Man, I’m really good at keeping up with this blogging stuff, right? If you’re just tuning in or have stumbled across this mess that is my blog, let me go ahead and spill the beans on the recipe behind every post. You can skip ahead, or probably just swap over to something more entertaining if it doesn’t suit your taste. I recommend dog videos or those funny cartoons that are popping up all over instagram.

A Lacy Blog Post = Self-deprecating humor + too much honesty + slivers of emotional realization

Lacy Llana, This Blog, 4-25-2019

Really folks, I need to get better about keeping up with this. It is good for me, and when I put it off until enough junk builds up that I want to blog, it all comes out in an explosion like this one. Now, onto the “too much honesty” portion of today’s piece. In my last post I talked a bit about how my counselor has identified my tendency to compartmentalize emotions to the point that they just become facts. She’s been working with me on this, because apparently when you numb yourself to the bad sometimes you numb yourself to the good too, which was the root of why I started visiting her in the first place. When the divorce happened, I tried to cling to the thing I knew would never leave me – my faith in God. I say tried, not because my faith is gone, but because I look back on that time period as one of the most humbling experiences of my life, because I was not as strong as I once thought I was. And I’m thankful that while I may have had my stumbling blocks (more like epic faceplant blocks but I digress), God was still faithful and picked me back up. But in that time, and even leading up to the straw that broke the camel’s back and then started a dumpster fire in the middle of the camel’s life with a hidden alcohol problem and an affair, I really struggled to connect emotionally to my faith. It wasn’t God – let me get that one right out of the way. He was still there, working, moving, and I watched Him use me in ways that I know only he could orchestrate because I felt nothing but empty. The joy that fueled my fire at my core was cold. It would spark up in brief, fleeting moments, only to be replaced with nothingness. On the counsel of good friends, and a boyfriend who is too patient and understanding for me, I sought out a faith based counselor to help with this. I know I’ve talked about this in the last two posts, but the context was always brief and victorious. It was “I’m seeking help” and “hey, I’m letting myself experience the emotions I was bottling up and that’s great”. In fact, an exact quote from my blog a month ago said:

These feelings demand to be felt and recognizing them, learning from them, and not locking them away is part of healthy healing.

Cool. I did it. Winning at therapy. What next?
Skeletons but also some good things too, Lacy Llana – An optimistic, proud fool

So I was feeling better about my emotional processing capabilities. Really, I was. And the majority of this is positive growth, I swear. Fast forward to Good Friday. I’m between churches right now and the search has been a struggle that honestly warrants another separate blog post but one baby step at a time on the regular blogging ambitions. TLDR, without any other details to read, this was my first Easter that I would be spending since getting saved without a church home. I was feeling pretty bummed about that, when my mom shared out this video:

And for the first time in a long time, I cried big, ugly, chunky tears as I both grieved and rejoiced the sacrifice of my Savior. I was so glad to experience that emotion again, that even in the midst of discovering that the mascara I had ordered from Amazon was not my usual waterproof formula (hello, Joker), I chose to listen to my worship playlist on my way to counseling that afternoon. This may not seem like a big deal, but let me give you some context. I used to lead worship with my ex-husband. I would spend hours listening to him practice in our office, or working with him on a song I was going to sing. So immediately after the split, all of a sudden worship songs that I once loved were painful to listen to, because all I could hear was his voice. The choice to put that playlist on didn’t come easily, but I felt such joy after watching that video that I wanted to continue my worship and hold onto that connection I was experiencing yet again. Of course, a few songs in my mood took a nosedive when one of those songs came on and I was smacked in the face with a vivid memory of us singing it together. So I spent the drive tearing up, trying to keep my weaksauce mascara where it belonged, and by the end of that drive I was just angry. I was angry at my ex, yet again. I wanted to write to him again, but this time it will just be this mini rant, because he doesn’t deserve that much of my energy anymore:

You stole more from me than you thought you did. You may have been aware that you stole my plans for our future, and ran off to give them to someone else. I’m sure you know that you took 5 years of my love, energy, and so much emotion that I was left broken when you gave up. I’m getting past those things that I have lost, but what makes my blood boil the most is that you marred the way I worship. Songs I hold dear are tainted with your voice singing in the back of my mind. How He Loves, Christ is Risen, 10,000 Reasons – they all echo with whispers of you and in my moments where I should be vulnerable with my God, instead my energy turns to putting up those emotional walls so my stomach doesn’t turn when I think of how little I meant to you and how much of a fool I was.

After that I made it to my counselor’s couch, and cried big ugly Joker tears while saying “I accidentally got mascara that isn’t waterproof.” Still working through that mess, but Easter was good. I visited a church, spent time with family and friends, and was thankful for salvation in the midst of my mess, because if I didn’t have that hope to rely on at the end of the day, I don’t think I would still be spending my evenings writing this blog. If you’ve read this far, congrats! You made it through my ramblings. You must either be one of the few good friends I’ve shared this link with, or a nosy Googler if my past experience is valid. Either way, I appreciate you taking the time to catch up on my life. I could end this post by saying something along the lines of “I hope this helps someone eventually”, but I can’t say that I actually think it will. It would certainly be a pleasant byproduct, but I’m writing for me, because while I don’t feel warranted to give expert advice to anyone, it has certainly been an encouragement to look back at my posts from a year ago and see just how far I’ve come. So there’s my unsolicited advice. Express your feelings, don’t feel shame in finding someone with expertise to talk to, and like the quote on my chalkboard says:

Do not let your happiness depend on something you may lose.

C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves…?

OH SNAP Y’ALL. I thought I was going to end it there in full transparency, because I like to give specifics citations to quotes that are actually real and not some goof I’m doing because I like the new WordPress formatting, I started digging around the interwebs and that C.S. Lewis quote is SUPER out of context. It was actually him summarizing a point St. Augustine was making in Confessions, and criticizing the idea that if you never open yourself to truly love those around you by not giving your heart to any but God, you are living a life of seclusion and safety that doesn’t represent what we are called to do as followers of Christ. So instead, I’m just going to end here with my mind-blowing realization that Lewis’ assertion was very much so a gut punch I needed to hear. And now I know my chalkboard is wrong…what a day.