Photo Credit: A.Futlilini, Creative Commons

God, will you make it stop hurting?

This is the simple prayer I prayed a hundred times at least over the past six months, sometimes a small, gentle whisper at the end of the day — the last breath I have to give before fading into sleep. Please God.

Other times a bit more aggressive, a sort of desperate raise-of-voice to make sure he’s heard me say it.

“God, will you make it stop hurting??”

The pain started just before Christmas, right abound the time everyone was setting up trees and wrapping up presents and completing obligations for weeks off of work to hunker down and spend time with family. At first I thought it was just a strained muscle, and then maybe a pinched nerve, but then when the pain lasted, and lasted…

I didn’t know what it was.

I wonder if the fear, the confusion around why my body was betraying me, made it hurt even worse.

And see, the thing with chronic pain that should seem sort of obvious is that it’s chronic. As in, it doesn’t stop. It doesn’t take a break so you can finish your deadline, or respond to that e-mail, or move across the country, or because you’ve had a rough day. It’s commanding like that, all-consuming. It’s relentless.

I reasoned with God.

This is really not a good time for me to be in pain, I told him. There’s too much happening, too much work to do, too much going on. I need to be healthy so I can write books and travel and help writers and publish content at Prodigal Magazine.

How am I supposed to do that if I’m in pain?

God, will you make it stop hurting?

You start to see a new side of yourself when you’re in pain — a desperate side, a selfish side, a side where every thought, all the time, revolves around you. At least I did. Anything to make it stop hurting.

Pain changes things. It changed me.

I started doing stretches, and yoga, and then going to acupuncture —

which taught me what a crucial role we play in our own healing, and also how we can’t do it alone. It taught me that sometimes, to get away from pain, we have to relax into it, submit ourselves to it.

It taught me how sometimes, our bodies betray us. Sometimes our nervous systems need rewiring.

I praised God for the way he used the pain to teach me.

But even after all of that, the pain didn’t go away.

It was better. Manageable, even. With a handful of iburpofen and a little bit of aspercreme I could make it through the day. But each time I tried to imagine living another six months, or even (heaven forbid) years of my life like this, my heart would race and I would keep praying:

God, will you make it stop hurting?

Finally, my body is nearly back to normal.

As I type these words, I feel nothing more than a small kink in my neck, and even that feels like it is daily getting better. It wasn’t one thing that healed me. It was a dozen little things, a small army of people and techniques I have to thank for feeling better.

But the one thing that tipped me over the edge was this: vacation.

I just stopped, for two weeks.

I stopped striving, stopped trying, stopped tweeting and facebooking (mostly) and blogging.

And thinking back now it makes so much more sense why, even when I begged God to make it stop hurting, he didn’t answer — or he answered with “no.” Because pain is meaningful, it’s useful. It’s our body’s signal telling us something is wrong.

And in that sense, pain is a good thing. We can’t ignore it (it won’t let us).

We have to keep listening until we figure out what it is saying.

Healing is complicated. And if you’re in pain, I can’t promise there is one thing to fix your problem.

There probably isn’t. For me, it’s taken several months and several different approaches and, if you want to know the truth, I don’t know if my right shoulder/arm will ever be the same.

It will probably always be a little more vulnerable, a little more tender than it ever was before.

But pain is not arbitrary. You can’t ignore pain. It won’t ignore you.

What’s the worst pain (physical or otherwise) you’ve ever experienced? What did it teach you? How did you find healing? To reply, Click HERE.

Today’s post is from a dear, sweet friend Emily Wierenga. She is a beautiful writer and mother and has the kind of sweet spirit you can sense even through a computer screen. She also just released a book called Mom in the Mirror: Body Image, Beauty and Life After Pregnancy. I’m so thrilled to share her words with you today.

Photo Credit: Ollie Crafoord, Creative Commons

I never wanted to be known as the girl with the eating disorder.

And now I’ve got a book with chapters and paragraphs and sentences stating that I am that very girl, the one who starved herself from the ages of nine until 13, and nine? People ask. Why so young?

But I tell them, I didn’t feel nine. I felt very, very old.

And sometimes it’s hard to remember (as I put down words like Hospital and Calories and Mirror), that I am more than that now. That I have always been more. That we are all more than our reflection.

But you couldn’t have told that to the girl with the mushroom cut and the big plastic glasses who stared into the long mirror in the dim-lit hallway while Dad typed away in his office, the door that was always closed because he was a pastor, and why do churches keep their entrances locked?

And Mum in the kitchen cooking supper in her apron.

I really don’t think it had much at all to do with eating, and does it ever? Do we sneak bags of chips or cookies or bowls of ice cream because we love food? Or because we hate ourselves?

And I think it’s because as women, as, mothers, we put ourselves last so often, that we don’t believe we deserve goodness. We feel we don’t deserve beauty or gifts or to sit down and enjoy a good long meal with a glass of wine because there are children to be bathed and put to bed, and clothes to be folded and toys to be put away and, and…

And this is what I saw stretched across my mother’s face, as she stood weary by the stove in her apron. And she tried to love us the only way she knew how: by homeschooling us and dishing up heaping plates of food and sewing us clothes, but all I wanted was for her to hold me and tell me I was beautiful.

But she’d never had anyone do that for her, not her mother nor her father nor my father.

We all need someone to be love, incarnate, , so we can put our faith in it.

My husband leans in on the pillows and I ask him to tell me, just one more time. “But why?” he says, this farm-boy that walked me through my relapse when I was 23.

“Don’t you know?” I shake my head.

“Tell me again,” I say.

“I love you.” He pulls me close. “I’ve never stopped loving you,” he says. “And I never will.”

I let him kiss me then.

And I’m learning to stand up for myself this way, to treat my body with kindness. And I know it has nothing to do with me. I know it has everything to do with me being a product of God’s genius. His hands molding dust into skin into breath.

He’s the one who makes me beautiful. So I sit boldly at the kitchen table in the afternoon light and eat a bowl of ice cream, my sons beside me, eating theirs, because we need to do this together, this life. This learning to eat, this learning to be gentle with ourselves and others.

Because lies can’t grow in the light.

And light is love.

***
I’m giving away a copy of my new book today, Mom in the Mirror: Body Image, Beauty and Life After Pregnancy, co-authored by Dr. Dena Cabrera, and foreword by supermodel Emme.

Here’s an excerpt from the book:

Giving birth produces life in more than one sense. It’s the baby powder, milky-breathed spirit found in the softest limbs you’ve ever felt, and it’s the respect a man feels for his wife as he watches her give up her body for another.
And it’s the deep-rooted soul satisfying feeling of knowing you were born for more than the mirror. That you were born to see the face of God in your child, and to know, you yourself are a miracle.

I want you to have this book! Tell me ONE thing that you love about yourself, and you’ll be entered into the draw! To reply, and enter for your chance to win a copy of Emily’s book, click HERE.

Otherwise, you can order it through the book’s website, here: www.mominthemirrorbook.com.

_____

Emily Wierenga is a mom to two beautiful boys, wife to a handsome math teacher, and author of Chasing Silhouettes: How to Help a Loved One Battling an Eating Disorder (www.chasingsilhouettes.com) and Mom in the Mirror: Body Image, Beauty and Life After Pregnancy (www.mominthemirrorbook.com). To learn more, please visit www.emilywierenga.com

Photo Credit: mikebaird, Creative Commons

What if I did whatever I want?

I’ve been tossing this question around lately. I’ve lived most of my adult life pretty disciplined. I’m artistic and a little bit spacey by nature and I think in high school and most of college I felt like if I didn’t get my act together, I would never be successful.

So despite the fact I am naturally a little more disorganized than organized, a little more free-spirited than disciplined, I got good at pulling myself together with an on-time assignment, an early wake up call, and even a clean room.

I took up running, which took discipline (at least until the endorphins kicked it) and before I knew it I was addicted.

Addicted to discipline, that is.

After over-drafting my bank account nine times my freshman year of college, I mustered up the discipline to keep a “zero balance” (that wasn’t actually zero) in my account at all times.

I read a few books about healthy eating and realized my eating habits were not great and so re-ordered that part of my life, too (which basically meant I quit living on diet coke, sugar free jello, and cheerios, my three staple food groups).

I started waking up at 5:00 to get writing done — just another notch in my belt of discipline.

And I’m a huge fan of discipline. It’s changed my life. It’s given me more control and helped me to hone and develop my gifts and as I’ve practiced it I’ve grown into a more functional, happier, healthier me.

But lately I’ve been wondering: Is it possible to be too disciplined?

What if I just did what I want?

What if I just did whatever I wanted, instead of being so careful all the time. Honestly, for awhile, it might mean I ate ice cream for lunch a few times a week (I consider this often) but would I eat ice cream three meals a day?

I doubt it. Because I know, if I did that, I’d feel sluggish and sick to my stomach all the time.

What if I woke up whenever I wanted to wake up?

In graduate school I started waking up at 5am. For a long time after that, I was so attached to the schedule, I couldn’t sleep in past about 6:30, even on a weekend. If I did, I would feel guilty — like I had just wasted valuable hours of my day.

But was I really “wasting” my day? What’s so bad about sleeping in?

And if I let myself sleep in as late as I want, would I really sleep half the day away? I just don’t think so.

Sometimes I think discipline is a crutch for me, or at least my attachment to it is. I worry if I quit being disciplined, quit mustering up the strength to do the things I know I’m “supposed” to do, I’ll go off the deep end.

I don’t trust myself.

But here’s the thing I wonder. If I just did whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, just for a little while, I don’t think much would change. In fact, I wonder if I would experience a more alive, more open, more vulnerable version of me.

I’m scared to test my theory, in part because I don’t trust myself and in part because I do believe there is a value in discipline.

But is freedom as important as discipline?

I wonder if, in my freedom, I would discover new things about me — my motives, my character, my deepest desires. And I wonder if discovering these things is as important as being disciplined to change.

If I could eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, I’m convinced I would still eat vegetables.

The discipline I’ve practiced of eating healthy has taught me to love the things that are good and nourishing for my body.

If I could work whenever I wanted to work, I’d probably work about eight hours a day, not because anyone is forcing me into my chair in front of my computer but because discipline has taught me how rewarding and completely satisfying it is to show up, every day, to the same project and see it through to completion.

Discipline has shaped me into a new person, and for that I am grateful.

I know I’ll continue to practice discipline in my life.

But lately I’m thinking of loosening the reigns of discipline, trusting myself more, and learning to live less out of obligation and more out of delight.

What do you think? Are you disciplined, or not? Do you need to be? To reply, Click HERE.

Many of you know this, but this year, I turn 30 on May 30th and instead of a big party or presents, I’m hoping to raise $30,000 to build a classroom in Gulu, Uganda with Bob Goff and Restore International.

One of the ways I’m raising the money is by hosting this remote 5k. I’m calling the event LOVE RUNS.

What the heck is a remote 5k?

I’m glad you asked. The beauty of a remote 5k is you can run the race WHEREVER you are. I’m in Minneapolis, Minnesota, so I’ll be getting some runner friends together to run with me, but you could run (or walk) in your own neighborhood, with your own friends.

The other beauty is you can run (or walk) at whatever pace you want!

So how does it work?

It’s actually pretty simple. You purchase your ticket here if you want to participate. The cost is $35 and includes a “Love Runs” t-shirt we can all wear while we run (inspired of course by Bob Goff’s Bestselling book Love Does).

All proceeds go to to support my goal to build a classroom (half of a school) in Gulu, Uganda (If you would like to opt out of the t-shirt, the total cost of your ticket will support this cause)***

Here’s the best part. SIGN UP NOW and I’ll give a free copy of Love Does to the first three people who e-mail me (allison@vesterfelt) a copy of their receipt, saying they heard about the race from this post.

The day of the race, take pictures of yourself in your shirt, running and walking, and post them to Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Use the hashtag #LoveRuns and feel free to tag me (@allyvest), Bob Goff (@bobgoff) or Restore International (@restoreintl) to help raise awareness.

What is Restore International?

Restore International is an organization started by Bob Goff, literally to restore justice in the world. For ten years Bob has been using his legal expertise to rescue and rehabilitate, lead investigations, and release people from slave labor.

He’s been bringing justice to the childern of Uganda by providing freedom, legal help and education. You can read more about Restore International here.

Where did this idea come from?

When I realized I was turning 30 on May 30th this year, I knew I wanted to do something special for my birthday, but I also knew I didn’t need more stuff (I just wrote a book called Packing Light, and I’m committed to living with less).

So I reached out to Bob Goff and asked him what I could do if I raised $30,000 (seemed to make sense — 30th birthday, on May 30th = $30,000). When he said we could build a WHOLE classroom in Uganda, I was sold.

I can’t think of a better birthday gift than the gift of education to kids who wouldn’t otherwise have access to it.

How else can I help?

If you want to help in other ways, here are a few things you can do. You can make an additional donation to the project (tax deductable) by clicking this link:

http://www.restoreinternational.org/happybirthdayallison

Also, you can share this event with your friends! If you have a running (or walking) buddy, invite them!

Can’t wait to run with you. Glad we’re in this together.

Click here to tweet about this event.

***If you live in the US, we’ll cover the cost of shipping. If you live outside of the US, additional shipping charges may apply.