Christmas Eve.

I keep thinking back to last year, after the candlelight service at church, I was sitting downstairs watching some Christmas special with my family, writing a post reflecting on all of the growth that had taken place in my life that year.  I wrote about being recovered, feeling valued and beautiful and loved and worthy.  I wrote about being more than my past, about never being alone, about hope and healing.  I wrote about my complete faith in an all-powerful, healing, restoring God.

Christmas 2012 I was in a very different place than I was Christmas 2011.

And Christmas 2013 is no different. 

Tonight, I sit alone in my room, thinking.

Thinking about how my life has changed in the past year and has put me in a position that I never once thought that I would be in.  I dropped out of my first semester of my second year at college because I had a major relapse with my eating disorder, depression, and anxiety.  I took medical withdrawals from all but one course, in which I’m taking an incomplete and hope to finish up soon.  I’m taking the entire spring semester off from school.  I’m spending at least four hours a day in different kinds of therapy groups, with different psychologists and psychiatrists and doctors and nutritionists, trying to learn how to completely accept and manage life with an eating disorder, with depression, and with anxiety, trying to learn how to manage my life with this illness.

I never once thought that my life would go back to this, not even all those days I spent in treatment in high school, when I was so excited to go to college so that I could fully engage in my disorder and no one would notice.  I never once thought that things could get this bad again. I never once thought I would be in very intensive treatment again.

I never once thought that my life would do a complete 180 on me. But it has and that’s something that I’m just going to have to accept because even though I think that I've convinced myself that I've accepted this situation, I reach a moment where I get really pissed off about having been given these genes with this temperament and these personality traits and having been dealt this environment.  And then I’m back at square one, trying to accept it all just one more time.

But it’s never just one more time.

Looking back on my post from last Christmas, I can’t help but be a bit judgmental about where I am now and thinking that I’m in a worse place now than I was then.

This Christmas Eve, I’m not thankful. I’m not filled with joy and hope and strength.  I’m not feeling encouraged or blessed.  This Christmas Eve, I am filled with anger and bitterness and resentment.  I’m filled with depression and loneliness and insecurity. I’m filled with anxiety and distress and worry.  I’m filled with shame and guilt and regret.  

I’m filled with questions like “Why me?” and “Will this ever be over?” and “Will I ever feel and live a ‘normal’ life?” I’m questioning what my next steps are, where I stand with my relationships with everyone in my life, and how my faith fits into this.  I’m filled with questions about what my life will look like next Christmas and the one after that.

And something that I've learned in the past five weeks of treatment is that all of this is okay. Having questions and doubts and emotions—it’s all okay. Even during Christmas, when the expectation is joy and peace and contentment. My emotions are real and I am allowed to feel them, even now. Even at Christmas.

I guess what I’m trying to get at is that things change. People change. Lives change. And things don’t always go how you expect them to go. You don’t always end up where you want to in life. Sometimes the unexpected is exactly what happens and sometimes you take a giant leap backwards.

All of that is okay.

It’s life. And life doesn't stop for anyone.

Not even at Christmas. 

Christmas Eve Musings.

For me, Christmas has always been a time to think and reflect on the past year...the good, the bad, the ugly. It gives me an opportunity to see how I've changed and grown because of it. And this year is no different. It's brought it's changes--senior year, ED treatment, heartbreak, graduation, camp, and Gettysburg. It's definitely lots to process.

I was cleaning my room this past week, and I stumbled upon my old journal. The last time that I wrote in it was Christmas 2011. This is a poem that I wrote on that Christmas Eve:

Emptyness and saddness, 
Lonliness and numbness, 
Christmas Eve. 

No hope, only pain. 
Blood. 
Streams of red from 
Pale white. 

We'll be okay. 
You're eating. 

Craziness exits, 
Just behind you. 
It lives here, 
In my head, 
Haunting me. 

Blood. 
Let me die. 

I read that and my heart just hearts. It breaks for the girl that I used to be, the pain that I used to feel. I cannot help but thank God for all that He has done in my life over the past year. The blessings He's given me, although I never really saw them as blessings at the time. I graduated Lake High School in June 3rd in my class. I am a recovering anorexic who can eat three meals a day and be okay with it. I am no longer suicidal and I can laugh and smile again.

I am alive. 

I cannot help but cry tonight because of this. Because God saw me, a broken, hurting girl, and He cared enough to send His son to die for me. And what's more, He wrapped me in His arms and love and He took His broken daughter and began to heal her. He told me that I am beautiful. That I have value. That I have always been worthy of love.

I still struggle, almost daily, with my past and depression, but tonight, on Christmas Eve, I know that I have hope. I know that I am loved. I know that my life is going to be important to someone.

I am more than my past.

To all of you who have walked beside me in this past year, thank you, from the bottom of my heart. I am so blessed to know you, for however long I may have.

To all of you who are struggling, always remember that you are never alone. There is hope. There is healing. And you are loved more than you know.

Mostly importantly, to Jesus, my Savior, thank you.

Merry Christmas!