Too Much?

It's kind of like drowning.

Your mind is racing, thoughts flying around wildly as you struggle to catch your breath. Nothing makes sense and the thoughts won't stay in place long enough for you to process them; they are scrambled blurs of pictures and sounds. You try to focus on breathing but your thoughts distract you and you forget. While your mind has shifted into overdrive, everything around you has slowed significantly. Or is it the other way around? You aren't sure. You can't tell which way is up, or if up is really down. You will realize you are crying when you feel the tears on your face, no sooner. They actually surprise you because you aren't sure why exactly you are shedding tears. Your mind will flail about frantically, but eventually you resurface and things are okay again.

It's called a panic attack...although I don't think its name gives this occurrence due justice. If it were my decision it would be called a holy-shit-I-think-I'm-dying attack. Or something like that.

I didn't really start having these overwhelming bouts of anxiety until a few weeks ago, while I was working as a counselor at a large summer camp. I'd been there for a couple weeks--I worked for a total of six, so I still had about three and a half to go-- when I started to just kind of...fall apart. It was a rough summer, the most strenuous I've had yet, and with everything that happened combined with the fact that I would be leaving for college two weeks after I returned home from camp, I think it became too much.

I came to that realization earlier today as I was lying on the floor of my dorm room in the midst of a panic attack. Only two words were clear in my mind at that moment...

Too much.

Which, when I'm thinking clearly is a huge conflict, because Jesus says He won't ever give us more than we can handle. So why am I having these ridiculous attacks that make me feel certain I am having some sort of breakdown? At first I saw two options. One, Jesus lied. Two, This is not, in fact, too much for me to handle. The former is beyond absurd; it's impossible. So that left me with option number two. But then it hit me--there is a THIRD option.

Perhaps this IS too much for me to handle...alone. But Christ says that we're never alone. He had Himself nailed to that cross so that I wouldn't have to carry my cross all by myself. That's what the Body of Christ is for. And here I am walking around like an idiot assuming that I am somehow an exception to that; that somehow I'M strong enough to do this completely by myself. I've lived in that illusion for about 18 years now.

God sent me a friend while I was at camp. Funny story, actually. I fainted a little over a week into the first session--it was REALLY hot, and my body decided it had had enough for the moment-- and she was the nurse who took my blood pressure upon waking up (I don't remember any of that, but she says she was there, so I'm going with it). Anyway, she loves Jesus with a sweet and genuine heart and I was lucky enough to be taken under her wing. She loved on me and continues to do so in a way that I've never experienced before.

And yet I continuously refuse to allow her to do so. But--I promise--I don't do it on purpose. It's just that...she tells me things that I've never heard before, that I have an incredibly difficult time comprehending. It's not that I don't want the love she so willingly gives or the Truth that she is constantly reminding me of. I do. I want it. I need it. I crave it. And it scares the shit out of me. I'm afraid that if I let someone in, if I open myself up, I'll only end up heartbroken. But I know that Jesus sent me my friend with a purpose because I feel safe with her. Her presence is comforting to me. I tell her she makes me sleepy because when I'm around her I'm able to completely relax, I'm comfortable, I'm...safe.

My prayer is that Jesus will soften my heart and allow me to share it with my friend so that she can help me carry the hurt and the pain that is starting to consume me entirely. She insists that she WANTS to, so I need to start believing her. I need to let Jesus love me and start to heal me through her. The question now is...how? How do I reverse a mindset that I've had since I was a little girl?

Christ has the answer, and I pray that I remember to trust in the fact that He knows what He's doing, and that my life is not only in His hands, but that He cherishes me as his own. His daughter. His beloved. I think that's the start. Where the healing begins.

"For I will restore health to you and heal you of your wounds," says the Lord. (Jeremiah 30:17)