Fix A Heart...

How do you fix a heart? Many people say time. Right? Doesn’t the saying go “Time heals all wounds.” Sure it does. I’m not sure the person who wrote that knew what they were talking about. Besides, how much time are we talking here? A few days? A few weeks? Try eight years...Is my heart fixed? I really can’t answer that question for you tonight. 

Fall is my favorite season. I think it always has been. I love football and cooler weather. I love rain storms and Halloween candy. I love fog and pumpkin patches. I love fires and hoodies and cozy sweatpants. But, the beginning of the school year always brings stress. Don’t get me wrong; I love my job. But the stress is there nonetheless. Add in the extra stresses this year of new bosses, new reporting systems, uncertainty of how the people and programs work. It’s a lot. And then there’s the fact that it’s been a stress for me for the last eight years in an extraordinary way.  The anxiety and panic that a simple turn of the calendar page brings amazes me each year. Every year I vow this will be the year that I can make it through without remembering what happened.  This will be the year that seeing October 1st on my calendar doesn’t bring me to my knees at some point in the day. This year has to be the year that my heart is fixed. Well...not yet. 

It’s always been a point of contention for me that my husband chose to unravel our lives on October 1st. We were just heading into the Halloween season when he came home and admitted he had done something so heinous that I knew life as we knew it was over. I remember the room spinning and pieces of my memories of our family crumbling in front of my eyes. My heart was broken beyond recognition. Why would he do this? Why did he choose this path for himself and our family? I still don’t have answers and I still don’t understand. My heart still hurts if I dwell too long in the whys and what ifs. 

Time does fix a heart. Partly. The pain doesn’t last as long. The beats that are skipped don’t happen as often. My gut doesn’t hurt for quite as long as it used to. I don’t make the same “dealing with it” choices I made in the past few years. But it’s a roller coaster for sure. I don’t feel like this is my best “fixed” year. The stress and fatigue of this school year mixed with too many “sure I’ll do that” moments and a frantic dance and school schedule have left me feeling like I can’t breathe. I am feeling the heaviness in my gut and the drive to want to run away and never return is something I fight every minute of every day. I cry myself to half sleep at night and drag myself out of bed in the mornings to punch and kick a bag at kickboxing to try and deal with the pain and the emotions of this time of year. I over schedule and over book and over plan just trying to float through the days and ignore the fact that there are days in October that are forever etched into my soul. Amelia and I are reading Mockingjay and just finished watching Catching Fire. There are scenes in those books and movies where the pain gets too overwhelming for Katniss and they just sedate her. I have joked to a few people that I would sign up for that in a heartbeat. Just knock me out for a while and bring me back when some time as passed, only it isn’t really a joke. There are seconds in the day that get so overwhelming that a shot of morphling sounds like heaven on earth. 

And then in the middle of my wallowing, I get messages from Father God. Reminders that I have come so far, thanks to God. Glimpses of how I used to be. Flashes of how I used to deal with things. There was the year I got drunk and sat in church and cried for hours. I ran away one year and scared all of my people. I ignored everything completely one year and declared how great I felt. It’s been a Jekyll and Hyde journey for certain. This year is no different. I smile and schedule myself and my girls to death and have fun and laugh and push through. Once in a while I reach out to someone, anyone, wanting them to ask how I’m doing. Or ask if I need anything. Or just even remember that today is October 1st and the beginning of eighteen days of memories that tear me from the inside out. But then I don’t want them to remember all at the same time. Ignore it and move on. Fix my heart? Sometimes I feel like there’s no way to fix my heart. Sometimes I feel so broken that I don’t know if I’ll ever feel normal again. 

And then I remember Psalms 46:1 and these words: “God is our refuge and our strength. A very present help in trouble.” So I close my eyes, and fold my hands, and remember that God is the one that gets to take it all. He gets to hold my pain and my angst and my emotions and tears. He gets to carry my burdens and my struggles. He gets to take my heart and all of the shards from the broken pieces and gently place them back together, fixing my heart one piece at a time. He has already gently persuaded so many of the most broken pieces back together. My heart, which was once joyful and happy and light, is starting to slowly take shape in His hands. He is making me whole. He is fixing me. So I trust. And I grieve. And I ask Him to fix my heart, one piece at a time. And I will come back more healed, more whole, more joyful than ever before. 

I thank God each and every day for the journey He has me on. For no matter how painful, no matter how broken I feel, I know He is fixing my heart. One piece at a time. One prayer at a time. One step at a time. My story will help fix others too. And as rough as things are right now, I know that I just need to fall into His arms, press deeper into Him, and wait in anticipation for the healing He has for me. He will fix my heart. I’m so glad I’m not in charge of that part.