A Light Bulb Moment ...

A womans body is amazing, she has the capacity to grow and protect a tiny baby inside her right from conception.  When it is so tiny that a microscope is needed to see all the development taking place. At the very beginning of her pregnancy she doesn’t know that there is another human being taking form in her womb, a few days before her period is due she may feel nauseated, her breasts are tender and she can feel ‘off’.  She will take a test - a simple ‘pee on a stick’ (poas) test that can show in a matter of minutes that her world is about to change.

There are the emotions of elation, joy and euphoria and sometimes it can be fear and trepidation.  It can be a planned pregnancy or an unplanned one - no matter which the baby that is growing is a gift from the Almighty God.

During the 9 months of pregnancy her body will change in ways that she never thought imaginable.  Every week the tummy grows, the baby grows. The woman will be able to hear the heartbeat, see the baby move around and eventually feel those kicks pushing out against her stomach, or up into her ribs.  As the baby grows and fills the stomach space and pushes the woman’s organs out of the way to make room all the while kicking, punching and somersaulting making her breathless and getting her body ready to push her baby out - that is just the physical side of things.

When I found out I was expecting Jonathan I was shocked.  I was terrified and in a split second I knew I had to grow up and become a mummy.  With Rose I was more terrified when I found out I was expecting her, I was convinced that the pregnancy would fail, and then Mattias …. Can you see a common thread yet … yes I was terrified again.  This time slightly different reasons - Rose wasn’t that old and his due date was her birthday and I was concerned with how I would cope with two so close together and 3 children altogether.

It is believed that a woman, for at least 6 months after having a child, should not make major decisions about anything.  This is because of the hormones coursing through her body that take a long time to settle after a baby is born (to be honest I think mine are only starting to settle at nearly a year later)  It is also the time, for a lot of women, that post natal depression (PND) can settle in. For me it was around the 4 month mark. I knew I was struggling mentally but I put it down to exhaustion.  Rose was demanding and screaming when we were out at everyone apart from myself and Dale and Mattias was going through a growth spurt and was constantly feeding and my oldest was pushed to the side - unintentionally.  It was also a time of uncertainty with Dale’s hip - he was on crutches and unable to do a lot, which made things harder again. My health visitor was so lovely with me and so reassuring and just told me to be careful and watchful, I think she was seeing the signs of the beginnings of it but just wanted to make sure before she said anything concrete.  

It was the end of July, beginning of August that the floodgates opened and all of a sudden I really couldn’t cope.  I cried for major parts of the day and I just couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. I felt like I was drowning.  I remember it very clearly because it was our churches outreach week and Dale had signed up to help and I wanted him to keep helping because they needed him, but at the same time I wanted him to not leave my side because I needed him.  In the end I ate every evening meal with my parents because I couldn’t face going home on my own (yes the kids were there but I felt like I needed help with them) I stopped breastfeeding because I was beginning to resent my son and I felt like I couldn’t do it anymore.  I didn’t follow the way they say to do it - I went cold turkey and had to work through trying to get him to take a bottle while I dealt with engorgement. He took to it really well after a day or two and I felt awful because I knew that I wanted to feed him but at the same time I didn’t.  

I called my health visitor and I left a message with her the following week and within 45 minutes of me leaving that message she was at my door to see me.  She stayed with me for a long time while I sobbed with her because I just felt I was under water and I couldn’t reach the surface. When she left she went straight to my GP and made me an appointment for that very day, I dropped the kids round with my parents and Dale called to say he was coming home from work early to go with me to my doctors appointment.  Sitting waiting for my name to be called seemed to last forever. I hated walking in to see my GP, I felt like I had failed. I felt useless. Now i know that those feelings are wrong. I wasn’t a failure, I wasn’t useless - I was just not mentally healthy and mums - that is OK!! It is ok to not be ok, and don’t let anyone make you feel differently.

I was put on medication, but I came off it after a few months because I couldn’t feel anything.  I was watching Mattias do things that I knew should excite me, make me proud and elicit a reaction but I couldn’t feel it or show any emotion.  In that moment I knew I had to come off them ( please note here though that coming off medication is NOT for everyone - I spoke to my health visitor and Dr and they both agreed) It took a while for all the effects of the medication to go, and I did find it hard to sort through the thoughts and feelings in my head.  My health visitor continued to come and see me every 2-3 weeks and I really needed those times with her. She helped me see reason, sense and helped me get out of my head. She encouraged me with the kids, she helped when I needed some advice and she never once judged me when I stopped breastfeeding.

I do have periods where everything seems to close in on me and I have times of clarity.  The bad times are getting less, I’m happy to say, and they will continue to get less. That’s not to say that we never get down periods, because we are human and events will come up that shake us to our core, but there is an equilibrium that comes and I believe that I am getting closer to that now.  

So why on earth am I telling you about my PND?  What has that got to do with anything?

A week ago I went to a conference in Ballymena Baptist church and the speaker was Nancy Guthrie.  I had heard of her before and was looking forward to hearing her so booked my ticket way back in September.  For a few weeks before this conference I wasn’t feeling myself, everything was getting on top of me again and I felt like I was clinging to a life raft.  I was finding it hard to get completely out of my funk.

I was to take my mum and my pastors wife to the conference and on Friday night my mum cancelled because she was sick, on the morning of it my pastors wife cancelled because she was sick too which meant i was going on my own.  What the ladies didn’t know was that for about a week I was talking myself in and out of going. I was so close to not going, especially now with not having to take anyone with me, that Dale had to nearly push me out the door.  I have to say - I am so glad I went! It was like a light had been switched on and all of a sudden I could see my way through the darkness I was trying to find my way out of.

Her topic for the two sessions were from her book ‘Even Better Than Eden’.  

The first was A Garden Even Better Than Eden: The Story of the Wilderness. She took us back to the very beginning.  In Genesis 1:2a ( The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters.)  it shows that there is a problem BUT v2b (And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters).points out that there is hope! God was hovering, waiting to fill the emptiness that was there with creation.  The problem that we see here (a world with nothing) is not a problem for God. The emptiness is filled with LIGHT (Then God said, “Let there be light,”).  The emptiness in our lives God looks at as a great opportunity, he can use that emptiness, that wilderness and put it to good use.  Creation shows us that God works well with nothing, with the wilderness (Toe-who Wha-bow-who) Nancy took us to chapter 3 and the downfall of man, she showed us what the original purpose of creation was - to increase and expand Eden.  It was so that Eden would cover the world, instead because of sin entering the world we couldn’t stay in the perfect garden anymore. Sin was not allowed to be in the place where God was. Eve’s life perspective changed because of the serpent - she believed she had an emptiness so she reached out and grabbed out for what she thought would bring happiness now turned to disaster.  It was not what she had envisioned. Just think - Eve was discontented when she had everything, and now out of Eden she must have had a raging discontentment. It is also a sign of grace - it points to the obedience of God. Nancy stressed the point that ‘Complete and lasting contentment only comes when we feast on the fruit of the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil’ Our future now is going to be MORE amazing than Eden…. Further through Genesis and she points out that Jacob wrestles with an angel to get back in to the area that was the promised land, Moses delivers them to bring the isrealites to the new Eden - a land flowing with milk and honey but instead the isrealites spent time in the wilderness (40 years).  In Numbers Moses talks about the rabble who were filled with discontentment with what God gives them - manna - but they want something else. (Aren’t we like that? We don’t want what we have, we want something else) Deuteronomy 8:3 says - ‘Yes, he humbled you by letting you go hungry and then feeding you with manna, a food previously unknown to you and your ancestors. He did it to teach you that people do not live by bread alone; rather, we live by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.’  

A divine presence, the power of living with less that we want in the wilderness of the world?  God’s plan could be to ‘let you go hungry’ to push us to Him, to retrain our appetite, our lives and to redirect our lives to the age to come as to gain perspective for what we are going to have.  
Nancy took us right through the bible from the old testament  where the prophets announce judgement but they also give hope Isaiah 58:11 ‘You will be like a well-watered garden,...’  and goes to the new … where we see John the Baptist who is the voice crying out in the desert - the one foretold in Isaiah, he shouts to the world to prepare the way for the Lord and his coming,  Jesus came in the FLESH! God flooded the world with his goodness. What I hadn’t thought about before was that John baptised Jesus and then - He went into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil - It’s so similar to Genesis 3 and Eve being tempted to sin, to the exodus from Egypt and the time spent in the wilderness.  Jesus quotes Moses words in Deuteronomy. Because of Adam the world was plunged into the wilderness but because of the second Adam we are able to go into the garden - we can enter paradise!

I loved this next bit - John 20:15 when Mary Magdalene is upset because the body of Jesus is no longer in the tomb (the new entry to the garden) and she turns, see Jesus but doesn’t recognize him.  She believed that he was the gardner … HE IS!!! He is the greatest gardner doing the work that the first Adam was supposed to be doing. We have the opportunity to identify with Jesus in his death and resurrection -  and this is Eden breaking into our lives, from spiritually dead women to spiritually ALIVE!!

What hope is there for us feeling full of discontentment in the world?  Look at Paul 2 corinthians 12:7 where Paul talks about the ‘thorn in my flesh’  It’s not talking about a thorn from a rose stem but a stake, piercing to the core.  Paul doesn’t ask why, he knows why - to keep him from boasting about his ‘tour of paradise’ that God gave him.  He doesn’t want to be prideful. He sees God working protecting him from falling into spiritual pride… is this from God then? (the thorn) or from the devil?  V7b - ‘...a messenger from Satan to tormwnt me and keep me from becoming proud’ Paul SEES God working to protect him and Satan trying to pull him down. God has a sanctifying purpose for his thorn, Paul prays 3 times for the thorn to be removed but it never has been.  It was a righteous rigorous prayer but God’s answer was not to take it away as a result Paul decides to boast about the power of Christ (v10 - that is why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ.  For when I am weak, then I am strong.) Paul is CONTENT with his weaknesses.

It is possible to be content in the wilderness,  If you give your weaknesses to God, to have the strength to be content in the midst of our weaknesses then we are FILLABLE!!  In your weakness you can be strong!

Jesus came in weakness, he was a tiny embryo - weak.  Jesus had many thorns in his body. Why are we so offended when we experience a thorn.  We are given divine power to be genuinely content (not perfect contentment as that comes later) We can be content even if God doesn’t fill up the emptiness the way we want it to be.  

John tells us in Revelation 22:3 that the curse that came into the world in Genesis 3 will no longer be there.  Instead God’s glory will fill every corner of the world and every part of US - every part of ME!

ALL OF MY EMPTY PLACES WILL BE FILLED UP.  - All of YOUR empty places will be filled up!

That is just so edifying for the soul, for the heart and for those who are struggling in their own wilderness.  

As Nancy prayed to close her first session I felt like my soul had been directly spoken to by what she had spoken about.  I knew that I needed to give my weaknesses over to God, to pray that God would use my weaknesses, that I would be content with every circumstance.  I prayed for that contentment and I have to say that my whole outlook, how i look at my circumstances has changed. That can work for you too. Read the Bible, read Nancy Guthrie’s book Even Better Than Eden.