Weathering the Emotional Storms

Weathering the Emotional Storms

Until recently, I was content to write songs in hope that someday one of three talented CD writing relatives would record one of my songs or someday I will be able to record them myself.  I was content to homeschool my kids, teach one morning a week in a co-op, teach my preschool “Music and Motion” classes and develop my “Urge to Purge” pizza parties business. 

I can be a bit choleric and as such, I read that cholerics are most likely to go into business for themselves.  I think in my case it is because I am very creative and I am bad at keeping jobs long term because I have a terrible memory and don’t deal well in very stressful, fast-paced situations.

Always, my creative months come and go.  My motivation reaches highs and then swoops viciously down to low valleys.  In the fall I always have lofty plans and sweepingly ambitious intentions then January comes and I get depressed because I think I set my sights too high in the fall and surely I was crazy to assume I could accomplish all that I thought I could.  My best laid marketing plans come crashing down around me and I can barely get out of bed in the morning to teach my kids.  I let them teach themselves mostly.  My oldest is always eager to teach my second youngest and if I want to call the whole thing off twice in one week for a movie day, no one complains.

Then February rolls around and that is one of my favourite months of the year, generally.  I plan a Valentine’s party for my homeschool group, and usually a live theatre date with my mother for my birthday.  Also, my husband proposed to me in February so we usually get a dinner date in.

The rest of the year goes somewhat on schedule with maybe a week or two of depression in the spring because I am bored with homeschooling and then I have a birthday party to plan for my youngest in April, so I have reason to be creative again until about the end of May when I start to feeling burnt out from homeschooling and I wish June away in plans for a fun-filled summer (in which I always end up having more schooling to finish up because my personality is such that I can’t stand it if my kids don’t do 99% percent of the pages in their books).

Well, everything goes out the window in July.  I think I don’t do well with free time.  I get depressed – crazy, eh?  I like to be busy.  If I sit around too much and don’t have routine, I get depressed and then when I am depressed, I get lazier and dislike myself and the cycle continues.  By August, I snap out of it and wonder why I wasted so much time in July when I could have been quilting and accomplishing things I don’t have time for in the schoolyear.

Such is my life.  The pattern is fairly well-established.  The fall comes again and I start waking up between 3:30 – 5:00 everyday with my mind bursting with business ideas and schooling opportunities.  I love the fall and Christmas and February.  I hate January and July.

Maybe you can’t put your finger on a pattern the same way I can but maybe you too struggle with depression at times in your life.  Maybe you too feel like the routine is dragging you down and you can’t get your head above water.  Being a housewife or a busy career woman can leave you feeling empty at the end of the day at times and you feel like you go through regular “mid-year life crisises.”

In my early years of marriage, I was unbearable to live with during my highs.  I would stress too easily and snap too soon.  I used to say I had “spaz mode” and “sloth mode” and my husband far preferred my “sloth mode.”  I have learned that I can’t always expect him to be on the same motivational page as I am and that I would rather have a peaceful relationship than the house finished in a week.

In the early years of my marriage, I had times when I was sure if I just ended it all by running away from my family (heaven forbid), my mother or my mother-in-law could do a better job raising my kids.  The enemy hit hard and I gave in emotionally to his attacks.  He was ruthless and I didn’t fight him off as I should have.  I believed his lies that my family would be better off without me but I never had the nerve to run away because I knew I would be just as miserable on the run.  I have never lived in the world but I have seen enough people that have and Christians that have given up on living the Christian life to know that they are not happier because of it.  Once you have tasted the fulfilled life in Christ, there does not seem to be any place that you can run to that could bring satisfaction and meaning.

In recent years, when the enemy comes to attack, I might give in and stay home from church if my husband is away flying or have a week where I read a couple Christian novels in bed while my kids are schooling themselves but I have learned to say, “Get thee behind me Satan” a lot better than I used to.  In the back of my head I know, that I will feel better in a week or two and so I try to grin and bear it for the sake of my kids.  In fact, I have had times when I tried to generate some happy endorphins by laughing and acting crazy with my kids despite how I felt.  My kids think I have gone over the deep end but I find it can actually work.  I have had times when my temper was explosive with my husband so I have stayed away from him and coaxed myself to believe again that he is a good man (because he most certainly is) and that I am irrationally just focusing on small things that bug me and blowing them out of proportion.  In fact, I get out my emotional pump and pump for all my might to make the tiny infraction inflate to zeppelin-sized proportions and then use a large rifle to explode the whole thing to smithereens.

So I tell you all this, young moms, and older wives, young, single women and older widows or divorcees, that life is full of mountains and valleys (for some the plateaus are rather scarce) but we have a source of strength and hope at our finger tips that we can access as Christians that has far more power than the Enemy has to point his bony, clawing finger at you and tell you that you are useless and not needed.  Christ died for us so that we can die to our selfish introspection.  If we can put the needs of others above our own thoughts of self-pity, than we have a chance of surviving the lows and the manic highs.  Since Jesus Christ had victory over the grave, we have available to us victory over our emotions and the devastating effects that negative emotions can have on our lives. 

I recently lost a cousin to suicide and it was a surprise to all his family.  He was the type of guy to “suck it up” and just go on with his responsibilities but I don’t think he took his woes to Jesus.  I think that he let the Enemy finally persuade him that in the long run his wife and kids would do better without him.  I have been there.  I have thought those thoughts but always my Jesus became the “lifter of my head.”  I can’t thank Him enough for always being patient with my negativity and waiting out my craziness until I came crawling back to him and saying, “Thank you, Jesus, that You have tossed my sins into the deepest sea and you remember them no more.”  You are good!  I am blessed!”