I was a fairly normal kid. I went through some stuff that makes me stick out a bit, but overall, I was pretty average. I had friends who lived nearby, and we would knock on each other's doors to come play instead of texting if they were free. We played army (I was always the nurse who sang hymns to the wounded soldiers), and super heroes, we sneaked into the neighbors' backyards to catch tadpoles in the little stream behind their house, and run when we thought we heard someone coming.
I also so much looked forward to growing up. I thought it would be so simple. I'd get older, go to college, get married, have kids, and that would be it, right?
I didn't know that life isn't like that. It's not that easy. I didn't know that I would deal with 13+ years of PTSD from stuff that happened when I was a kid. I didn't know that a whole new trauma would occur when I struck out on my own and moved to another state. I didn't realize that when I moved back, my parents would move away, and my Pawpaw would die, and my church would fall apart- and me right with it. Even when I turned 15, and I got dunked under water to symbolize being washed by the blood of Jesus, I didn't know it would be this hard. I didn't think it would be easy, but I thought that the hardship would come in the form of persecution and standing up for Jesus. I didn't think it would be feeling like I'm slowly going mad, where one day praise is on my lips and the next, I don't know what I believe anymore. I didn't think that it would be like this.
I thought that my whole life would be set to go. I had such a clear plan and idea of what would happen, but life will never be like that. It's messy. You make mistakes and hold them over yourself for years, you pretend to be okay because maybe if you tell yourself that enough times, you will be. But I wasn't prepared for this. And now I'm losing my faith one mustard seed at a time, and I feel like I'm slowly going insane, and I don't know what to do because I'm screaming at a God that I'm trying to believe in, but it's not getting any easier. And I'm not asking for someone to tell me that God isn't real, and that is okay to think that because it's not. And I'm not asking for pity, or promises that it will get better. I guess I'm asking for help. And also, what the hell were we all so excited about?
