I am having a hard day. I am overwhelmed with the thoughts of how inadequate and flawed I am. The negative thoughts screaming in my head are like a jackhammer pounding and tearing up concrete. My chest feels tight like I cannot get enough oxygen to breathe. The pain is sharp, the thoughts jagged against my brain and heavy within my heart. Although this is not the first time, and doubtful it will be my last, today I feel like I won't be able to withstand the agony.
So I started to pray. Out loud. Kadence is at school, so it's just me at home. With tears sliding down my cheeks, I plead for some relief, or an answer to what I could do to push back the unbearable depression that was pressing down all around me.
Please, Heavenly Father, please help me! I don't want to feel this way! Just please make it go away! I am so sad. And I am so tired of being sad. Please help me to know what I can do.
Prior to today I had been trying hard to make choices that would help me to be happy. In August I had been hospitalized for a couple of nights. I was having trouble breathing as well as some other health issues. After leaving the hospital, I felt strongly that I would feel better if I started going back to church. I had been prompted in the past to do this but because of feeling like I was not good enough, not "perfect" enough, that I had to be "better" BEFORE I could start going again, I shrugged the thought off. This time I didn't.
I contacted my bishop, Bishop Sefcik, to let him know I had recently moved from Utah. After getting the information of where and when the meetings were, I made sure that we started church that next Sunday. Kadence and I have been going every Sunday. We are in the Waukesha Ward in Wales, WI. We have been going 4 weeks so far and I am feeling much better. Happier. Even my sister Tanya commented that she has seen a difference in me.
So today I needed God's help. I wanted to know that he knew that I was trying to be a better person, even though I wasn't perfect. I needed to know that he heard me, that he was listening, and that even though I wasn't perfect, he would help me. See, for one reason or another, I struggle with believing he would want to help me. Me, an insignificant, ugly, fat loser. A nobody.
It is not that I don't believe he can. It is more like why would he even care about me? Especially with all the mistakes I make, over and over again? So even though I wanted and needed to know that he would take the time to answer me, or guide me, part of me wasn't sure if he would. Because I don't think I deserve it.
So after praying aloud for help, I had the thought to go into my scriptures, specifically the Book of Mormon. I opened them to a random spot, inside my head hoping to have some words speak to me. Something that would let me know he is aware of me and my struggles.
I turned to Moroni 9. I skimmed the left side of the page but so far nothing about it seemed to "speak" to me. Then I looked over to the right side and came to verse 25. It is Mormon writing to his son Moroni, but I felt that Heavenly Father was saying these words to me:
"My [daughter], be faithful in Christ; ..... may Christ lift thee up, and may his sufferings and death, and the showing his body unto our fathers, and his mercy and long-suffering, and the hope of his glory and of eternal life, rest in your mind forever."
Off to side in the margin I have written and highlighted in red, see Mormon 8 for pattern. I then went to that chapter. At the top of the page I have written and highlighted in red, with stars on either side, Pattern for Fighting Depression.
As soon as I read that I started to cry. I felt like Heavenly Father was saying "I am aware of your struggle. I know you are having a hard time right now. I hear you. I love you."
I, of course, read the pattern, but even if I had not read further, I felt that my heavy heart and struggle of depression had been lightened at that moment. Just knowing that God heard and answered my thoughts and prayer made me sincerely happy and thankful. I am grateful to know that he knows me as an individual. This experience is extremely special and has reminded me that, even though I still have my struggle with depression and other difficulties, as long as I turn to Heavenly Father for help, I will get through it. He has proven to me, again, that he is there for me and always will be.
