Healed

(this was a post that was originally written prior to the day my computer "bit the dust". Thankfully it was recovered by the genius superman computer guy. Here it is..)

When the girls were little and just starting to walk, they took a lot of small spills. Thank God for the padding in diapers, for their little bottoms took most of the fall. Their spirits took most of the wounding, though, and they would look up at me with a slight pout, waiting to see my reaction. I would smile and say cheerfully, "you're okay!" And they would get back up and happily start their walk all over again.
As they got older, they took bigger falls from their bikes, yielding bigger scrapes on their knees and elbows, and the pouts got slightly bigger. As they lay in a pile of bike and cement, I would first assess the damage, see that it wasn't too bad, and then cheerfully say, "You're okay!" We would then set to work cleaning up the boo-boos with my trusty red washcloth (to hide the evidence of blood), and the latest character band-aids, and finish with mom kisses and a popsicle. Then back on the bike, with a little more caution, and sometimes more determination not to do that again.
Sports always contain injuries of some kind, and for some reason, my kids have weak joints in their shoulders, knees, and ankles, and so we dealt with various painful problems there. We saw them get plowed over by bigger girls in basketball, we saw them get hit in the face with volleyballs. We saw them wipe out fighting for a ball. After these moments we would jokingly say, "How did the other girl look?" or "Did you hurt the floor?" or "Did you wreck the ball?" Sometimes after they'd get up, I would just give a sigh of relief and think, "you're okay!"
Older still, the falls became down the stairs for one of my children, which is now a running joke in the house.  We just know it's her,we don't even have to look, and we'll say, "----- are you okay?" She laughs, and says a laughter-filled, "yup". She will not be doing pageants, we always say. The stairs would kill her.
There have been times when they weren't so okay, like the time Serena was so sick with the flu that she fainted in the bathroom against the door and I couldn't get it open to get to her. The time she had pneumonia and her oxygen level was so low they nearly hospitalized her. The time Natalie had such a high fever she had seizures. Oh, Natalie has had lots of scary times...she has been through a lot of serious stuff from age 2 to 15. Most people don't know that because she walks around acting and looking like everything is "okay". We know better.
 A few bumps and spills can be shrugged off and sometimes you can just start over after you get hurt, other painful injuries leave scars. I think a lot of people walk around in pain and act like they're just fine, but inside they are not. We have a lot of depressed people in this world, I am finding out. It is so sad. But what is sadder to me is the insensitivity toward depression that I am also hearing about. Why do people feel it's  necessary to judge another person for their emotional state? You don't judge someone when they break a bone. It's mean-spirited, and I'm not sure why anyone would want to hurt an already hurting person by telling them they don't have a real illness, or talking behind their backs. I think it's why we have depressed people hiding their conditions and not participating in society. To have to feel shame for a condition that they have little or no control over because someone else is uncomfortable with them. Or because someone keeps telling them to focus on their blessings and they won't be so depressed. Maybe that person has never experienced true chemical  or even situational depression before, or maybe they are just blind, or well-meaning, but there is no cute catch-phrase like "you're okay", when it comes to depression, of that I am certain.
I am certain because I have experienced it myself. Unfortunately, because of the chemical misfires in my brain, depression is often a buddy of a seizure condition and migraines.   I am not ashamed of it. I needed medication to correct the imbalance in my brain that was causing it to happen. Depression is very isolating, very scary, and completely suffocating, and some strange part of me kept thinking "come on, get over it!" And I would hear, "You just need this, or you just need that..." And I just kept thinking, "you have no clue!" This is depression at it's purest. You have no answer, because you're in a pit of black! And it is extremely scary to feel something have a control over you, but it really is no different than having a cancer in your body that you can't control either. People don't walk around being ashamed of cancer, do they? So people, please don't be ashamed if you have a mental illness either. Does anyone ever question a broken leg, or tell someone to get up and walk after a major surgery? But for some reason they feel a need to police someone's emotional business, as if it matters to them somehow. It should matter, but in the way of kindness and love, not judgment and lack of human compassion.
Some boo-boos just can't be covered with a Hello Kitty band-aid, or massive amounts of chocolates and iTunes cards, in my case. Little hurts can be fixed, and what I wouldn't give to put a red washcloth on a knee scrape right now, give it a tender kiss, and put a Spongebob band-aid over it. But big hurts take time to heal, and sometimes they scab over, only to have the scab come peeling back off again, revealing raw skin beneath. Unhealed, tender, exposed to the air again, needing time and attention. Sometimes it results in a scar, reminding us that we were hurt once pretty badly, but slowly we healed, and in time we will be strong again. Maybe we'll be even stronger than before, with the assurance that  our wound will never reopen again. Because we finally conquered that one for good. Sometimes we have to remind ourselves and those we love to leave healed wounds alone too.
 And maybe we don't need everyone to understand and participate in our healing, because here's the good news, at least for me. I finally realized that although I felt completely alone in my illness, deep down I knew I wasn't alone. I wasn't feeling strong, but my faith in God remained strong.  My capacity to lean on God at that time was severely compromised. But  His Spirit in me kept praying for me when I could not, and kept me going each day. I still had hope, though I wasn't sure where the seizures were going to take me, and I was fearful  every day for almost a whole year.  Being a Christian, I know full well where fear comes from. I had thoughts of giving up so many times, but the Fighter in me kept fighting, the Spirit would not let me quit. Ultimately, this was my healing. As soon as I became strong enough to face my diagnosis head on and speak about it out loud, I became less and less fearful, and the healing began.
I still struggle with migraines. I still have a seizure disorder controlled with medications. I still have depression and anxiety from time to time. However, these things do NOT have ME. I use them to my advantage when I can. I help others who struggle with these conditions by encouraging them and informing them when I become informed. Believe it or not, many famous artists and writers suffer from depression, and they attribute it to their flaming success. I write and create more in those low times, and find it helps to keep me positive, and sometimes reveals things to me that I need to learn. But ashamed? Never, and anyone who would try to suggest that I should feel anything of the kind would be kicked out of my circle immediately. And I would suggest the same to anyone who is being treated this way.
One thing I do know is that there are days I don't "feel okay", but I AM okay and it's going to BE okay. That's the message I will leave for you if you don't necessarily know that yet. Our feelings are not to be trusted on those low days! What I know for sure is that I am not alone and even when I "felt" alone, God was there with me, pulling me through, sometimes lifting me up with a tender kiss and a "you're okay", with a promise that He would take care of the rest.  And He will do the same for you if you let Him.

My Life Verse:  I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13