I am fearful

Here is how things really are.  

I am fearful for the future.  

I haven't been able to pay all my bills on my own for months and even years, especially since my marriage. The church has had to help and so has my mom.  I'm on food stamps which is a blessing and live in low income housing. 

I was diagnosed with  1. Major depressive disorder (moderate).  (not a surprise!)  

I'm going through Vocational Rehabilitation, a state program to help me get a better job.  I could of picked going to school, but that caused me a lot of stress and tons of tears.  In 12 days I cried 10 of them. Not good odds. I was fearful of that too.  Picking the right thing, being successful, getting a job afterwords, going into more debt to do it when I'm trying to get out of debt.  So I picked having them help me find a job, but I"m fearful with that too. I worry about shooting too high or too low.  I worry about getting a job and quitting the one I have now and then needed to go back to subbing but them not letting me.  See I was nearly let go from that job last spring.  What if the new job doesn't work out?  What if I go through burn out as I have in the past and need to change jobs again. What if? What if? What if?

How will I support myself for the rest of my life?  Mom will not always be there with money.  I don't have health benefits and what if my health goes bad?  What if I need to get another car and can't afford it?  More what if's  I'm sure I'm missing some more I haven't even thought of. 

I need someone to tell me It's all going to work out, that Heavenly Father has a plan, that somehow, some way things will get better.  

I used to travel.  I used to have hope for the future.  I used to enjoy life.  But the reality of just making it, just holding on financially and otherwise for the rest of my life and not really enjoying it looks like what the future holds for me. I don't think I'll be getting married any time soon. I used to have so many blessings that said I would. But now that doesn't happen in blessings anymore. There is no one here in Twin and I've gained weight and my hair is short and that's just the physical stuff, not the diagnosis's.

How does one be happy with all that now and in the future? Acceptance?  But acceptance isn't happiness.  It's being resigned to my lot in life. 

Maybe I could get on disability income and still work some hours and that would pay the bills.  That needs to be my plan B and that is up in the air and uncertain too. It also means low income housing and foods stamps for the rest of my life. 

But I keep on keeping on, only I cry more.  I teach primary.  I go to work.  I go to social things, but am I happy?  NO. This diagnosis has taken the life out of me. 

One of the most difficult things is that I have no one to share my feelings with that validate me.  That have known me for more than 2 years here in Twin.  No one that knows what I used to be like. That knows more than just my disabilities. No one that I can really just sob to and get it all out and have them do and say the things I need to hear that are correct too.  I know some will say some things but it won't be helpful. There are people whose advice I don't trust. 

Another difficult things is no one to give me a blessing- that has the spirit of prophecy like I had in Brother Thompson. 

The whole thing is just awful and so not about Jason anymore although at times things from the past will pop up; Jason, the Twitchell's and family members who have hurt me. 

But there.  I got it all down and hardly any one will read it, comment or care- especially my family. 

Softball and Being Real

Thursday in PE the kids were playing a sort of baseball game in the gym.  I flashed back to being a young teen maybe 14 or 15 and playing softball with Brother Bardsley as the coach.   Two memories: One of him taking me behind the scenes of everything else and standing just feet from me, throwing me the ball, helping me to catch and throw correctly.  He'd move back and back and and we'd keep throwing to each other.  That is the man who taught me to throw a ball. 

Then there was the time that I lost the game for us.  I was up to bat and still sucked at it.  I don't know if I ever got good.  But there was a lot of pressure from both teams of what to do.  To swing or  not to swing. Both teams were yelling at me.  Voices coming from every where of what to do. And who did I listen to?  Not my team, not my friends, not my coach.  I listened to the opposing team.  I listened in essence to the enemies.  I realized Thursday what that means. I didn't trust those people who had me in their care.  I don't think it was "them", (the people on my team that I didn't trust), but the main adults in my life.  I'll leave it at that for the reader to figure it out.  

Or maybe I was just stupid.  Just not mature enough intellectually yet, or maybe both?  But that is how it's been really.  I've been afraid to trust God, because of what he would or would not give me.  I got over that pre-marriage, but I'm trying to figure it out now, not knowing what words, what blessings,  what promises to still put trust in or what to ignore and lay aside.  Lay it aside because I screwed up and screwed up badly, altering the course of my life.

It's sad really to be at this place at 40.  But all I can do is to keep on keeping on and work on getting out of this mess that has me crying at strange times due to strange memories, because I can't compartmentalize. It's all related, all tied together.  What's happening now, with what happened at 15.  I just want it to go away.  To be saved from this all.  But even the financial salvation would still leave me with me and he questions of WHO am I? and What is my life's mission?  Am I a failure?  A looser?  If not, show me.  Show me how not to be.  And please make it easy, because it's been so hard and sometimes I want to throw in the towel, and not try anymore.  I want to give up.  But I don't because I have too much knowledge.  And that is what keeps me here, trying, going to church, teaching the kids in Sunday School, trying to pray and to read my scriptures.  Hoping that the cloud will clear and the light of who I am will shine through and I will find that I am valuable and there was a purpose to this.  A REAL purpose.  More than just consequences.  Is that possible? Is it possible to feel real after a divorce?  To feel real when there is no one love in your life?  To feel real when you are single and most often alone?