The Middle ☁️

“You don’t know what the story is about when you’re in the middle of it. All you can do is keep walking. At the beginning you have the buoyancy and a little arrogance. The journey looks beautiful and bright, and you are filled with resolve and silver strength, sure that you will face it with optimism and chutzpah. And the end is beautiful. You are wiser, better, deeper. The end is revelation, resolution, a soft place to land. But, oh, the middle. The middle is fog, exhaustion, loneliness, the daily battle against despair and the nagging fear that tomorrow will be just like today, only you’ll be wearier and less able to defend yourself against it.”                              

                        –Shauna Niequist in Savor

This was my morning devotional. Thank you Shauna. This passage most accurately described my heart after the week we just had. It’s exactly how I felt but was unable to put it into words so eloquently. This week kicked my butt.

It’s funny because the week before was so different. I felt on top of the world and like I could handle eight more kids. Motherhood came naturally. I felt like supermom. I even prayed for the mom I saw in Starbucks who’s toddler was screaming on the floor. "God, give her the strength to get through today," I said. And also thank you that that’s not me, I thought.

Then this week happened. The plague hit our home and snatched me of my confidence just like that. Seeing your babies sick and unable to console them—well nothing strips you of your mom card faster than that. I felt so helpless. My babies cried, and I cried right there with them. All week was a constant stream of liquid from our noses and our eyes. Jeffrey was working longer hours so some days he wouldn’t even get to see the kids at all. I felt so alone. When it rains it pours. Literally it was down pouring all week so I couldn’t leave the house—which is never good for my sanity.

Then on Thursday I got a phone call from my mom to tell me a close family friend we had grown up with committed suicide.

A flood of new emotions.

Confusion…Why? Was he lonely? Did he struggle with depression and never told anyone? And his parents. How hurt and broken and in a haze they must be right now. My heart just hurts for them. God have mercy on him, I prayed.

Comfort the family and bring people alongside them to walk with them through this dark time…

Eleanor’s soft cries from the couch next to me brought me out of prayer and back to my reality. Well my stuff isn’t as hard as THAT. It pales in comparison. Why am I even complaining? I should be grateful for my kids, sick or not. I should be thankful that my husband has a good job that provides for our family. How many people do I know who have it harder than me? The single moms who don’t have someone to share the weight with. The moms I know whose husbands travel and are gone for weeks at a time while they’re alone with the kids. And I’m complaining about a hard week? Be thankful and just shut up.

This is the voice I hear and surprisingly enough I don’t catch on quite yet that it’s not from God. I’m pretty sure Jesus never told anyone their feelings were invalid and to just shut it and be thankful for the cross.

Yet this is the dialogue I let run in my mind, which made me spiral deeper into feelings of despair and hopelessness. And now add guilt onto it. Satan always tries to make me feel like I’m failing at life and I’m not enough. I hear, "You’re a bad mom because you can’t even comfort your babies and worse, you wish someone else would come and take care of them because they would do it better. Also you’re a bad Christian and just all around person because there are a million people who have it worse than you right now yet you’re complaining."

These voices become so loud that I begin to feel ashamed so I stop praying. I hide away instead of reaching out to people. I hook myself up to a constant IV drip of Netflix to numb me from my own reality. I hope that if I just turn on Grey’s Anatomy and let it run on a loop, by Season 12 I’ll miraculously be out of this “foggy middle” period and into that beautiful part that Shauna talks about. But wait. Numbing is not going to bring me to a wiser, better, deeper place of resolution and clarity. It’s going to allow time to pass excruciatingly slow and I’m going to come out on the other side a little older but with the same issues and believing the same lies about myself and God.

One of the ways I’ve begun to crawl back to God in these times are through the Psalms. If you ever start to believe that your emotions are “bad” and you just need to shove them down and not feel—look to the Psalms to be proven wrong. David was a FEELER. The Psalms are filled with raw and honest thoughts to God.

So I flip through the book, I see Psalms that are bursting with joy over God’s goodness and provision. I keep flipping. I see Psalms of straight fear of the future. Psalms of deep brokenness over choices made and the weight of it all. Today I stop on Psalm 73.

I read the passage a few times letting the truth replace the tape that’s been on repeat all week. I read it aloud letting the words seep into my heart:

When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before you. Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.You guide me with your counsel, and afterwards you will take me into glory.

(v. 21-24)

I write the verses out. I write it again in my own words and as a prayer and confession to God. I’m comforted by David’s honesty and feel like I have permission to feel too. The truth grounds me. It doesn’t condemn my emotions but also doesn’t send my emotions spiraling out of control.

Instead it brings a wave of calm and peace.

Whom have I in heaven, but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. As for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge.

Elle will probably wake up sick again today. This wasn’t a magic prayer and everything’s better. It’s still going to be a long, hard day. Elle will most likely cry most of the day. I might too. At the same time I’ll stop throughout the day and pray for our friends and the loss of their child—which is still so heavy I can’t comprehend it. I’ll read Psalm 73 again. I’ll text a friend who I know is also going through a hard season and encourage her. Then I’ll take a deep breath and keep going. Because this is the definition of the middle. The hard part that is pushing and pulling and stretching and refining me. And it's not particularly traumatic. It's just the everyday life that's molding me.

It's days like these that my soul so deeply longs for the other side of all this—the season where I bear the fruit of patience and perseverance and true joy despite whatever circumstance I face. I look forward to that beautiful part—where I’ll be able to look back to the hard days where I chose Him over Netflix. Where I chose to fill my mind with the truth of scripture instead of lies. And where I chose to trust him even when I didn’t “feel” like it.