On this Monday morning I wanted to continue our talk about this book: Strong Women soft hearts by Paula Rinehart.
We are continuing in Chapter 3 and that may be all I end up writing about from this book, but there are so many other wonderful gems found in this book that I highly recommend that you find you a copy and read it, and also do the questions in the study guide in the back of the book. I really like a good study guide, and this one is great. It really makes you think about the chapter you just read and apply it to your life. This is a very well put together book.The Faces of Pain:
"Pain - emotional pain - is a curious thing. It takes place on an invisible level, yet it has the potential to actually shape the real stuff of a person's future. It can numb and destroy our passion in life, but it can refine and bless as well. When you're hurting , no amount of logic or rational thought will make it go away."
This idea of "...Faces of Pain" was very intriguing to me. I don't know that I had ever really given it a ton of thought. I just knew one over lying truth about pain in any form: it hurts.
But there are many different forms of pain and it comes in all shapes and sizes. There are very big pains that are obvious and leave gaping holes, and yet there are those smaller pains, you know, the ones the eat away at you and over time become a deep pain that takes a long time to get to the root of.
In this particular paragraph, Paula is writing about emotional pain. Emotional pain itself has many faces, and can put on or mask itself in many ways. Yep it is the stuff of emotional pain that causes much hurt and often despair in a persons life.
You can't reach out and touch emotional pain, like you can a physical pain. When my knee is hurting, I can put an ice bag on it, or rub it, or do many and various types of exercises that I've been shown to help ease it, but emotional pain is different. You can't see it in a physical sense like you can my knee, but oh can you see its manifestations. Often the manifestation of the emotional pain is deemed the problem, when really it is only the symptom.
For many years I struggled with food addiction. I'd go up and down on the scale, and with each up and down my emotions would get more and more out of control, until one day I started binging and purging and found that I could satisfy that craving and then go purge and not feel the guilt of that craving. This went on for some time in my life and the curious thing about this was that I never saw it as wrong. I mean after all, I wasn't hurting any one (ahem, really Dawn?) and nobody knew. I was keeping my weight down and eating healthy for all to see from the outside, so what was the harm.
Well, the harm was what I was doing to myself, and of course, it was wrong. One day I was listening to Christian radio, (Praise Jesus for Christian radio) and there was a lady on there talking about food addictions and bilema and how it was sin. I know your gonna think this is crazy, but I had never thought that food addiction was before that day. I know, nieve little thing huh? And I was a grown woman, married and living my life. Listen, this was such a lie of the enemy in my life, that HAD to be over come. Once I realized what I was doing was sin, it had to stop, but by that time, it was a strong hold in my life. I went to my husband and told him what was going on. He was stunned. He had no idea, but he loved me anyway. He helped me through it, and today I am completely free from it, thanks to Jesus Christ in my life and the leading and guiding of my husband and friends. But getting free from it was quite a process. I had to be held accountable for my actions. My husband held me accountable and so did a very good friend of mine. She would ask me the tough questions that I HAD to answer and some weeks I answered in victory and others in defeat, but over the course of time, God helped me to see things differently, to see myself differently, and today I don't think about binging and purging anymore, although food is still a struggle for me at times. It is a deeply personal journey that God continues to teach me through. It is a beautiful thing.
I say all of that to say this, the emotional pain that I was feeling, fueled the physical manifestation of that pain. The food addiction wasn't the problem, but rather the symptom, and that is something that I had to understand and deal with at it's root, if I was ever to be free from it. It was a long process and one I am still on today, because I never want to be back at that place, so I keep my eyes open. I am a conscious live-r today. I don't walk around with my eyes closed, putting on the happy face. If I'm sad, I'm sad. If I'm stressed, I'm stressed. If I've had a bad day, it is what it is. But ALWAYS I live with an expectancy in my heart for Jesus. I love seeing Him move and work in my life and in the lives of the ones I love. It is truly an amazing thing. I live with expectancy and hope.
When I sat down to write this post, this was not a course I had even thought it would take, but it did. So I hope that for whomever this was written for, that you know there is hope beyond addiction, whatever it may be. And if you struggle with food addiction specifically, and would like to talk with me more about it, please feel free to e-mail me.
I believe that valley experiences happen in our lives for a reason. And for me, I am hoping that I can be a Blessing to someone else by sharing what I have learned along this journey of life.
Thank you for reading and have a Blessed and Beautiful day,
