IT'S ME, NOT OCD

Hi, it's J here. This is my first post for this blog, and I'm really excited about doing this project with my sister. When she asked me to join her in this blog venture, I felt so honored, and so loved. A philosophy professor of mine used to say that "love is a collaborative art project". I am getting to experience that truth-metaphor in so many dimensions with Christie.

I've been thinking a lot about what I should say in my first post. Where do I start? I could start with the birth of my baby, my little lily. I could start with my vow to protect her. I could start with my debt to my husband's tenderness, and firmness. I could start with the sushi we had three days after lily was born that caused me so much anguish. I could start long before her birth, with the paralysis of fear, the panic attacks, the guilt and depression. I could start with the scary stomach bug picked up overseas, being pregnant and frightened and burning up with fever in a foreign country, with no reliable doctor around that I knew of, no pharmacy, no midwife, and no husband. I could start with the false pregnancies and false hopes and false starts. I could start with the possible miscarriage. I could even start over a decade ago, with an eating disorder and long bout with depression. I could start with an uprooted and uncertain childhood.

But no matter where I start, no matter how far back I go, I won't be able to explain how I got where I am, who I am or why, because I am a lot more than the sum of my characteristics and experiences.

I had to discover the depth and complexity of identity in order to get over an eating disorder. I had to realize that I had been looking for my identity in the sum of past experience. I'd always been "the skinny girl," so I had to keep on being it, and be perfect at it: the perfect skinny, which in my mind was a particular number on the scale. I had to realize that was not my identity. I could not be "the skinny girl" any longer, not if I wanted to be the joyful fellowshiper with God I knew I was meant to be.

Perinatal depression, anxiety and OCD were like a bottomless vortex, sucking me in whole. Every aspect of my life and identity narrowed to one swirling point of fear. I am struggling to the surface slowly now, and it's still scary, often agonizingly so. Along with all the pain and fear and questions, there is a dark, confusing undercurrent--the question: "Who will I become now?" I don't know who I am anymore. I'm not the brave, adventurous missionary-type I thought I was--I wanted to be. I'm not the fun-loving, totally cool mom I dreamt of being. I'm not the spicy, spunky wife.

I can't help but wonder, am I a germophobe? Am I a neat freak? Am I OCD?

And I know the answer is the same as it was when the battle was with an eating disorder: NO! That is the illness, the tormentor, the enemy. I must not and will not be branded by it. OCD is not me.

So perhaps, I must again find out who I am NOT in order to find out better who I am--"some glimpse, some revelation, some wisdom, some authority to tell [me my] right name and [my] true destination."*

I'm like Jacob, wrestling and struggling to be blessed by my true name (Gen 32:24-31). The struggle bent and re-shaped his life forever, and it will do the same to me. He became "Israel"--"God-wrestler," limping through life, forever marked and reminded of that night, night of striving, fruitlessly pouring out strength, fruitful only in the final defeat.

Thinking about the story of Jacob in Gen 32, and about my struggles lately, I wrote this prayer in my journal:

"O Lord, You have touched me and thrown my life out of joint. Bless me now, Lord! Bless me by my true name, my true meaning. What do I mean, Lord? Please begin to tell me now, as the sun rises slowly. And not just who I am, but who are You? Who do I wrestle with? What will You do to me? What mark will You leave on me, unmistakably Yours, to forever brand me, forever identify me only in relation to You."

*Emily Griffin, quoted in Disciplines for the Inner Life, by Bob Benson, Sr. and Michael W. Benson, p. 24. (I've been going through this devotional book lately. It is mainly a compilation of readings from well known, and not so well known, Christian writers. I will likely make reference to it in other blog posts).