There And Back Again: Part Two

I’m being brutally honest – starting college was a “crash landing,” if you will.  Here’s another piece to the story.  I’m thinking if there’s a part two, then I might as well go big and do a trilogy; 'cause trilogies are the best:

            My first signs of life outside high school were grim and ominous ones.  After all, I felt like I was just getting started – I had built and fostered more relationships in one semester than I had in numerous years.  It was like the childhood timer suddenly ran out once I had shown up to life as more of a real me.  The chapter that I felt I had suddenly caught onto was closing, forcing me to leave behind the life that I had fallen in love with. 

            The momentous occasion of graduation hurt like the devil.  To this day my parents will tell me how much pain was in my eyes that day.  I walked across that stage into a new way that I didn’t want yet; with all my heart I just wanted to stay where I was until I had fulfilled all of the goals that had suddenly become all too real and possible.  As the wheels of life kept turning, my heart was left behind; I was going to college, yes, but no one could have told me that.  Summer vacation came and went like it was shot out of a cannon – I’d say with supreme confidence that it was the fastest of my life.  All the emotional ups and downs were like chains; as the summer progressed, more and more of them were heaped upon my shoulders, leading to one of the more humbling experiences my 18 year-old life had seen.  I just couldn’t take it anymore; I broke down in front of my group of friends one night like I never had.  Crying was something I hadn’t used to deal with pain often.  I suppose the oppressing buildup of chest-tightening stress, mixed feelings, and the realization that I had to let go of everything finally resulted in a massive explosion of emotions that shot out of me in front of my brothers.  The vice grip I had so greatly loosened on my friends returned that night despite the Christ-like brotherly love they displayed.  They all gathered around and prayed for me – it hit me then that my friends were pretty great, but I didn’t let the emotional explosion alleviate my pain for long. 

            An explanation could not be found for my feelings once the packing for college started.  All I remember was that it was the middle of August 2010 and I was headed for the University of Arkansas.  A kind of cruise control for humans had taken me over – I was going through the motions necessary to get by, but I was upset to the point of blocking out all the nauseating feelings of emptiness.  Moving in day, however, is more to clear to me; I was sent careening into reality (a place that can be ever so cruel on a given day).  My mother says I looked like a ghost – pale, expressionless, and unable to respond.  To me, life was over, and the college thing could have only been a dream.  Yes, I was there with most of my best friends, but things just didn’t seem right.  The surreal sense given by stepping into a new walk of life is inexplicable; I was just waiting to wake up in my own bed and make the ten-minute drive to the school I had grown so close to. 

            As time crept slowly by, God wasn’t so cool to me anymore.  The cowardly, worrisome person I thought was gone began to reapply its poison, taking back a firm grip on my life’s reins.  I began to act as if God had abandoned me, forgetting all about Him who gave me new life free from a debilitating mental disorder.  Even the simplest of social interactions began to be filled with self-defeating thoughts and terrifying feelings of awkwardness as I tried to fight the battle of life completely on my own. 

This is astounding when I think on it now, but this whole time I had been taking the same medication – nothing should have been different regarding my levels of anxiety, but it was.  It was like God was trying to send me a message for the entirety of the first semester of college; that He was the cause for my recovery, and that I had thrown Him under the bus in return.  It was clear that I wasn’t going to win the battle for my mind on my own terms, but no one could have convinced me of it back then.  It wasn’t until a short time after the 5-week long Christmas break that I realized the giant steps I had taken backwards.  God and I had grown far apart over that four-month semester – not that I had let us get that close in the first place.

                                                             Grace and Peace,

                                                                                      J. S. Wade

There And Back Again: Part One

I thought a sneak peek into how this whole thing got cooked up was necessary.  This is one of those "If you didn't know" sort of things.  

       

       So, the moving out process is over and done with.  I’d say I am sitting pretty these days, gazing across the vast landscape of summer vacation and all the freedom it brings.  Family time is abundant, seeing old friends is prevalent, and most of all, time is laid out in front of me like a steak on a silver platter.  In this first week of my prolonged break, I’ve had a substantial amount of time to sit and think about the milestone chunk of road that is now behind me.  Questions concerning where I am now have been multiplying in my thoughts recently, especially the question of “How did I get here?”

       The beginning of high school is a complete blur nowadays; life was like landscape zooming by outside a train car window back then.  But what I realize now is that who I am was just a block of cold clay in those days, and the molding was only just getting started.  It was Freshman year of high school that my anxiety started clawing its way to power, seizing my identity and forcing its way to the center of my being.   I slowly reached the point of viewing everyone and everything around me through fear’s eyes instead of my own.  God’s help wasn’t even in consideration for candidates to pull me out of the hole I quickly found myself mired in.  He was just a distant entity then, a faint force in the sky that wouldn’t dare to waste His time on some kid and his personal issues. 

       Day by day, school became associated with dread that year.  I had already thrown away many parts of who I was up to that time – most significantly, my love for drama, music, and entertaining people that defined a solid chunk of my childhood.  Things that were unacceptable in the eyes of a mental disorder became my rules to live by.  I essentially became a zombie, or walking dead, as it was not the real me walking the halls of my school, but fear itself.  Life became merely playing host to anxiety that Satan only intensified, constantly reminding me of my position as a person – out of the way where no one would have to deal with me.  Prayers for the day (if any) consisted of begging God for the teacher not to call on me, that my hands would stop sweating, and that I could walk down the hall and not wonder what awful things people were thinking about me.  As high school raged on I would only drill deeper into the hole I had dug, further separating myself from most everyone, including the God that I hardly acknowledged anyway. 

       Today, one of my daily praises is for my immediate group of friends that kept me from losing complete control of myself back then.  My one form of security was in their hands – it felt like their friendship was the one thing I had going for me.  They are all probably unaware of this, but during that time I held onto them with a vice grip as if I was attempting to ice skate for the first time.  Their approval was my totem; the consistent symbol that I had not been completely rejected.  As I grew more and more dependent on those seven guys, those outside my circle of trust became my opposition.  A false perception quickly formed; one that had everyone I didn’t hang out with on a regular basis out to get me, as if their one goal was to leave me completely embarrassed and humiliated.

       Quite sadly, the day I realized the irrationality of all this didn’t come until the middle of my monumental senior year.  After the first semester had passed I was in a dark place, convinced it was depression that I had stumbled upon just a few years before.   Realizing that the “chapter ending” year was halfway over and that I had wasted it was hurtful.  College was looming just down the road and I hadn’t completed any of the goals I wanted to complete for my last year of high school.  For the first time in a long time I felt a fire deep down inside of me that was overwhelmingly clear – the desire to fight the fear that was ruining my life. 

       I decided to finally sit down with my mother and go over what had destroyed my spirit for so long.  For a while I thought all teenagers felt awkward and rejected like that; that it was just something all adolescents had to go through to be “mature.”  After hearing of the simple tasks that I saw as dreadful, my mother explained to me that it wasn’t something seen everyday.  I was dealing with something much more serious than teenage awkwardness, and that I couldn’t fight this battle on my own. 

       Thinking on the idea that something was wrong with me was degrading – I felt like a crazy person without any credibility.  I also found explaining my symptoms in detail to my doctor I had been seeing for a while particularly unsettling, but he agreed that I needed assistance.  He suggested a certain anti-depressant medication that would increase my level of serotonin, the neurotransmitter linked directly with feelings of well-being.  What is cool about the day that I sought help was that God was right there waiting to open the door to recovery the whole time.  It was like I was in a hall of mirrors, looking for a way out.  All I could see was myself in every direction; I had become obsessed with having pity on myself, and I didn’t realize that the only way to freedom was the one that didn’t revolve around me. 

       In just weeks time I felt like a new person.  God was good, people were good, and senior year was good.  Although I had been going to school with the same hundreds of kids for almost five years, it was like I was seeing them for the first time.  Every conversation was a monumental one, and every stroll down a hall full of kids was a new experience.  The world was different – a good different.  I made a great effort to get to know as many new people as I could in the time that I had left; I even forced myself to talk in front of the high school in our senior chapel about not letting fear hold you back (I was nauseas for three days before I spoke).  Everything was in perspective then, but what I didn’t know was that I had only won a battle that was part of a war.  I had scratched the surface for sure, but things went way deeper.

                                                                    Grace and Peace,

                                                                                             J. S. Wade

Vacation at the Sea of Good Intentions

         Any essence of giddiness or hope during the week of final exams can only be explained by the fast approaching summer vacation.  The warm light of freedom never fails to dissolve the dark shroud concentrated by countless hours of studying and staring blankly at computer screens.  I, for one, am already showing the negative signs of “hell week,” highlighted by blood-shot eyes, irritability, and the constant emitting of “glass half-empty” overtones.  Nothing could be more alleviating than the thought of summer – an always-distant entity that means nothing less than pure freedom among American adolescents.  The recurring problem seems to be the massive, brick wall labeled “Finishing Strong,” that hides the 3-month long vacation from our view.  The trying hurdles of this time of year, however, are not the point; what we do once we scale that brick wall is.

         At the threshold of summer, it always seems appropriate to throw around in our minds the endless possibilities available to us.  As schools close and swimming pools open, meaningless aspirations begin to pile up in my head – “getting ripped,” learning to play an instrument, finding a job, meeting new people, and countless other goals that I wish to fulfill.  It was not until just recently that I realized the triviality and mistake of making the focal point of summer none other than “me.”  In fact, it seems that I make every trip home revolve around me somehow.  Lengthy breaks from school typically start with vows to grow spiritually – I would know because of all the ones I’ve broken.  My dear friend (also like a big brother to me) reminded me of this just last week. 

         “What are your spiritual plans for the summer?” Hunter asked me along with a group of friends at a local coffee shop.  At this we proceeded to sound off individually, listing our strategies one by one for staying on track with the Good Lord over the long summer break.  To be honest I don’t remember how I answered the question; something related to reading the Word everyday and clinging to God while away from accountability – yes, something like that.  In the midst of contemplating the three months of possible spiritual growth ahead, I was unaware of the trap already waiting for me.  As I have done every year up to this point in my life, I was once again headed for a summer vacation at the Sea of Good Intentions – a quaint, self-efficient beach of complacency where just a few days of relaxation leads to miles and miles of drifting.  A promise to seek the Lord transforms into a sorry excuse as my old self greets me in the open water, no shore in sight.

         The provocative aspect of it all, is that summer is such a perfect time to be preparing ourselves for the spiritual battle that rages so heavily during the school year.  I needed my God last summer more than ever, but I chose to spend three months drifting into oblivion while worry and fear of college circled me like bloodthirsty sharks.  At the end of August, I landed on the shore of the University of Arkansas, so used to drifting that my “out to sea” mentality continued well into the first semester.  Again and again, I thank the almighty God for opening my eyes to Satan’s network of false prophets and lies; lies that molded me into a regular at the Sea of Good Intentions, where one day away from the word can lead to months as an ineffective Christian.  My Father has shown me that summer isn’t something to be feared, but something to be embraced.  Drifting out to open sea teeming with complacency can’t occur if I never set foot on the sand. 

         For this particular summer, I have already booked ten days to travel to Peru for missions, and I’m not stopping there.   This break looks clearer than it ever has to me, as I now realize that every day usually spent drifting further away from God can be a new opportunity to grow into the man He wants me to be.  Going home should be a prime chance to show my new identity found in Christ, not a chance to drift out to sea to meet my old one.  Now, it should be noted that I will be making a trip to the beach this year with my family, but the Sea of Good intentions isn’t the destination; God and I agreed that a summer long stay is much too expensive – We were thinking Gulf Shores was my best bet.

                                                                     Grace and Peace,

       

                                                                                          J. S. Wade