I feel like a stranger in so many ways. I can't seem to shake the thoughts in my mind that tell me everything I say and do is under scrutiny or being criticized. I feel like I can't burden anybody with how I feel or how hard my days have become. It's gotten to the point where I feel like I'm wandering through life. Stress and burdens have taken over my heart and mind. For every one thing that I get accomplished it's either a "that was good, could have been better" reception or I find that I have another five things to accomplish in even less time.

What terrifies me is the feeling that I don't know how to grab hold of what's been held out for me. I have before and I know that nothing can separate me from the love of Christ, but when stress and anxiety put blinders over your eyes it's so hard to focus on the Son. Some days I notice my life is just like it was before November 3, 2007. The faith I have has taken such a brutal beating that I don't know how to revive it. On second thought, I don't know how to let go and let God. That's what scares me--the fact I can't just let things go like I once did and have faith in the promise of the Lord.

I find it hard to ask for things myself, even when I know I need it. I've always been taught that if you only do things for yourself when there are other people in need, you've got something wrong with you. I've seen the healing hand of God...I just wish this once He would reach out and mend my broken heart. I hear all these songs and read Scripture about how God mends the broken hearts and gives strength and comfort to the weary, but I never thought that they would be about me. I never thought they'd be used by God to speak to me to tell me that He has me even when I can't sense it. I need that lack of inhibition, reluctance or fear. I need a lack of me. I need to just let go of all these burdens I've allowed to dictate my life and just trust in a perfect love that drives out all fear. God doesn't expect perfection, He expects faithfulness. I haven't even been able to keep that. I always talked about how I couldn't understand people who didn't know Christ--they spent their days walking through life with fear or uncertainty, not knowing how things were going to go. I've experienced that fear in life again and it's not pretty. It's awful. Even though my faith may be battered, I still know it to be true that a day is coming when there is no more pain, suffering, or fear and I can be welcomed into the loving arms of the One who loves me more than anything or anybody on this planet.