change

A Life Turned Upside Down – Part Two

/ Nicole Bartell / Leave a comment

Coming home from the hospital was overwhelming. I was still in a whole lot of pain and needed precise medication dosing. I slipped pretty hard in my codependency recovery during this season. It was just so much easier to become passive and let others take care of me when I was in the hospital. When I got home, though, reality sank in. My illusion of safety in my life had been shattered, and I was terrified all the time. I didn’t like to leave my house at all, but even at home I faced the fear of someone coming in and attacking. I don’t think I had ever been this aware of my own mortality. One of my ways of dealing with my lack of control in my life was to try to hyper control everything and everyone else. I fanatically managed my own medication schedule and really wouldn’t allow my husband to help me, even though he was willing. I became very particular about how I wanted things. I only have vague memories from this period, but I am certain I was a bear to live with.

I turned 50 three weeks after I came home, and I was very disappointed that I couldn’t have the ’80s party I had envisioned. I was cleared to eat a soft (read: pureed) diet on my actual birthday and so my husband and friends planned a small get-together for me on the Saturday I had originally planned to hold my party. It was another example to me of Dad’s love through others, and I was struck again by how these people He had put in my life cared for me. And the blessing of actually being able to eat a little bit instead of taking nourishment through a PEG tube was amazing, even if it did have the consistency of baby food.

I found great comfort during that season just sitting on my front porch. I would sit there and listen to the breeze and the birds and pretend that Jesus was sitting in the chair next to me. And I would talk to Him. A lot. Out loud. I think I grew even closer to Him as I began to process my terror of life outside my haven, and the fact that I did not recognize the face I saw in the mirror. At the same time, Scriptures kept coming to mind about how I was supposed to rejoice in everything and give thanks. The one that really hammered home a lot was Hebrews 12:2 (CSB): “…for the joy that lay before Him, He endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” I agonized over these verses because I knew I was not rejoicing or being thankful. One morning, I poured out my heart to Him because I could tell that the old fear of not measuring up and being rejected by Him for being disobedient was rising in me again. He showed me the Garden of Gethsemane, and Jesus crying out there before He went to the cross. And Dad asked me, “Do you think He was rejoicing then?” Having that visual and recognizing that Jesus also wrestled over doing Dad’s will renewed my hope. It showed me that it is okay to wrestle with Dad. He welcomes my wrestling. If I am wrestling with Him, then I am not giving up. My faith was strengthened and settled in my relationship and security with Him again.

Until March. I had been struggling with a persistent infection for a number of months. I was receiving hyperbaric oxygen therapy in the hopes that it would heal the infection, but by late March it was clear that it had not accomplished what my surgeon had hoped, and I was looking at another surgery. It was also becoming apparent that my initial custom-made hardware had failed on one side so I was going to need either an internal replacement or an external one. I burst into tears when she told me. I already felt so uncomfortable in my own body. The idea of having an external frame outside my jaw to hold it in place was so devastating. I had also learned a bit more about the details of what happened the day I was shot, and I was suddenly hit with this internal question: was this allowance or causation? Did Dad ALLOW this to happen to me or was I CHOSEN for it? I was the only other person hit besides the original target, and I realized later, from reading the report and doing some deductive reasoning, that I was actually hit by the first bullet. This threw me into a tailspin. There were a lot of other people around that day. Why was I the one shot? I was back to wrestling.

Here is where I am very glad for recovery. I am glad that recovery has taught me that it is okay to be angry at Dad. He is big enough to take it. And He wants honesty most between us. No one else could answer this question for me, so I went to the only One who could. No answer. That hurt. I was hoping for an easy answer. Years ago, when processing through my sexual abuse as a child, it was so healing for me when He told me that He gave us free will, and He wouldn’t violate my abuser’s will any more than He would violate mine. But He did show me all the ways that He showed up and provided for me in that season, even though I didn’t know Him yet. I was asking the same here…tell me something that will make this easier to understand and accept.

Crickets.

It was really the first time since all this happened that Dad went silent. And here I was again, wrestling. I reached out to the therapist I had been seeing before all this and made an appointment. I was angry that this was my lot. I was angry that my face had been irrevocably changed. I was angry that all the work I had done to learn to love myself was for nothing because now I didn’t even feel like me anymore. I was furious. This wasn’t fair. And here I was, facing another major surgery when I had JUST gotten to the point where I could do normal things again like sleep on my right side and chew actual food. This would put me right back to the beginning again, and I was not happy. My therapist encouraged me to create a “Book of Remembrance”: a single place where I could record everything Dad has ever told me, taught me, provided for me, and all the ways He has shown up for me-a record of Dad’s faithfulness TO ME in the past so that I don’t have to go digging through years of journals to find it. I did NOT want to do this exercise. I wanted to be angry. I wanted Him to know I felt this was very unfair. And then memories started flooding in of other times I had felt similarly and Dad came through. Not on my schedule, but He always delivered. It didn’t always look like what I wanted or expected, but it always ended up being better.

The more I wrote, the more I realized it didn’t really matter which it was. I am following Jesus to the Celestial City, and whatever difficulties and hardships I bear along the way in this life are opportunities for me to see Him better, to know His love more deeply, and to be able to share with others what He has done in my life because the hardships and struggles have never been the end of the story. The end of the story is that I am His and He is mine and nothing and no one in this life can ever take that away. I say with Simon Peter, “Lord, to whom will we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and KNOW that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6: 68-69 CSB; emphasis mine). He is my Rock. My refuge. My Safety and Security. When everything else gives way, He is the One to whom I run and find shelter and rest.

Charlie was really happy I was home.
A little hint about what is to come.

Is Change a Bad Word?

/ Nicole Bartell / 1 Comment

In 2011, my word for that year was “change”. I can still remember driving to work that January morning, talking to Father about what word He would give me to represent the coming year and hearing that word spoken to my heart. I was NOT happy! Firstly, I felt that I had already gone through a great deal of hard, life-altering changes the previous couple of years, and I dreaded there being more. I avoided, as much as possible at that point in my life, the pain of living in reality. I was still in so much denial, and I truly wanted to escape the reality of my situation, frequently at any cost. The desire to avoid reality drove me back to the past hang-ups and habits of control, food, and pornography in an attempt to shove the pain back into a box where I didn’t have to deal with it. Later that year, something happened that changed our family drastically. I couldn’t escape it. The burnt husk of what remained was a constant reminder that my life had altered. I was also trying to help an eight year old figure out how to navigate this new reality. This was the catalyst that drove me to take my very first steps toward recovery. I sought help. I began to see the high, impenetrable wall I had built around my heart to keep people out and to keep me safe from harm. I also began to realize that the wall I had erected for my protection also locked in all my pain and darkness, and that I wasn’t allowing the Healer to access any of it so I was stuck with it. Opening the gate allowed Jesus and His light in, but it also let all that pain I had barricaded within begin to pour out. I was overwhelmed. It was hard for me to cling to the Scripture Father had given me that year to go with the dreaded word “change”:

“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.“ Isaiah 43:2 NIV

It felt exactly like a flood, and I was certain I would drown. At that time, I was trying to work through it on my own. My counselor had moved, and in my codependency I didn’t want to burden anyone else with my problems. The darkness was so great during this time that I often contemplated suicide, just so the pain would end. I couldn’t seem to stuff it back down. It demanded to finally be acknowledged. I made the choice to go on anti-depressants because I didn’t want to leave my still young child. The pills took the edge off, enough that I could somewhat function, but I was still in a lot of emotional agony, so my acting out increased in an attempt to shove it all back down. That continued for the next few years until Father finally led me to Celebrate Recovery where I learned that I didn’t need to go through it alone, but that the only way I could truly be free of it was to to walk through it.

I could not have imagined back in 2011 all the changes that lay before me. However, change became a little less scary over time. As I learned to accept the things I couldn’t change and sought courage to change what I could (me), and as I learned to stay in the moment, one day at a time, “change” became easier to bear. I’m no longer dealing with it on my own. Besides my sponsor, mentors, and a supportive accountability team, recovery brought another change in my life. I became even closer to my Father. He began to show me what a good and perfect Dad looked like, and I learned I could trust where He led. Psalm 27:10 (LB) says, “Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close.” I came to experience just how true that is. 

That being said, my initial reaction to change on the horizon is still fear. Change isn’t bad, not if I am following my heavenly Dad, but it still means some discomfort. Change fundamentally means that things will be different, whether it be in circumstances, people, or even me. But growth means change, and I want to continue to grow in recovery, in my relationships with God, myself, and others, and in my awareness of my calling. I’ve heard many times that if you pray for patience, God will put you in situations where you get to practice it. I’m finding that to be true about a lot of things. If I want to grow, He is going to allow my faith and my recovery to be stretched so that I can begin to practice, growing organically into this new area. I think back on my son learning to do new things: walking, math, reading (which as a dyslexic was especially difficult for him). Each of those things presented him with a new and often uncomfortable challenge. As his parent, it was my job to support and encourage him to keep practicing, knowing that as he practiced, he would get better until he could do it well. I didn’t berate him every time he failed. I realized he was still learning. When he mastered one thing, the next challenge would come: from walking to running to riding a bike, from addition to multiplication to algebra, from phonics (which he struggled with) to trying multiple new things until we finally figured out he needed to read and hear it at the same time, and the even harder things of life such as learning to heal and trust again after being hurt and abandoned. Father used this picture to show me how He wanted to love and support and encourage me through the scary transitions I’m still making toward growth in this life. He’s my Good Dad, encouraging me to get back up and try again. The question was asked in my Bible study this morning, “What changes, if any, are you sensing the Lord leading you toward?” (Lysa TerKeurst, Good Boundaries and Goodbyes). In pondering that question and feeling a little overwhelmed by the answer, this post is what came out as I was journaling. And this is why I record spiritual markers, “stones of remembrance”, to help me to recall Father’s faithfulness in the past to give me courage and strengthen my faith in the present to take the next step moving into my future … whatever changes it may hold.

Transitions

/ Nicole Bartell / Leave a comment

Transition: (noun)

  1. a) a change or shift from one state, subject, place, etc. to another
  1. b) a period or phase in which such a change or shift is happening

Change is inevitable. Everything changes. Some changes are easier to weather than others. We change when we age but most years just blend one into another. There are only a few that are truly significant and impact our lives in important ways. Change is a constant fact of life. If we aren’t changing, we aren’t growing, and if we aren’t growing, we’re dying.

The process of change is the difficult part. It isn’t a quick progression from point A to point B. That transition period is affected by many factors. How easily I embrace the process. How quickly I am willing to trust that this season of change is for my good. I have been finding my ability to do both of those to be easier the past few years, which speaks tremendously to the work I’ve done in learning how to trust Father in small things so that the big things become less daunting. However, I still have not reached the point where I don’t initially balk at the prospect. He knows me. And I can’t count the number of times He has graciously given me a heads up about change coming so that I would be prepared when I stared it in the face. I wish I could say that I embraced those warnings and bravely launched into the transition. That would be a lie. I still balk when it is before me, just for a (slightly) shorter time than I once did.

When my boy was 16, Father spoke to my heart and told me it was time to begin transitioning from parent/teacher to counselor/advisor. I needed to let him start making some of his own, more serious, decisions and allow him to do so while still safe under our care. As a codependent, that was hard enough, but I did recognize from my own experience how important it was for him to have the freedom to make mistakes while he was still within the shelter of home. With a plan in place of how I would manage this, I proceeded to do exactly that. I stepped back and let him begin to make big decisions. If he asked for my advice (and even sometimes when he didn’t), I would give it, but other than that, I was learning to let him be responsible for himself. That was especially hardest to do when I knew his decision would cause him pain, but I also knew my head-strong boy needed to learn some lessons on his own. This was the hardest when it came to letting him learn the hard way about not taking his anti-seizure meds. It took a few years, and a couple of seizures, for him to learn those lessons but learn them he did. In our state, the law is that an epileptic must be seizure-free for an entire year before they can get their driver’s license. That year was over the end of 2022, and after jumping through some bureaucratic hoops, he finally got his license last week. I am simultaneously thrilled and terrified by this prospect. I am so happy he will finally be able to experience some of the freedom and independence he has longed for (for three years longer than his peers). He has gained a great deal of wisdom, and he has some very wise people speaking into his life, so I am not overly concerned about really bad decisions being made. My main concern will always be the specter of epilepsy. This is the hardest to let go of. Will he remember to take his medicine? What if he has a seizure, and I’m not there? What if he has a seizure while driving? So many things I cannot control. Things I have already been letting him manage for quite some time, but it was easier to do that when I was his sole source of transportation. Even when he was with his friends, they knew and were extra cautious. Now, it is time to cut the strings and let my baby fly. And though I have been preparing for this season for almost four years, now that it is here, I am having a really hard time just letting go. I know what this means. I know the changes that are immediately before my family. He will get a job. Eventually, he will move out. And I know these are all good things and necessary for HIS continued growth (and mine, I know). But I’m struggling with the fact that this will change our family dynamic. He won’t be there at home with me for much longer. With very brief exceptions, he has been with me every day for the last almost 20 years. Soon, all those things I’ve been so used to, that time I was able to spend with him, will fade as he pursues the future Father has for him. And I know this is good, and I am thankful he has such a good relationship with the One who made him. At the same time, I am left trying to figure out what this means for me moving forward.

Which brings me to the next big change. I have spent the past few years preparing for this time. I’ve learned to pursue my own interests and have sought the path Father has laid before me. I’ve had some stops and starts along the way. Fear of failure is a beast to overcome. But He has been patient with me and has lovingly pushed me to take small steps of faith, one at a time. My first sponsor once told me that it is normal to be afraid to embark on something new, but that the more I grow in competence, the more I will grow in confidence. I have found this to be a true statement. I am still overcoming the damaging core beliefs of unworthiness and incapability, and most things I’m faced with trying, those are the leading beliefs, and I have to allow Father to talk me through each one, to speak truth to me in the moment so that I can keep replacing those lies I’ve believed with TRUTH. Unlearning is probably the hardest part of recovery, and I have a lot to relearn. He led me to take a step of faith in accepting a position with more responsibility than I have ever had before. I confess, I am terrified of messing up, of failing at this. I recognize that it is a great opportunity to learn more in preparation for the next big change coming later this year, and I also know I’m not alone. There are others I can rely on and turn to for help. And I am thankful, both for the opportunity to learn and also for the faith others have put in me. It’s just a lot of change all at once.

Maya Angelou once said, “We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.” I think of the caterpillar, ensconced in its cocoon, its body dissolving into slime and wonder that somehow, that formless goo comes back together to become something truly beautiful. I guess I feel like I’m in the cocoon again. I wonder if the caterpillar knows what it will become? I am so thankful that the One who designed it to form that chrysalis knew exactly what that larva was destined to become and built into it the insatiable desire to fulfill its destiny. No fear of change for the butterfly. I seek to trust the One who created me for a unique purpose, one that He alone sees, and continue to work on surrendering completely to that vision.