Christians with Depression.... HOOO Boy hold on!

Ok so here is a topic that has either piqued your interest or sent you running for cover. Its hairy, a bit unpleasant and totally my opinion which is completely without any formal education in Religion or psychology. It is not meant for any purpose other than a bit of therapy for myself, and basically I need to write this somewhere public (I do not understand why) so that I can get it off my chest and maybe sleep tonight. If I offend, ok that happens, just never read my blog again and nobody will be any the wiser. :)

I am an early thirties mother of two, who is able to stay home to (s)mother her children, and who suffers from Depression and Anxiety, and has suffered since I was about 11, and I am a christian.
Now I can hear those people in the crowd echo the sentiments in my head - HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE???? What about the joy of the Lord? What about Do not be anxious about anything? How about come to me all you who are heavy laden and I will give you rest??
Good question, when you work it out please let me know!

No really its hard to answer and I can't tell you really, I am sure there are some christian scholars and psychologists out there who can. I will tell you what I know. My brain needs to make a chemical so that I can cope with stress, I don't make enough to cope sometimes with simple things (getting out of bed, making breakfast, driving hairy and mcleary to school) sometimes I can cope with those things fine but give me an extra in my day and tomorrow I will be the messiest mess that ever messed.
Lately it has been so bad that I had days where there was no test pattern, no beep, no hold music, just an empty dark box that is completely void of life. I have prayed constantly for weeks and weeks on end "Please God". Don't know what the please is for, sometimes the next five minutes, the next nano second, If I can get through to the next ten minute break I might be ok.

In between these episodes came the massive guilt of "Christians shouldn't feel this way!" This isn't right, I shouldn't have this overwhelming desire to not exist anymore, should I? But lately while reading my bible (please don't turn off now, it will get interesting!) I read a bit of Job. Only a bit , because Job for me, is extremely depressing. The man speaks my thoughts a bit too clearly and I have to shut the book. I will admit I am a Christian who doesn't read her bible much..... Hmmm, yep hopelessly flawed!! Job says "I rue the day I was born" yep I understand that completely. So many conversations of mine with God have been "what on earth did you bother for? truly just look at this mess! I am an emotional pile of refuse that is steaming and attracting flies in the sun, and repelling everything else". Now Christians are meant to be "pro life" and my whole emotional state screams "END IT! END IT NOW! Run dont walk!!!" My whole psyche says that my husband will find someone who can really care for him the way he needs and that I am completely screwing my kid's heads and lives up. Better off Dead. Harsh I know, and God gave me this life, where is the excitement people for such a gift?. I know it, but life hurts so much all the time, and faking it to get through after 15 or so years of faking it is extremely hard. I want to lie under the kitchen table or in the cupboard and tell the world and God to stuff it!

Hypocrisy is something I dislike with a passion, and to all intents and purposes I know that I can be a complete hypocrite myself. My whole being cries out for attention, please please please help me!!!!, but give me a person like me, and my insides cringe and pull back and honestly let me help you secretly, Let me help you so that my conscience is sort of satisfied but so it doesn't have to be public. Meanwhile another part of me is screaming YOU ARE LIKE THAT! You Hypocrite.
Ugh. Its ugly and far from pleasant. I have heard religious people say that they have spoken to people and at the end have thought "there is five minutes of my life I won't get back". I don't want to be like that, and I don't want to be treated like that. I think that you can learn something in any situation, even the bad which is where i am going with this whole post.

During some of the worst times and leading up to them I have heard God (please don't roll your eyes!, bear with me) I once stood at my front door trying to unlock it, groceries around my feet, two children whos playful banter is sending me into some kind of psychotic spin because of the noise, and the pain and effort just to take a breath is almost killing me. I stood there and in a nano second a whole conversation occurred "God how long will I have to be like this? How long is this really going to last?" "Child I will carry you until you can walk, when you can walk, I will walk beside you and when you need to be carried again, I will do that." OK. I hang onto that conversation and play it over in my head. It brings peace.
Another one is where I asked God "Father if I am a Jar of clay that hides your treasure, do you know what this vessel looks like? I have so many cracks and holes and sometimes I am just the base of the jar, nothing else. I am a mess, I can hardly hold it together, how can this be right? Surely there is sin there and that's the problem, can't we fix this, make it better, make me 'normal?'." The instant reply was gentle "If your jar had no holes how could the light shine out? Look at the beautiful pictures we cast on the walls and people will know without a doubt that it is me and not you, and that is how it should be". Oh Kay I can handle that too.
Being a christian is not about being perfect now but being perfected now. He is the potter, I am the clay, and He molds me and makes me, I am not made yet. Humble pie be my desert tonight.
The last conversation I recall that God and I had clearly was "God if Jesus commands us to go in to the earth, and more than anything I want to serve with my everything for you. When I can barely get out of bed How do I do that? There are so many things that I would do for you, send me overseas, send me to the ends of the earth, the slums the lowly anywhere! please heal me so I can serve you in any capacity, please!" and the reply "All you have to do is Glorify me, with your life and in your marriage. The rest will follow" Um ok, How? Today is a grind to get the kids to school without turning into the Mega-Beast, I don't even trust myself to look after my niece and nephew during the holidays, and my soul is crying out to die for some relief. Where is the Glory in that? How can I glorify anything except my own patheticness in this situation? How do we make it about you God when my humanness cries out "it should be all about me!". A friend of our family told me the answer to this one, "today you say, God I got out of bed, thank you, I got up, it was all I could do just then, I have done it for you. There may be nothing else today, I will give you what I have". When you think of it that way there are other things very simple things, God thank you for a warm bed, thank you for food in my stomach, thank you for indoor plumbing, thank you our roof doesn't leak, thank you we have a roof!

The upshot of this is I am a Christian who believes without any doubt that God came to the earth as a man and died on a cross so that I can be reconciled to God. It is not about making me feel like less of a person, just a fact, I could never be good enough, he knew it and helped me out. I also lack the chemical in my head, or its out of proportion up there, to help me do the basic things sometimes. This isn't anything new, diabetics need insulin, people who suffer epilepsy need medication. Depression is something I think I will have all of my life, but I also know that if God in His wisdom can see my frailty and lack, and mess and still say to me "Child I think you are acceptable, come to me all you who are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" "child I love you" "child I will carry you" "YOU are MY child", then I probably will survive it.
It doesn't feel like it in reality, But I also know that being a christian does not instantly make me "perfect" I am perfect to God, he made me this way and He gets what is going on down here, I don't get it, you don't get it, my husband and friends don't understand. Thats why HE is God and we are not. My brain would probably explode if I could understand it. So be it.

So if you are having a horrendous day, week, year, lifetime and you think that there is absolutely no way a God could care about you, you are wrong. I know it without a shadow of a doubt. Life will still be hard, God is not a fairy floss machine of miracles to make us all happy. Joy is not about being happy, I don't think, and I truly believe that God heals, sometimes it takes a lifetime. It isn't what we want to hear, and truthfully I write it and my innards rebel against it and want to scream NO NO NO fix me now!!! However God being God, I believe in His Holiness, knows the right path for us, I won't fight Him (too much), and I don't believe this is laying down and giving up, more like surrendering. Sometimes the limb has to be re-broken to heal correctly, and it hurts, but you can use your limb afterward and the pain is a memory.

Don't deny yourself the opportunity to know the God of the universe, Don't deny Him. He wants to know you, and truly if you read the first four Gospels of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke & John) Jesus hung out with a lot of people just like me. Hopeless on the fringe, hopelessly messed up and falling apart and with so many problems that other people could not and would not fix. God is not for the beautiful people only, God is for everyone and the more messed up you are and the more you admit it, the easier it is for Him to work with you. Sometimes people think that you are beautiful, but they don't see the rank dung heap that is your soul, you know about it, feel it and live with it. He sees it and says "I love you, you could be mine, and I knew where you would be right now, my need for you is still great." No other religion in the world has a God that sacrifices Himself to save humans. We all have to work in those other religions to meet the approval of the deity, as if we ever could! God saw it all before the world began and knew the price that would have to be paid, and did it as a love offering for us. No other religion tells you that. If God Created me, and I believe that God is Holy and Perfect, then He did not make a mistake, even in all my failings, this is exactly how He made me and He loves me, and if He can love me (you have seen lots of my mess here) He loves you.

Yes Christians get Depression, they break limbs, have epilepsy, high blood pressure, diabetes, and are hypocrites (the worst), and get it wrong, and judge people unfairly. I get it wrong alot of the time, Don't look to Christians as the answer, look to God, He is so much more than we will ever be. He is confusing and we desperately want answers and for it to make sense, and it might not. He is God, His ways are not our ways. That is how it should be, otherwise would He really be God?
Don't look at me, Look at Him.