God sooner than later now. As I was growing up I learned that “God helps those who help themselves and we need to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.” I believe the better way is to give my struggle to God and then allow God to direct me. I am better at this but there are still moments where I try to get out of my struggle on my own and find myself even more depressed. I do believe though that I need to do what God is telling me to do. I find that if I have a peace about what I am doing then I am following God’s direction. If there is no peace then I need to go back to prayer and listen again. I did that when I married Junior. I was so afraid of entering into another bad relationship. I did not want to be married again if I had to work so hard at being married. I prayed hard before I went to marry Junior. I felt a peace come over me and I went to him. I have not regretted one day of this marriage. We do have struggles for sure but I find being with Junior the best gift I have ever been given. I pray to be the wife Junior needs and in that I find such a wonderful sense of love and commitment. May God bless you and keep you, make His face to shineupon you. Love Janet

April 21, 2012 Greetings my Friend, I have been struggling with depression yet again. I have been considering taking an anti-depressant with my Doctor’s advice. Right now I feel like “how many more battles Lord?” I’d like to both curl up in a ball somewhere and stay there….well actually I sit in the recliner, turn the TV on and sit. I don’t want to commit suicide. I’m afraid it would not take and I’d be an invalid. I also don’t want to commit suicide because I’d be killing myself and the 10 commandments teach to not kill. I love words. I have loved to write, journal etc. since I was a child. Words move me. As I journal I can’t find the words to name what is going on inside of me. I have been struggling for a few weeks now. So again I tried to journal and finally words came. I wrote two e-mails to people who love me and words came. I was so happy when the words began to flow out of me once more. We aren’t getting the addition. I told Junior I was sad. I did not tell him I was mad. Junior is a sensitive guy and I did not want to hurt his feelings. Truth of the matter is…I was very unhappy. I am angry actually. I buried my anger so I would not hurt Junior’s feelings. In that I lost who I was. Finally I admitted my anger. I was able to tell Junior and not spew forth venom. I think that is what I feared the venom. When my anger flares I can be rather mean with my words. Since I have been with Junior I have worked hard at not unleashing my mouth whenever life hurls a curve ball. Junior is a nice guy. He is sensitive in many ways so to be mean isn’t something I want to do anymore. I could unleash my venom in my previous life and not care. In this life…I don’t want to give into it so I work hard at controlling it. The contractor talked with Junior. The dream began to take shape. I saw the bedroom and bathroom and laundry room taking shape in my dreams. I saw a walk in closet too. I began to buy the dream, taste the dream and then the dream was gone. I also saw that the addition was the beginning of the end. In my mind when the addition was finished most of the renovating would be done and we’d be living a retired life instead of a renovating life. Next I had a struggle with my impulsive behavior. I don’t mean to question everything but sometimes I do. I like to add my thoughts to discussions as well. I was in a group situation and raising my hand a lot and adding my thoughts. My behavior made the instructor uncomfortable and I was talked to about this. I felt bad. I wasn’t trying to be a problem but I was a problem. So depression was my best friend again for a few weeks. I quit picking up, cleaning the cat box etc. I cooked some and kept the sheets clean and that’s about all I did. I do like to run so if we needed to do errands I’d go with Junior or run on my own. Other than that I sat in my chair and watched TV. When the words flowed again, I began to see me coming back to the land of the living. I knew I was on the other side of this depression. Somewhere in all of this I knew that I knew that God was going to help me move past the hurt. That has been a comfort to me. I know even in my deepest depression that God knows what is going on and he will move to help me. There are some that believe that anti-depressants and counseling are not needed if you are on a faith journey. For me that is hard to believe. Many years ago I was told that as a victim of abuse, I’d probably need counseling throughout my life. That has proven true. I did go 10 years without counseling. In that time frame though I was in accountability groups which helped me move through life. After we left Michigan and had no accountability group I found myself struggling. I was depressed due to many reasons, health and life in general. Slowly I am working my way back to the ‘old’ Janet. I have read my Bible prayed and attended church and yet I still struggle. I love Jesus beyond measure. In fact if it weren’t for Jesus, I wouldn’t be able to function. Jesus gives me hope and hope helps me move out that door. My junior is also a guy who struggles with PTSD. He is a man and when men are scared they tend to get angry. Junior is no exception. His PTSD can make him fearful at times and then he gets angry. One time when I was going through radiation he had a moment in the car where he was going to get out and get into a fist fight. I pulled him back into the car and he settled down. After many years of counseling alone he asked to be put on an anti-depressant. He is able to stay calm easier now. He isn’t constantly trying to hold his anger in check. Actually he doesn’t get as angry at all now. So the medication helps him do life without all the struggles he had before. I am choosing to not go the anti-depressant route at present anyway. For me, I have a tendency to be overly sensitive to drugs. I will be the small percentage of people who suffer the worst of the side effects and so I don’t want to add that to my list of struggles as well. In my heart I believe God knows my struggle and will guide me. I also believe God has given me the counselor that is best for me. So I am moving through life as well as I can. I also believe God uses this struggle of mine. I find whenever I write about depression people who write to tell me of their struggles. I think I offer hope to others who struggle with what I struggle with. That comforts me too. Where is your hope? Is it a bottle? Sex? Drugs? I’d like to ask you to turn your struggle over to Jesus. He helps me with any problem I have. May God bless you and keep you, make His face to shine upon you. Love Janet

April 14, 2012 Greetings My Friend, As Junior and I thought about the next church we joined I felt a huge need to go to a church that celebrated communion at least once a month. Some churches do communion every week, some every month and some a few times a year. For me the act of communion was important. I tend to need to reflect on the gift of what Jesus brought me/us frequently. As a kid and young adult I had a love/hate affair with communion. The church I grew up in made communion a long process. First the tray with bread was passed through the aisles and then the wine (grape juice) was passed. It was a long solemn moment and my over active brain struggled to stay reverent and quiet throughout the process. As I started going to church with Junior I often marveled when we were in communion together. He prays throughout the whole process and I often wondered what he prayed about. My mind could not think of prayers that would last that long. I also had a tendency to look at the people around me and not focus well. A minister one time taught on communion and I learned to pray from his teaching. For me I started with my mind. I prayed that my thoughts, my eyes, my hands and my feet would be go in the right path. That revolutionized praying for me and communion became so important in my faith journey. I was learning to bring my whole body into worship and into service to the Lord. The last part of my prayer taught me to ask God to direct my steps into the service He had for me. I found my prayer lasting through the communion service and my heart being quieted and then a desire to walk out of that service and into life with a sense of loving, serving and being about God’s business instead of all my own selfish desires. Through the years I have also learned that in my own way I am having communion with God most days in my prayers. I do not eat the bread or drink the wine (grape juice) but I feel the communion moment as I pray through each stage of the cross. I start off with the last supper, I may not go into detail but realizing that the last supper was Jesus’ last meal with the disciples usually makes me realize the bittersweet moment that particular last meal was. Sometimes I focus on Jesus washing the disciple’s feet. I marvel at the servant attitude that Jesus had and then I strive to become more of a servant in my walk. Then I move into Jesus going into the garden to pray. He was sweating blood. I sense his anxiousness as I ponder his prayer, the blood he sweated. Jesus prayed, “Take this cup of suffering from me, not my will but your will.” At this point I sense that He did not want to go through with what was coming. This part of the prayer has given me courage when I had none. I have learned that our Lord was afraid and did not want to go through with what was coming up. As I prayed this I realized that I am terrified of physical pain and in the prayer I see the angels coming to help Jesus and I learn that God truly knows. When I lift up my fear and concern to God I learn that He knows, He hears and God will give me the courage to face whatever trials I may encounter. As my prayer moves forward I see Jesus being scourged (whipped) with bone and glass tied to the whip. I see Him being mocked. The mocking was brutal. Those soldiers were not gentle and by the time they were done our Savior’s face was swollen beyond recognition. Next they had him carry his cross which he was too weak to do and had someone else carry it for him. He was nailed to the cross, literally nailed to a piece of wood. I learned that the victims struggled to breathe and had to pull up to get air in their lungs and then would sag down till their lungs needed more air. Then they would pull up to get air again. At this point I see our Savior’s torn up back from the scourging rubbing against the wood and being torn up even more. He did this for hours before he finally died. My heart breaks. About this time I think on the phrase “truth is stranger than fiction.” I believe this was a real event that our Lord truly went through the awfulness of the cross. Up on the cross in all that pain our Lord then had compassion and I marvel at that compassion. He prayed for those who were crucifying him. He saw his mother and had her live with John his disciple and the thief confessed his wrongs and asked to be with Jesus and Jesus invited him to be with him in paradise. I see our Lord crying out “My God My God why have you forsaken me.” I feel great anguish in Jesus’ comment. He then dies. The soldier sticks his sword in Jesus’ side and blood and water spill out. Our Savior is dead. They take Him down from the cross and bury him in a tomb. Three days later our Lord and Savior rises from the dead and walks among the people for 40 days. At Jesus’ ascending into heaven I feel a rush of hope. This is the hope that helps me face life when life is rough. The older I get this hope is what makes me yearn for heaven. When I was younger I thought heaven would be boring. Now I find I long for “no more tears, no more sadness.” Life on earth is hard. There are great moments of joy for sure but the pain of life often is over whelming to me. The thought that a day is coming where there will be no more tears or sadness…..it moves me anymore. I am not going to die and be dead and nothing else. I am going to die and go to heaven….that moves me. My mission anymore is to try and give the news of the Gospel to those I meet. Heaven, Jesus both give me hope and I find life bearable when I know that I am not going to die and that is it. There is something beyond the grave. What is your hope? Where it your hope? Have you considered the gift of a Savior who would literally die for you? May God bless you and keep you, make his face shine upon you. Love Janet

April 7, 2012 Greetings My Friend, Recently Junior and I both were struggling with PTSD. Junior has PTSD from being in war. He kept going out on expeditions with little or no time to decompress and it now plays havoc in his life. For me I have PTSD from being in abuse for the first 40 years of my life. I was abused at home as a child and there was abuse in my first marriage. Generally we don’t go through our PTSD at the same time, recently though we were struggling with it at the same time. Junior was anxious and when he is anxious he tends to be angry. In his anger he uses his ‘man” voice which can be firm, scary to me. We were dealing with stress, with a new Dr. for me and taking B to her Dr. appointment and not knowing where we were going. This brought out the anxiety in us both and we were relating in our PTSD mode. One of the things I do most days is pray for my marriage. I ask God to teach me to be what Junior needs. I find that seeking Junior’s highest is really good for our marriage. I am not focused on my needs to the extent of not caring about Junior. I want what is best for him. So I believe God was helping me to not go in a panic mode that would escalate into a huge argument, each of us operating in our fear. At some point I was able to identify the problem and not react. Instead I was able to stay clear headed in my thinking. Was I afraid, yes I was. I was actually terrified. Still God helped me not fuss back at Junior as he talked what to me was scary. In that we both began to calm down and act rationally. As I said I pray pretty much daily ask for God to teach me to be what Junior needs. In asking God to teach me to be what Junior needs, I find ways to relate to him that otherwise would derail our relationship if I acted on my own. I was able to deescalate our situation and we found the Dr.’s and we went on to have a good day. Tomorrow is Easter. We celebrate Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. In the Bible I find times where prophets raised people from the dead. One prophet lay on the child and he came back to life. Jesus himself brought a few people back to life. He was in charge of the situation. Jesus though came back without any intervention from a human. He simply rose from the dead three days after he died. I have been pondering that fact for some time. God raised Jesus from the dead. No one else was involved but God and Jesus. Junior and I have been married 14 years now. We still enjoy each other and our marriage. We both had moments within the marriage where we wondered about what we’ve gotten ourselves into. At this point though we have overcome much and find the other person to be a good companion and friend. It is hard for me to pray without thanking God for putting me in this marriage. When I was divorced I found myself wondering if men and women can truly enjoy each other. I remember praying and asking God to allow me to be in a good marriage to someone I respected and looked up to. I went on with life and at some point I met Junior. We hit it off right from the start. We married and have enjoyed each other’s company/companionship through the years. After we married I remembered how I had lost respect for my first husband and I did not want to do that again. I began writing Junior letters and I only allowed myself to tell him what I admired in him. He thinks I was doing that to be nice. Nope I realized if I told him often what I liked I wasn’t going to see the faults he had. Next I remember starting to pray for our marriage. I did not want to be as unhappy as I was the first time around and I began praying for my marriage. I continue to pray for my marriage. I believe God opens my heart to Junior and I find him to be the best companion for me. I have found pure joy in seeking his highest good. I find I don’t have to win arguments for the sake of winning. So we were both struggling that day. His man voice in deep anger is frightening to me. In my life that man voice in anger generally meant someone was going to get hurt. I have a tendency to want to run, to leave the room and in a moving car…..you can’t run. At some point it occurred to me that he was struggling. We have learned that new things tend to be a trigger for Junior, airports come to mind. Junior gets frustrated trying to navigate airports, the tickets etc. We know he struggles and so we have found ways to lessen the fear where we can and I ride out the caustic comments if necessary. Jesus died for our sins. Were we sinning? Yes and no. Due to the fall, we are not what we were created to be and in that we weren’t able to function well. As I ask Jesus to be in my life though I find moments where I can function beyond my wildest imagination. So in my other life, I would have entered into an argument and felt justified. In this new life…..I am able to look beyond the moment. God opens my heart to what my man is struggling with and God teaches me what I need to do. I was struggling too and God helped me to move past my fear and to look at my husband with compassion. As I acknowledged my fear I was able to let go and soon Junior and I were the friends we love being with the other. May God bless you and keep you, make His face to shine upon you. Love Janet

March 31, 2011 Greetings My Friend, Easter is around the corner and my thoughts turn toward Jesus, the cross and the huge price he paid for our sins. I find myself ever grateful for the gift Jesus gives us. In my gratefulness I want to share to spread the “Good News”. I have felt like a victim for a good portion of my life. I know how to live in victim mode, because I’ve been a victim and so I automatically tend react in victim mode. My counselors through the years have taught me that I don’t have to stay in the victim mode and have shown me how to not react as a victim. I still find times where I resort to being a victim though. In my journaling this morning I am in victim mode big time. That man can still send fear through every fiber of my being and I haven’t seen or talked to him in a couple of years now. So I put my fears down in my journal and then if I’ve done a good job, the fears stay in the pages of my journal and I will function fairly well. As I gave my heart to Jesus I found love first, an acceptance of who I am. That was awesome. I felt I mattered and in that I began to have hope. Hope is what moves me out the door and into life. Without hope I had wishing. One of the things I do is pray through Jesus’ last hours all the way to his death on the cross. When God first told me to pray through the cross I didn’t want to. It is ugly. It is awful. It seems barbaric. I told God all those things and he said for me to pray through the cross anyway. I gave in and began praying through the cross. At this point in my life it feels like communion for me. “Do this in remembrance of me till I come again.’ In the cross I have understood the great love God has for us. I see I can never be good enough without a Savior’s redemption. I then find myself even more grateful for the gift of Jesus in my life. Just because I gave Jesus my heart doesn’t mean that life is a cake walk. What it does mean is that when the struggles come, I have someone who will walk with me THROUGH the struggles. When I get to the other side of the struggle I am amazed and eternally grateful for the assist. So I struggle through abuse all these years later. People don’t realize what it does to you. I was at the dentist office recently and asked about my ex. He did some part time work for them for a while and I was always leery that he would show up one day. I asked and found out he hasn’t worked for them in a couple of years. Slowly I learn he isn’t going to be showing up wherever I am. He has done that a whole lot since the divorce, he shows up in my life and then I have to deal with the fear that runs through me. My ex is a friendly guy. He doesn’t seem like the type that would hurt a sole. People wouldn’t believe me when I did tell. I got to where I didn’t because no one believed me. When my mom got sick and was dying he had to help care for her. Sounds nice I know but it was a way for him to be near me. Even more awful was going to bed in the bed he just left with my current husband. He seems like a real nice guy. He is unless you were married to him….then the story is different. Through the years Jesus has held me so tenderly. He has said he believes me. He has wiped many tears from my face and told me I was precious when I needed to know that I mattered. As I struggle with what the ex could do or can do Jesus reminds me that He is with me. I have learned how to make jokes when I am afraid. I make people laugh and I love it. In the laughter I move out of my fears. Junior understands mostly. He stands beside me. One thing for sure is if the ex-tried to hurt me, junior would not allow it or he would defend me. That is a huge comfort. Junior does get tired of hearing about these fears. To me they are very real. Others can’t understand this fear that refuses to leave me alone. I’ve learned to talk less and less about the fear. I may still struggle with it but I won’t talk about it much to others. As I come to Easter I am grateful for the cross yet again. I want to cry as I see what our Savior endured as he went to the cross and hung on the cross. It is about the ugliest I have ever seen. Not only was the physical pain awful but his emotional and spiritual pain was as bad. The more I pray through the cross, the more I feel Jesus’ pain. In that deep pain I again learn the gift I have truly been given. As a victim of abuse, I find myself relating in many ways. We all come to Jesus and find that He knows what we feel. As I pray through the cross I know that Jesus has gone through even more than I can imagine. I see that Jesus suffered emotional pain, spiritual pain and physical pain beyond belief. His poor back. He was whipped with bones and glass tied to the whip. He was hung on the cross and as he rode the cross up to get air in his lungs his back dragged on the hard wood. His back was so torn up. He knows physical pain in a deep personal way as well. Jesus’ good friend betrayed him. That makes me want to cry. So I struggle through abuse years after it has ended. I know that Jesus knows and I find comfort. I can face the day and move through life. When the moments overtake me, I pray, I journal and I talk with a counselor. I am not stuck in the abuse like I once was because I know that there is a tomorrow filled with hope. Where is your hope? Do you have hope? May God bless you and keep you, make his face to shine upon you. Love Janet