Being Christ to the Creeper, Part II

Perhaps it boils down to this: What would Christ have me do here and now?  This poor dude has fallen in my path, and I am supposed to be a good neighbor and love extravagantly.  I'm supposed to meet his needs somehow because I am, as they say, the man on the ground at this moment.  This strikes me as a tad absurd because, frankly, I would say this kid does NOT need ME to try to teach him to be SOCIAL. 

I am an introverted, lonerish, antisocial person by inclination.  I LIKE being this way.  I suppose I could teach him how to repel people less obnoxiously, but obviously, he doesn't need my help overall with that.  He needs friends his own age to help him understand what is appropriate and what is not.  But let's be serious: how many 18-year-olds  at anime clubs do you know who have the sensitivity to notice this situation and the ability to do something to improve it? 

I'm not saying they're non-existent, but when I was in college as an upperclassman leading orientation groups, I had to reach out to some of my freshman to give them people to hang out with because their own peers couldn't do so.  I tried approaching the leadership of the club to ask them to take on this responsibility (I figure it's theirs), and that . . . didn't really work.  Maybe they need someone to teach them how.  : )  But I was a completely different person back then in a different place, and I had that to offer.  Now I don't. 

So we circle back to the question again: what would Jesus have me do besides pray for someone else to intervene?  Lacking any clear messages in 30-foot letters of fire, I turn to the gallery.  Your thoughts on what it means to love my neighbor in this case?

Losing your life to gain what

When she started to follow Jesus seriously, she gave up the thing she was best at and loved most: writing about music.  Recently, as we were studying Luke 9, she wondered if that counted as laying down her life to save it.  At the time, she thought it was.  She couldn't see any way that her writing about secular music could lead anyone to Jesus, so she left it behind.  (Oh, hyper-evangelicalism, you make me so sad.)  As far as I can tell, she didn't really replace it with anything.  So now she is not doing what she loves and not necessarily leading anyone to Jesus that she can see, and she is miserable (for this and many additional reasons). 

It seems like she is more miserable because a couple of people in the group ARE writers and see that as part of who they are in Christ.  And it kindles this longing inside her that she isn't sure she shouldn't smother. 

I had to resist the urge to respond right away, though several things came to mind.

• The Bible doesn't necessarily indicate that we need to leave behind anything that isn't directly related to leading souls to the kingdom or whatever evangelical, Christianese phrase you prefer.
• Jesus didn't tell soldiers or tax collectors to stop what they did, drop everything, and go become full-time preachers.
• The Bible does say we should work heartily as unto the Lord, not for men or praise. 
• The Bible doesn't really indicate that vocation and avocation must be the same and anything that is not avocation must be abandoned.
• God loves beauty and beautiful things, and good art is beautiful.
• God sees beauty in broken things/people other people think are worthless and dirty.
• It's okay to work hard at a craft and create beautiful things; we serve a creator God.
• What exactly did stopping writing about what you love do to help you gain abundant life?

I shut my mouth firmly and resisted the urge to say anything or even follow up because she was Not Making Eye Contact in that skittish way she has of offhandedly revealing truths about her life that she is deathly afraid will get her judged in some way.   Normally, I would not have the presence of mind to notice the body language and think thoughts and stop myself from saying them.  Perhaps this gluten-free thing my doctor is having me do is a good idea.  Or maybe the Holy Spirit hit the brakes for me?

I really need to ask a lot of follow-up questions to get a better understanding of the situation before I start throwing out statements that she could take as judgments.  (She can twist almost any statement into something she perceives as a judgment. : )  If I understand the situation better, maybe I can ease things slowly into a direction where she can think things through and make a different decision now.

Things I want to know

• What did she write? 
• Who was her audience? 
• When did she make this decision? 
• Why, exactly did she give it up (there had to be multiple reasons beyond the simple one she tossed out there)? 
• Does she feel the same way about these reasons now? 
• Can she see a way she might be able to use her writing for a purpose she feels is more redemptive? 

Any other questions you can think of that I can try to slowly and slyly trot out there so as not to scare this fragile honesty away?

Home for the Holidays: STRESS for spouses edition

So there's this person who grew up in a fairly toxic evangelical environment.  Her mother is pretty much horrible and seems to relish making her child stressed out and angry because it is a form of power she doesn't plan on giving up any time soon.  Holidays are, naturally, really awful for this person.  Her husband grew up in a happy haze of lalala and adores his family to pieces (it's really sweet and adorable).  Recently, he raised the white flag because the holidays are coming, her stress is skyrocketing, and he has absolutely no idea how to help make things better.  Spending time with his family makes him deliriously happy, and he simply has no frame of reference for a world where seeing one's parents causes rage, grief, and debilitating self-consciousness.

He is desperate for any advice from folks who may have tips and tricks about how to deal with stress-inducing family members and the holidays.  He would especially like any advice on how to cope as a spouse and help his wife cope.  Anyone out there from a FUNCTIONAL family married to a spouse from a dysfunctional family?  How do you make the holidays better (even marginally)?  How do you help your spouse cope?

Doctors don't really understand chronic pain

Most doctors don't really understand chronic pain.  

People who have it for a long time are used to hiding it.  So doctors who are looking for "signs of visible discomfort" are not going to find it, and this is going to make them think you are a hypochondriac and not an excellent, well-practiced actor.  It's a good idea to establish some way to communicate with each provider when you're in discomfort.  If nothing else, this will save you the frustration of having to read the puzzled phrase "no signs of visible discomfort" so many times in your records. : )

Since they don't understand it (its causes and especially its effects), doctors will really just not be able to factor it into your overall situation.  It's frustrating, but if you set that bar low, you will be less frustrated.  It can also be a gate you use when meeting new potential providers.  How much do they know about chronic pain and what do they understand about its effects?  Can they factor this knowledge and understanding into the puzzle that is your symptoms?  If so, they may be better able to help you. 

At the very least, they won't frustrate you as much by throwing their hands up in the air and getting mad at you when nothing they try seems to help and they get pulled up short by their own limited knowledge and understanding.  Not all doctors do this, but some do.  Try to avoid them, if you can.  : )  But also try not to hold it against them.  No one likes to be reminded sharply of one's finitude.

Your health care providers don't really understand that your information is yours

Your health care providers (and their billers) do not really always understand that your information is yours and should be easily accessible, so you will have to go on the offensive mission and gather it even if they treat you like an annoying fraudulant fraudster (or like they think you're a hypochondriac and not a responsible adult trying to be organized). 

Cut them some slack because, in theory, they make it this hard in order to protect you and your information from unsavory types who might want to steal it.  It's just a rather unfortunate side effect that all this protection makes it a hassle for you to obtain it, as well.  (And judging by the amount of it that gets stolen every year, not that much of a hassle for the unsavory types to obtain.)

Frankly, you know you're working with good providers if they send you a copy of it (or post it online) automatically after your visit. If they do this, then you know that they believe that you should be a participant in your own care and not simply a consumer.  However, this isn't common, so be ready for arcane rules, regulations, and hurdles not clearly posted anywhere.  Be ready to make lots of phone calls and follow-up calls and records of the names of the people you talked to, their phone numbers, job titles, dates and times of conversations.  I wish it weren't like this, and maybe things will get better soon, but for now, you will have to hustle to get what is rightfully yours.

Request your medical records at least annually, while they are free

Request your medical records at least annually, while they are free (by law the first copy is free if requested within a calendar year, I think). 

If you've been tracking them with your PHR, this should actually be a piece of cake.  At a set point every year, you can look through your list of visits and know exactly who you saw and when and what kinds of records you need to request from which group and which records you already requested (if any).  You can create a form letter and then fill in all the information clearly and in an organized fashion.  The records retrieval people will love you and maybe even be nice to you and not need to be called 6 times for follow up.  They will especially love you for not needing this done ASAP right now or you will be in a bad place because that is when people usually contact them, needing it done next week when their standard response time is 8 weeks or whatever. 

Make sure you know each organization's standard response time, so you don't panic and start calling to follow up prematurely.  You could record this information on the provider page or your PHR!

Once you have your last year's records, scan those suckers into your electronic file, so you can print out the pages you need when you need them.  Then pat yourself on the back for having it together.

You need to take control of your personal health record now (before it gets complicated), pt. 2

You need to take control of your personal health record now (before it gets complicated), pt. 2.

Seriously.  If you wait to even find out about PHRs until you are on the other side of the mountain, putting one together will be prohibitively difficult for one or more of the following reasons:

• Destroyed. They will have been disposed of (usually after 7 years) and no longer available.  
• Prohibitively expensive in one go.  They will cost money.  $1.27 a page or more.  And they will print out and charge you for every page, including the ones that say nothing but "Page 2 of 2."  
• Lost.  They will be impossible to obtain because they were lost in the move/merger/buyout/closing of the clinic.  
• Overwhelming.  There will be so many of them that you won't be able to organize them in a meaningful way.
• Useless.  Some of them will be comprised solely of doctor or PT speak, and they will mean nothing to you (OR OTHER DOCTORS) and will thus be worthless.  Better to find this out early, maybe while the doc or PT remembers well enough to actually produce a coherent 1-page summary if asked nicely.  And before you pay $1.27/page for 30 pages of useless gibberish.

You need to take control of your personal health record now

You need to take control of your personal health record now (before it gets/especially if it's complicated).

Yes, it is a total pain to track down records from providers, and some of them won't have the records you need because they moved and lost them or there was a fire or they just toss them after a certain period of time.  And if you don't have any chronic medical problems, you may not really need to, but if you do have some chronic medical problems or a history of injuries and illnesses, it might really be good to gather things while you are still relatively healthy.  (Age will likely not make you healthier.)  If you do have chronic conditions or a long history, it will be even more nightmarish to track down and organize all this information, but it is such a good idea to have it collected and tabbed and available electronically.  In case of emergency, you don't want to be given a med you have a bad reaction to.  In case of regular life happening unexpectedly, you don't want to have to be hunting this stuff down when you are hurting and not at your mental best. 

My advice: Just bite the bullet and do it now.  It can't hurt, and it CAN help.

Your medical records are wrong

Your medical records are wrong, and you can('t) change them.

This is a sad truth.  And a frustrating one especially if you are dealing with any kind of Worker's Compensation claim because then the lies are embedded, and zealous adjudicators will haul them out and use them against you, but I should stop now).  It's also only partially true.  In theory, you can change your medical records.  You just have to do the following:

1. see the records (why it's important to get the records).
2. notice the problem.
3. bring the problem to the attention of your provider within the time limit and in the manner your provider requires (why it's important to get the records quickly).
4. follow up politely, fervently, and regularly even if you can tell they think you are a huge pain (because they don't have to deal with the fallout from the incorrect records, but you do, and it could be worse than just having some medical records people get huffy with you).
5. have that response be approved/agreed with.
6. follow up to make sure the change gets made (and pay any fees associated with getting another copy of the records). 

Correcting records is (understandably?) not something your provider prioritizes.  It's hard to appeal because the time limit can expire, and it is a huge hassle to follow up over and over and over again to be sure it's moving.  And the whole process can even tick your medical provider off, frankly.  I mean, you are challenging their records, and some of them take it personally because they think it is a slur on their competence as wise doctors, when really it's just a reminder of something they may have written down wrong or something you didn't have time to fully cover in the short appointment you are usually granted, a gentle acknowledgement that we know our doctors are not omniscient, and we don't hold that against them, as long as they correct their mistakes.  We just want the records left behind to be correct since they are, technically, our records.

But it really is a hassle, so you may only want to address the potentially life-threatening mistakes, especially if this provider is the one linked to the hospital system you would most likely get admitted to.  If the hospital system and associated docs use the same health information system, the emergency room docs can see that cortisone allergy in the records.  If you end up at a totally different hospital, they have no records at all since the health information systems are all designed as silos that don't play well with other health information systems because standardization in this realm prevents them from making any money.

(That was cynical.  Sorry.  But also true.  Standardization of electronic health records would save hospitals, clinics, the government, and patients tons of money at the expense of the health information system development companies, so you can see that it is unlikely to ever occur.)

My advice: If your doctor is not afraid of you providing paperwork, try to hand over copies of what you say during the appointment (much easier with your handy PHR binder!).  This could increase their chances of typing up accurate notes and save everybody time.  Otherwise, just request the records a week later, and determine if it's worth the hassle to correct the mistakes.  (If this is a worker's comp claim, IT IS ALWAYS WORTH THE HASSLE NOW TO CORRECT THE ERRORS TO SAVE YOURSELF SO MUCH STRESS, TIME, AND RAGE LATER, EVEN IF YOU JUST DON'T HAVE THE ENERGY TO DO ANYTHING RIGHT NOW.)

What your doctor tells you

What your doctor tells you and what s/he means to tell you are often not the same thing.

The most fascinating lessons I've learned have been about what doctors tell you in the office and what they put in their notes.  Sometimes these things are . . . at least similar.  Sometimes they are not.  Not even vaguely.  And I'm not just talking about all the times when they get basic information wrong (my job, my exercise frequency, other medical conditions, allergies, medical history).  I mean like when they tell me: "if PT makes this flare up, we'll do a steroid injection; there's no need for an MRI" and their notes say the next step is definitely an MRI.  (This is one of the reasons it's a good idea to get copies of your medical records every year, though it won't help you in the shorter term.)

I don't think they're being willfully deceptive or anything.  They just have such a limited time with you in the office, and they can't review everything, and they don't always cover everything, and maybe they just don't realize that we patients don't automatically get the benefit of the more thorough notes they write up afterward.  I suspect it never occurs to them that there is a difference.

My recommendation?  A week after the appointment, call and ask to have the doctor's notes from the visit sent to you.  Not all the time, just any time they tell you anything about next steps, medications, treatments, or what they think might be wrong with you.

I have now been to one clinic where they do this automatically. (!!!!)  And when I compliment them for this genius way for them to make sure patients heard what they really meant to say (patient compliance is much easier this way, docs), they tell me, "If we ever forget, just call and remind us."  Needless to say, I am liking this clinic.

I am a spreadsheet nerd

I am a spreadsheet nerd.  And I like it.  

Love it, actually.  Practical application of skills!  I looked at PHR templates and options.  (Not for long, because I didn't have time for that.)  I saved and printed some out to look at.  I wanted something electronic and easily printable.  I ended up finding these two things to be mutually exclusive.  I wanted something flexible, and nothing I found really met my needs as a not-actually-elderly person.  So I made my own.

Lots of trial and error.  Some combining and recombining, a few views, and voila!  After only 60+ hours I had gathered and boiled down a box full of medical records into something convenient, filterable, sortable, printable, copyable, and able to be shaded and updated at my whim.  Not that anyone has really wanted to look at it, but that's not its fault . . .

My advice: Make a PHR and commit to keeping it updated.  Do it using whatever programs, pre-existing forms, and storage methods make the most sense to you.  Do it now, before your life and the lives of your loved ones get complicated.  It's kind of a spiritual exercise to get it ready.  And you probably won't have as many records to deal with, so it won't take you as long as it took me . . .

If you'd like a blank version of the one I use, let me know.  I can certainly send it to you if you use Microsoft Excel or compatible things.

Folks are not living their lives AT YOU

This is a great article to read, whether you have kids or not.  I am not a parent, but I fall into this trap sometimes, as well, and it was great to feel convicted when reading this.  I mean, it doesn't make me feel happy, but it is important to be reminded to watch out for this tendency.  And it does feel weird when I'm in the middle of it and have to take that step back and realize I'm being self-conscious in this particularly sad and dumb way.  I guess I prefer to avoid the error instead of have to deal with it when I'm in pretty deep.  Most of the time, nobody is judging you but yourself, and nobody is really motivated to better behavior in order to make you feel bad: I guess that's the message I got.

"I felt as if this woman had materialized for the sole reason of making me look bad. I am telling you that I decided right then and there that this mother was feeding her child avocados AT ME. And that also she had matched her child’s clothes that morning AT ME. And also that she had likely disciplined her child effectively for years AT ME. And that as icing on her (likely homemade and gluten-free) cake she was enjoying a lovely, peaceful, well-planned, healthy lunch AT ME. I felt judged. I felt like her approach to parenting was maybe developed solely to shine a big old spotlight on my “not good enough” parenting.  She was parenting AT ME, I tell you!
For years I lived in world in which people lived AT ME. For example:

• Craig worked out AT ME while I tried to enjoy the couch. So aggressive.
• People discussed natural child birth AT ME because they could sense my previous sixty epidurals.
• People attempted ATTACHMENT PARENTING AT ME. ( I still don’t know what that really is but it certainly doesn’t sound like something behind which I’d rally.)
• People threw Pinterest parties AT ME.
• People trained for triathalons AT ME.
• People refused to eat carbs after 8 pm AT ME.. . ."

"Feeling judged by other people’s decisions is an insanely ego-centric way to live. Like my dad always says, “Glennon, nobody is thinking about you as much as you think they are.” Everybody’s just doing the best she can, mostly.'  - Glennon Doyle Melton

Exactly.

A House Hunting We Will Go? (2013 edition)

So here's the situation. My rent already went up once this year. And now it's going up again. It'll have gone up 6.5% after this. (I did the math.  Twice.) What with all the medical issues and student loan payments, that's, frankly, too much for my budget and attempts to get out of non-mortgage debt, especially if it's going to happen every year. Below are the options.  Do you have any suggestions about things I've missed or opinions on what seems like the best idea or time frame?

I'd really appreciate your advice . . .

What I Dream About	SITUATION: A good friend will get a full time job and she and her family will be able to buy a big house (duplex or apartment building or mother-in-law suite or whatever), and I'll move in and help them pay off their mortgage faster ($500 a month) while being able to pay off other loans faster (by not having rent keep going up crazy, unexpected  amounts all the time) DIFFICULTIES: To be frank, my friend might not be able to get solid, full-time employment.  The job market just isn't terrific for her field in this area.  It definitely won't be in place before my rent spikes for the second time this year. ONE MORE THING: If I do find another place, some corollary to Murphy's Law guarantees that my friend will soon land a great, full-time job.  But I'm willing to take that one for the team.  : )  Also, I may end up increasing my commute time and end up even further away from PT.
The Next Best Thing	SITUATION: Buy a condo or townhouse.  Still living in a community for safety but with fewer neighbors than an apartment (and hopefully less having to overhear raging domestic arguments) DIFFICULTIES: Finding one of these that is single level in the price range I'm looking is sort of impossible.  I really only need a bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen on one of those levels (possible surgery concerns).  Also, these have association dues, and those can go up randomly year to year just like rent can. ONE MORE THING: To avoid ending up with double payments, I'd have to give notice ASAP that I'll be vacating my apartment; if I don't find a house and close on it in that time, I'll be stuck in a big way.  I could end up being allergic to some hidden thing in the house I won't know about until I start living there, and I may not have the money to get it fixed.
The Next, Next Best Thing	SITUATION: Buy a house.  It's easier to find single-level houses with all the rooms on the ground floor, and there are no association dues to pay.  DIFFICULTIES: I would be living alone.  That can be dangerous for a number of reasons (and my mother would worry ridiculous amounts).  Also, I have to shovel snow and mow the lawn, something I am not really physically capable of doing, so I'd have to pay someone else to do it and be concerned about someone getting hurt or getting trapped in my house if the snow removal people get tied up. ONE MORE THING: Hiring a snow removal service and some kid in the neighborhood to mow the lawn is an expense that can also go up suddenly.
The Status Quo	SITUATION: Stay here for now (and pray the dream comes true [SOON, DEAR GOD, PLEASE]).  DIFFICULTIES: Deal with the rent hikes and the extra money I have to blow running my AC all four seasons because I live on the third floor and nobody in this building pays for heat, and so they waste it insanely, baking those on the third floor.  And all the screaming and the strangers my fellow tenants casually let into the building.  And the added trouble sleeping because of the light and noise from the rigged up AC in the bedroom. ONE MORE THING: At least I wouldn't have to pack and inflict moving on my friends.  Again.  In summer.  And if something did come up (sudden job loss or something else), I am still probably more easily mobile in this situation.
The Least Best Thing	SITUATION: Move to another apartment.  It could be better.  It would have to be more expensive to be this size but better quality. DIFFICULTIES: Seriously?  Pack and inflict moving on my friends when I will just have to move again and when I can't know if the rent will be more stable or if the situation will be improved. ONE MORE THING: Just don't have the energy to do the research on this for some place knowingly  temporary.

Give your friends a chance

An acquaintance recently informed us that she has suffered with depression and OCD for a couple of decades.  She was so nervous, it hurt to watch her.  I wondered whether she would start unraveling the blanket if she ran out of tissues to shred.  She made eye contact in stuttering dashes.

Oh, I thought, some things make sense now.  And then I thought, Why is she acting like she's coming out to a hostile audience?  She knows two others in the group have wrestled with depression (and still do).  Why is this so hard for her to "admit"?

As she told us she'd been kind of suicidal, I said a little prayer of thanks to God that I had been too typically procrastinatory to actually write that email I had been thinking about sending because I thought maybe she was just doing what my other friends who just wanted to move on had done because they were too cowardly to just say it to my face and break things off cleanly and openly.  Don't leave us hanging and wondering if you're going to come this week or ever again, I would have said in a more polite way because I was afraid she was just dithering in a passive aggressive way and afraid of hurting our feelings with the truth.  It's a very good thing I didn't send that email, which would have kindly assured her that if she didn't want to be part of the group anymore, she could just tell me, and I would tell everyone else and no one would hold it against her. 

Because that would really not have been a good thing for her to hear while she was trapped in negative thoughts, withdrawing from us all, as she told us she has done to many friends, because she didn't want to inflict herself on us, especially not when she was like that. 

I thought of a couple of my friends who pulled away in this way for some of these reasons because they were depressed.  Were they, like her, afraid of finding their friends really weren't that good of friends? That their friends would slowly drift away, always having a good excuse, not saying anything, not returning calls until no one called anymore?  Did they, afraid of finding out that truth, take the yoke upon themselves and wrap themselves in silence because forcing everyone away and leaving them seemed preferable to being left by them?  Probably.

My heart hurts.

How do I tell her that I am honored that she told us these things, yet that I beg her to please oh please give those friends a chance.  Because while it's true that some of them--even most of them and maybe all of them--will leave, some might stay, and she owes it to herself and those friends to uncover this truth?

"I was writing to figure it out, writing to get through it, writing because I couldn’t remember how to pray." - Addie Zierman

My heart hurts.  And all I can pray is, "Please, God . . ."

Yes, once again trying to decide important things, part III

Well, now that I've had a positive performance review at work, I have more to think about.  I mean, when I say that I focus on the job I have now, I don't mean in a corporate ladder climbing sort of way.  I have no interest in that. 

It's funny to think back.  When I graduated from college, I would have been the go-getter whose work-life balance was way out of whack.  I would have been interested in everything and tried to do too much and kind of been a know-it-all out of sheer curiosity. 

That is not what I want or need or can do now, so I spent the first year trying to make sure to set managements' bar of expectations low for me.  I didn't want them to expect more from me than I was capable of giving, so I used my slacker voice, dressed really casually, made sure they knew about my disability and diminished capacities. 

And they still liked what I did (even if I was slow at it or got sick at bad times), which makes me happy.  After years of ridiculous and pointless and terrible (below my expectations) reviews at RetailEstablishment, it felt nice to get a raise (even a "small" one) and kind feedback from peers and managers.

But. 

I can't throw teaching over the side of the boat based on a good performance review.  My first two reviews at RetailEstablishment were good before they started bringing in terribly incompetent managers, changing their policies to be more misguided and inefficient, and generally making increasingly terrible management decisions.  These are things that could happen at any business, including my current employers.  I have to remember my new policy of keeping my expectations low, remembering my increasing limitations, not taking on too much and grinding myself down. 

What will I do if I give up on teaching now and find myself 5 or 10 years down the road hating my job and unable to get back into teaching because I don't have any recent experience?  But what will I do if I try to do too much now (teaching and full time work) and resent teaching for all it's taken away from me in 5 or 10 years?

Any suggestions of angles I'm not considering?

Yes, once again trying to decide important things, part II

The promised expansion of the choices.  Again, if you can think of other options that I am missing, let me know.  : ) 

Option 1: Focus on the job and life I have now.  Stop looking for teaching jobs, researching teaching, and teaching a class or two every year.  Read more, write more, be in a choir, be less exhausted, find a new church, find some more volunteer work with a church.

Option 2: Focus on the job I may get in the future.  Sing less.  Be more exhausted.  Read less.  Write less.  Try to get published.  Keep researching and teaching.  Build up enough experience and/or publications over the next ten years that I might be able to get a teaching job once I have my loans paid off.  Work a couple jobs some of the time.  Have less time to do volunteer work and in my church. 

Don't worry, I think I'll hold off on making any momentous decisions until after my performance review at work and maybe late spring when I'll have absorbed so much sunlight, I can't possibly be the least bit SADD (if I even am now, which I doubt).

Something to ponder

So there's a person where I work who is mostly known for incompetence.  This person has had some serious health problems, as well, which seems to be why our kindhearted bosses don't want to simply fire this person for being bad at a job despite having it for a good number of years.  The rest of us are competent enough to get around this person's incompetence, but it's annoying sometimes to have to do this person's job in addition to our own.

Lo and behold, I discovered that this person attends a Bible study some days over lunch.  And I thought, "Does knowing that this person may be a Christian change my opinion of this person?"  And I thought, "Should it?"  And I thought, "If so, why and how?"  And, "If not, why not?"

Your thoughts?

More Dreams and Nightmares and Longing

.
Why would I look to a job that will be full of roadblocks, irritation, and the prospect of failure when I have what is most likely a steady, rewarding job right now?

I am 

• starting to pay off my tremendous debt (so slowly) (collected compliments of the OWCP).
• respected by my co-workers.  
• appreciated by my supervisor.  
• challenged but not too much.
• able to balance things enough to maintain hobbies, ministry, and a part time teaching gig on the side.  

Why on earth would I possibly even think of giving that up to work in a place where Big Brother will be watching, and I would be hemmed in and repressed and have my integrity challenged, my freedom in Christ squashed by legalism and politics, and many things I believe in opposed?  What could possibly be worth that? 

• Tenure?  Hardly.  I won't even be considered for that unless I seek a pointless PhD, which I can't possibly do in my current haze of chronic pain and fatigue and reduced mental capacity.
• A full time, long-term teaching post with benefits at a small, Christian, liberal arts college?  Well, quite frankly, those don't grow on trees, and even with the connections I have, I can't really hope to even try any other ones until I've been working part time for 15 years.  And I don't think I can keep this two-job thing up for 15 years.
• A home closer to my family?  As you know, that's not really a consideration for me, cheerful loner that I am.  If I lived closer, I'd have to feel more guilty for still not visiting more than twice a year.
• Being able to say my dream came true, and I was able to leave work I was merely good at for work that I was good at and loved?

I actually blame my current dissatisfaction on how close I came in the process last year.  Because things looked so rosy, I slipped up and let myself think of what life could be like it my dream came true.

And that made it so much harder to come back to reality when the dreams got stomped.  I had to admit that the idea of working in my current job for longer than it takes to pay off my school loans was . . . unpleasant.  (Of course, at the rate I'm going, that will be at least 15 years anyway . . .)  It is not a bad job, at all.

• I indirectly help save lives.  
• I directly help bridge communication gaps.  
• I like my co-workers.  
• I believe that doing anything and everything for the glory of God is my calling on earth. 

But I can't help how much I love teaching and how much I love teaching comp and how much I love teaching comp to students at small, Christian, liberal arts colleges and how much I wish I could focus my full vocation time on it.

I don't believe in Teaching Composition as a Holy Calling, but I can't help but feel that I will have wasted my life if this present situation is all there is to it.  I can't help but know that there is more to life than this.  I can't help but long for that more, even if I'm physically incapable of really reaching out and grasping it.

Maybe I'm just
greedy.  When things were

bad, I was
content (often discouraged

but certainly content).  Now
that things are "better," am I just
selfishly wanting more?

Should I be straining? 
Or should I be settling? 

All for the glory of God. 
Harder in practice than
theory.  Amen.
.

Give me rest

I am not very good at resting.  In fact, I am terrible at it.  Resting in people, in my own company, in God's company: I seem to have lost the knack.

A friend who helped me move recently told me he'd be glad to come help me assemble a piece of furniture this weekend but that he'd also be happy to spend some time NOT assembling furniture or doing anything but sitting and talking, for that matter.  I looked at him blankly, remembered that he's a people person who likes to be social, and wondered if he would mind me unpacking while he talked, or if that would be a problem and he would feel like I wasn't being properly social. 

Now it's true that I'm not really a social person (understatement), but the main reason the idea of just sitting and talking threw me is because it wouldn't involve doing anything, and I just couldn't handle that.  He said he didn't want to think I was just using him for cheap labor, which is understandable since the only times we've interacted outside of singing and a club we belong to have involved moving-related activities, but I just couldn't imagine having someone over and not doing anything when there's so much that I need to do. 

Today, someone else asked with an accusatory, threatening, and motherly gleam, "You're good about taking the time to rest yourself, right?"  I had a moment of guilt and thought, No.  I feel guilty when I'm not doing anything, so guilty that I don't let myself just sit and rest and do something I enjoy because that would be nice and I shouldn't do anything nice if I'm being lazy and not doing the things that need to be done.
The thing is that these tasks don't actually NEED to be done right now.  I mean, no one will die if they aren't completed.  Why this feeling of urgency?  Merely the weight of the number of things on the list? 

Maybe some of it is my growing frustration with how lazy folks in the church are in this country on the whole.  They don't seem to be doing much for others at all that I can see.  Many churches seem more like country clubs where people go to comfort each other in their minor inconveniences and mourn their tiny discomforts.  "I have no energy to do anything except care for my husband and kid."  "God doesn't want me to burn out." "I work full time; how can I possibly have time to volunteer or work in a ministry?"  I don't just hear these phrases; I see them.  It's hard to go to church. 

What logical flaw is this:

1. They're not doing anything to minister to others because they're selfish and lazy.  
2. I'm not doing anything to minister to others.  I have an excuse, but maybe they do, too.
3. I can't just go pointing out the lack in their lives when it's present in mine.  
4. I must be selfish and lazy, too.
5. If I'm ever going to confront this problem in my church, I can't be guilty of it myself.
6. Overcommit!

Or maybe I'm just afraid that if I stop, I won't be able to muster the forward momentum to get moving again.  Let me tell you, once you stop,  it's hard to get started again.  I learned that in physical science class and in the school of life, I guess.

I've been bogged down before.  I've been trapped in a place where I can't do what I want (lack of sleep for years is a killer), so I just block out what I should be doing because I have no energy for it and I don't want to deal with the guilt and thinking about it all it won't make the pain go away and won't make me able to do all that needs to be done.  Avoidance!  Distraction!

When that happens, I feel like I am being lazy.  I am afraid of being lazy, of being seen as lazy.  I am terrified that I will have to try to live with this reduced ability to function for the rest of my life, that I will use this as an excuse to do less than I could.  I'm afraid of my own weakness, afraid that it will lead to getting weaker in some sort of psychological spiral I'm already living physically.  (These are realistic fears.) 

Maybe I'm trying so hard to avoid stopping and confronting that side of myself that I just keep pushing when I shouldn't.  I can't tell any more.  Am I really waiting for some sort of breakdown to serve as an epiphany?  If so, why?  I mean, that's just silly.  I wouldn't let anyone else get away with such harmful self-disrespect (unless they were having their own epiphany).

When did I get to this place where I feel guilty if I stop moving and insufficient if I keep dragging myself on when I shouldn't?  It's not like I feel I'll be punished by an authority; I am an adult living alone, so the only person who can punish me is me.  And that guilt monkey, apparently. 

I wonder why rest = laziness in this messed up head of mine?  I wonder how much of it has to do with the fact that I just have no energy to do things that are good and right and true.  Maybe I feel like using what energy I do have to rest or do something I enjoy is a sort of betrayal of some kind.  But of what?  To whom?

My God is a God who says, "Come to me all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest."  I want rest so bad, but it's beyond my reach with this chronic-pain related insomnia, and it's been beyond my reach for years. 

I do not call my God false for promising this and not delivering it right here right now.  Rather, I look forward to the rest that is to come, and I enjoy the rest now of knowing that my worth in His eyes is not based on what I do, how much I do, how long my to do or already done list is.  At least, I'm supposed to be enjoying that rest.  I know that's true.  I'm not completely miserable, which I would be if I were trying to prove my worthy by what I did.  So why this unease with ease? 

Maybe I need to attack this head on.  Maybe I need to schedule some time to rest, chores and responsibilities be darned.  I mean, if it's on my list of things to do, it's legitimate, right?  I'll try setting aside a day I force myself to rest and tell that feeling of guilt it's not needed every time it pops up . . .

That doesn't actually sound very restful . . .

Do you feel that guilt when you stop?  What do you do to rest?  How can you tell when you need rest versus when you just want rest.  Is wanting rest laziness?  Any thoughts on all this?

Further thoughts on what I'm ashamed of

I wonder if this dilemma is like people searching for the perfect church.  They look around to find one that's running smoothly and healthily, and they reject any as soon as human cracks become visible to them.  Of course, all human institutions have human cracks.  The longer you're around them, the more cracks you see.  The fall tainted everything.  If you're looking for the perfect anything here on earth, you're on a fool's quest, one that is doomed to failure. 

Is it wrong for me to pull my support of an institution just because I've clearly seen how sinful, fallen, and human the institution is?  If I am unwilling to settle for anything less then perfect, unable to find anything at all, what benefit is that to anyone?  Where's the balance between wise stewardship, wisdom, sour grapes, truth, and consequences?


This is hard.  Any thoughts?