Tag: depression

A Repaired Heart

On By SandraIn faith, family, love, stressLeave a comment

I write to you on the fifth week after my quadruple bypass surgery.  According to the professionals, I am progressing right on schedule. Even so, it is slow progress.  I am a “let’s get it done and I mean right now” kind of a person.  Unfortunately, this is a slower than molasses recovery process.  After four weeks I got the staples out and thought I would be ready to go.

I was beyond shocked when my wonderful surgeon let me know I had two more months (not weeks, months) of picking up less than ten pounds. My purse weighs almost ten pounds. This is miserable. No raking, no sweeping, no cleaning, etc. What can you do?

So I am in a situation of evaluating my life. I thought I had a handle on life. Work. That is what life is all about. Doing, doing, doing. I grew up in a home that did not understand the word play. My mother always worked. She owned a five and dime store. I stood on an apple crate to ring things in the cash register when I was eight years old. Work was what I was taught to do.

Each morning you wake up and go through your list of things to do. You prioritize your list and attack it. Each evening as you go to bed you reflect on your list. You think of those things you have accomplished and you get some rest because you have worked hard and you are ready to start another day of doing, doing, doing.

My husband, on the other hand, knew how to play. He grew up in an orphanage and had chores and worked on the farm, but he also learned how to play. In our relationship he pushed the play button and I pushed the work button. I never learned the value of play. Now, I am having a hard time learning how to relax and be still.

Not only does the activity level throw you off, but the self worth and emotional levels are out of sync. When you work all the time, you use your accomplishments to boost your self worth meter. When you are sitting all day and you evaluate your worth at the end of the day, there is not much in the plus column. That leads you to battle emotions of low self confidence, low self worth, hopelessness and depression.

Questions such as “Why did God leave me here instead of letting me die?”  “What am I suppose to do with my life now?”  “What did I do wrong that led me to have this issue?”  “Will I ever get my energy back?”  “Did God use this to give me a message?”  “What if I don’t get the right message from this?”  “What am I suppose to do with all of this?”

My three daughters are doing their best with me. My daughter that lives in Alaska even came down to help out. They are trying to re-educate me. I have a list of Stress Relievers that one daughter helped me put together. Twelve things to help me relieve my stress.

It is stressful to look at it.

I am listening. I am learning. I am trying. I pulled out my Erma Bombeck books. I am reading and laughing out loud. I am watching a movie each night. I am reading and re-reading all of the cards that my friends have sent to me.

I am slowly finding my way to a new life. One year ago that my life was torn apart. I adjusted as best I knew how to through the tragedy. Now I am adjusting again. I know a few things. One, I have a very strong faith. If God left me here on earth then I have a purpose and I will find what I am meant to do. Second, I am an eternal optimist. I will find the positive in the situation. Third, I have a great family and wonderful friends that will help me along the way.

The repairing of the heart will take time but it seems I have plenty of that.

 

Feelings

On By SandraIn gratitudeLeave a comment

I have been doing a lot of studying, reading and thinking lately about feelings. You know, those emotions that we all have.  Where do they come from?  What do we do to get them?  How do they rule our lives?  Should we let them take over?  Are they healthy for us?  What are good ones and what are bad ones?  Should we have a balance in feelings?

Most of all, should we be in control of our feelings?  Is it good to keep a lid on our feelings and not let them control us or should we allow them to be our guiding light for the days activities?

This is what I have discovered and what I really believe after doing a lot of reading. Feelings can lead us down a misleading pathway.  Many times we do not exert control over them.  We seem to allow them to take the lead.  We validate feelings as if these emotions are the way our lives need to go.

Honestly, our feelings can be sponsored from reflecting on others. Or conjured up from some irrational thoughts that we may have.  They may be a dishonest display of what is really happening in our lives.  They may come from many things around us.

A bad nights sleep or the grumpy greeting from a housemate in the morning, or indigestion or hunger, or not having clean clothes to wear or looking out of the window and seeing rain instead of sunshine can all evoke negative feelings. Even viewing positive things can conjure up negative feelings if we let them.

And we know that our feelings can push us to act in certain ways.  If we feel depressed, we will lack in motivation.  If we feel sad, we will mope around crying or looking for relief from our sadness by wallowing in self pity.  The ultimate action can result in suicide that is directly related to our feelings.  The rate of suicide in this country is soaring and that is a scary statistic.

So what do we do about our feelings?  How do we control our emotions?  Is this even possible? What about those people that always seem to be happy?  What is their secret?

I think I know.  We can will ourselves to be happy.  We can reverse the emotions and the action sequence in our lives.  The will is the power of conscious deliberate action.  It is the decision to go in a particular direction.  It is the choice to do a particular thing.

When we will ourselves to do something, our emotions follow our action.  It is just reversing the process.  Instead of responding to emotions, we make emotions respond to our actions.  We push in a particular direction and the emotions will follow.

I know this sounds simple.  It is more complex than this simple recipe.  But we can learn the practice of action followed by emotion rather than emotion followed by action.

Practice, practice, practice. Getting up in the morning, giving God praise for allowing you another day to be vertical and breathing.  Next, plan your positive actions for the day. Moving through the motions of positive actions will keep the negative emotions at bay and the positive feelings of accomplishments and happiness will come.

When my husband died I had to make a decision. I knew he was not coming back.  I knew he was in God’s hands. I knew that God had a plan for me. I had to will myself to accept that and get up each morning with thanksgiving in my heart and a plan to serve God.  For the most part, I have kept that going.  I slip every so often.  But mostly I can say my emotions have followed along and I am happy, comforted, and at peace.

Keep the  positive actions going and the positive emotions will follow.  It is a plan.

A Puttering Start

On By SandraIn grief, lossLeave a comment

I am lying here looking out of the windows. It is mid April. It is cold. It was 36 degrees this morning.

What is that about?

April in South Carolina is supposed to be warm.

It seems that this winter, the world has not known what it wanted to do. Weather wise it has been a bouncing ball. We saw some of the coldest weather that I can ever remember.

Thirteen degrees?
In January?
In the south?
No way.
Yes, way.
It happened.

Then we bounced. A pretty day. A cold day. It puttered. Winter returned. It just never seemed to know that it should get warm and stay that way. I thought when we finally began to see some flowers in late February that we had gotten to our spring.

But no! Here came winter again. It would get cold and stay cold. Then we would have a one day tease. A seventy degree day and we just knew that it would start climbing and we would have winter behind us.

But then, at 36 degrees and lots of cold wind, I decided that winter just didn’t want to leave us. I am not sure why, but it just can’t get enough traction to make it over the hump.

It is like you are driving a car on ice and you try to get up the hill, but you just can’t make it and you slide back down to have another go of it.

I feel that way about my life. One day I feel that I have made it over the top of the sadness. I feel that I have conquered that loneliness. I have finally dealt with the issues and am moving on. I have made it to the top of the hill and can see over the top.

Then I hear a song or I read a particular scripture and I am just like the weather; sliding back into that sadness. It feels like a roller coaster; up and down. I become like the winter, quiet, isolated, not wanting to be with others and ready to ball up in a knot and let the world go by. I am gloomy, grey and have clouds hanging over my head.

I am sure as people look at me they see a chilly breeze floating around me and they feel that they need to put on their coats because I am like a cold front that has assaulted the good feelings of others. It is as uncomfortable as the wind blowing on a cold day.

Then, just like the weather, I will perk up, show my smile and want to be motivated to get out there and start over again. I feel like a seventy degree day and full of sunshine. I am boosted to pop out like the spring flowers and blossom like the buds on the trees.

It is truly a slip and slide position. I think I will blame it on the weather. If it cannot make up its mind, why should I? Maybe if the weather would get its act together and move on into a permanent solution of warm, I would follow suit and move right on into a constant sunny disposition.

Until then, I guess I will be up and down. But I will try to keep my downs to myself and only show my ups. Wish the weather would do that. I wish to see only the warm sunny days with no wind and lots of pretty flowers. I bet you would like that also.

Psalm 30:11:12 You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever.

All in Perspective

On By SandraIn gratitude, stressLeave a comment

Last week I was at the beach with lots of work to do.  I am getting the houses ready for summer rental.  So I had my things to do list and one chore was spray painting a wicker loveseat.  I had waited several days to do this because the wind seemed always to be blowing and spray painting needs a calm day.

I got up and was anxious to get the job done.  But when I looked out at the ocean all I could see was very tall, rolling waves and lots of foam.  I thought to myself, “What an angry sea!  That wind is terrible.  It is blowing so hard that the ocean itself is upset.”

I saw an angry sea because I was angry.  I was anxious to get my priority list done and nature was not cooperating with me.  It seemed that I would never find a day that the wind was calm so I could get my painting done.

As I moved to another chore I began to reflect on the ocean.  Actually, it was really pretty. The waves were huge and the foam that was stirred up almost looked like frosting on a cake.  I noticed how the clouds almost touched the horizon.  I began to see the picture differently.  My perspective began to change.

Life is like that a lot.  We have the power in our minds to see things as we wish. We must consciously make an effort to put the positive spin on what our eyes show us.  Many times we let our emotions cloud our vision.  If we are angry, as I was, we will put a negative spin on our view.  But if we can change our emotion or our perspective we will see it in a positive manner.  It makes a major difference in how we approach the world.

Recently I overheard my daughter say to my granddaughter.  You cannot have two thoughts in your mind at the same time.  So if you have a negative, or sad or terrible thought, make your mind think a pleasant or happy or positive thought.

I was impressed.  She is so right.  We choose to think.  We control our minds.  If we choose to go down sad paths, we will be depressed and overcome with those emotions. But if we are conscious of what we are doing, we can work to change our thoughts and stay out of the depressed thought realm.

No one has the perfect life.  Bad things happen to all of us.  Sometimes it is financial, sometimes it is a major loss, sometimes it is physical and sometimes it is annoyances. But all of us have bad things that happen.  And sometimes it seems that they all come at once.

Last year was a horrible year for me.  Illness, loss of my husband, financial crisis, a major relationship issue, recent loss of my mother and it just seemed like it would not stop.  There were even little things that seemed to go wrong.

I felt that maybe it was me.  Maybe I had angered God so severely that I was being punished.  I read Job many times.  I had to be strong.  I had to get through this negative time in my life.  Somehow I had to find a way to exist and be happy.

I cannot say that my life is perfect now.  I recently had an unexpected flat tire, I have more to do than my old body wants to do and I get thrown a curve now and then.  But I am trying to keep those positives thoughts in my head.  I can control my way of looking at even the bad things that happen.

God promised to take care of me.  He has kept His promise.  It is my responsibility to be happy and have the right perspective.  Think happy.  Be happy.