Women’s Sunday
January 16, 2005
Crystal Sullivan
Did you ever hear the Bobby McFerrin song Don’t Worry, Be Happy? It’s a catchy tune. Sounds easy enough but for some, worry can be paralyzing and almost impossible to turn off. I am one of those people.
Let’s rewind 30 something years. I come from a long line of worriers. I grew up in a small Italian community where gloom and doom were as plentiful as the meatballs. Now don’t get me wrong, I love my Italian heritage but there was a lot of drama around illness and death. I remember that even when things were well there existed this certainty that some impending catastrophe loomed overhead. And so I started to convince myself at the ripe old age of probably 6 or 7 that I was terminal. Congestive heart failure, inoperable brain tumor but most likely prostate cancer. I was very relieved to find out I didn’t have a prostate!
Fast forward around 10 years and I head off to college. I do something that anyone with an anxiety disorder probably shouldn’t do. I go into the medical field. One of the first books they give you is a Merck Manual, the medical professional’s ‘Bible.’In it every disease known to man is catalogued. Symptoms, treatment, prognosis- It’s all there. And so I spent the better half of my 20’s and 30’s self-diagnosing. Once I had exhausted all the physical ailments, I quickly moved through the psychological ones. The irony is that for every disease process, any healthy person at any given time will probably have one or two of the symptoms. But with each of my self-assigned diagnoses, I was certain I’d be dead soon. It actually got to be a joke to us. Kenny would come home from work, see the book open on the table, take a deep breath and say, “What is it today and how long do you have to live?” Well, the Merck Manual eventually went into the wood stove (my doing) and may I say that was the easiest five pounds I’ve ever lost and probably the only to keep off!
I can laugh about it now, but to the person who knows what it’s like to be pathologically anxious, it really is no laughing matter. It is estimated that 1 in 10 persons suffers from an anxiety related disorder (women more than men) and that three out of four prescriptions written are anxiety related. I could never take the drugs, although they had been prescribed. You see, all I needed to see was the list of four thousand potential side effects from the drugs and I knew I’d have every one of them. Poor Pfizer, I flushed a lot of Paxil.
Anxiety throughout most of my life was fairly manageable until somewhere in my late 20’s when it kicked into high gear and knocked the wind out of my sails for along time. But you’d never know it, because outward appearance to me meant everything. Smile though your heart is breaking. Isn’t that what I as a woman was supposed to do? A marriage, purchase of a new home, a job change, a career change, infertility and a major identity crisis were the perfect recipe for me for disaster. I started to view the world as a fearful place and decided my home was my only safe haven. I became a raging agoraphobic. A walk to the mailbox at one time was near impossible for me. And when we finally became parents, the fearful feelings intensified. I now had a daughter to protect from this scary, uncertain world. The unbelievable part in all of this is that it’s the same time I’m directing Cotton Patch Gospel. On the outside, I’m a strong and energetic leader but on the inside I’m simply crumbling. I was driven by the need to please and be liked by others. So for a long time, I suffered alone too ashamed to let anyone see me with my guard down.
Sound Depressing? You bet, but work with me there’s redemption in all of this! The reason I share this with you today is not to gain sympathy. I know that there are friends here today silently suffering and I want to help. Now back to the story………
Several years ago, my friend, Todd Lawson greeted me on a Sunday and said, “You’re not fooling me with that pasted on smile.” For several seconds, time stood still and the truth in his observation hit me like a Mack truck. Why was I so convinced that I had to put up this Donna Reed –Superwoman of the Year front? Why couldn’t I let others see my vulnerable and very fragile self who was screaming for attention? And then something else happened. One Sunday morning Alice Niemczyski shared with the church her personal struggles and I was so inspired by her courage that I started to open up more. And I started to identify and express what my needs and wants were after putting them on the back burner for so long. Strangely, I started getting calls from friends, family and acquaintances that were struggling with anxiety and boy would I give them an earful. It was in that sharing that healing took place. God’s hand had brought purpose to Alice’s suffering and now It was bringing meaning to mine.
2 underlying themes fueled anxiety for me: fear and shame. People with anxiety catastrophize. What if I lose control of myself? What if I have a week to live? What if I’m not good enough, smart enough, thin enough, wealthy enough, and on and on. We ‘What if” ourselves to death! Then there’s the shame and guilt. I should be a better wife, mother, daughter, homemaker, etc. These issues were brought to light for me through some personal counseling and a very helpful self-help program I had purchased from the Midwest Center for Stress and Anxiety. But, I have to say the single most important factor in my healing has been this church. I’m not the first to say this but quite honestly this church saved my life.
Here someone taught me to change my negative ‘what if’s’ to positive ones. Not “what if you fail” but “what if you succeed?” “What if you teach Sunday school? What if you direct a play? What if you start a folk group? Here someone believed in me and taught me to do the same. Here I was told for the first time (and have started to believe) that God loves me exactly as I am: flawed but beautiful! Here someone nurtured my creativity and encouraged me to use my talents to worship my Creator. Here someone shared their vulnerable self with me and let me do the same. Here I learned I didn’t have to solve everyone’s problems. I just needed to be there for them and I could share my vulnerable self as needed, too!
The best way to treat anxiety is to prevent it. Learn how to lighten up. Accept yourself ‘as is’ and honor your limitations. Share your story and your pain with others. Care for your body with good food, exercise and plenty of rest. Allow yourself time to pray and play and teach these strategies to your children. Anxiety left unchecked will fester and intensify. Anxiety addressed will abate. If you suffer from anxiety or depression, get some help, call a friend , a minister or me and rest in the knowledge that you aren’t alone in your discomfort.
So now I see myself a bit differently. I am gentler with myself, more compassionate with others and so less likely to judge. The nervous Nellie that gets under your skin, the seemingly arrogant friend who hides behind a wall of insecurity, the person who runs out of church five minutes early because they really just can’t tolerate being in a crowd for one minute longer and the poor, white-knuckled driver who hasn’t been behind the wheel in years and is coasting at 20 miles an hour in a 40 mile an hour zone. I feel their discomfort and exercise as much patience as I can muster with them. And I am careful to not envy anyone else in their life situation because let’s face it we all have our pain and our secrets. I remind myself I’m exactly where I need to be.
It may seem strange that I can sing and jump around up here as I do as uncomfortable as I often am but I have a little trick. When I am struggling, I envision Jesus in the balcony, my Audience of One, and I remind myself that my discomfort pales in comparison to the pain He endured for me. And that makes all the difference. And I have always been comforted by the knowledge that God didn’t cause this pain. Its just the way things are. I have trusted that God’s wisdom would bring meaning to this suffering. And it has over and over. There’s a song I miss so much from the traditional service. It is called It Is Well and for along time it was my mantra. And it got me through some pretty scary moments. I recently came across a contemporary arrangement of it and knew I needed to share it with you today. So I’d like to invite Branches up here to help me out and Chip is going to give a bit of history about it……..