Category: my life

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have made quite a few changes lately. I will try to list most of them. Sometimes it seems like a lot, but changes always happen. It has been accelerated, but I think part of it is that these changes all work together.

• Church on Sundays was shortened to two hours.
• We now have a home-based curriculum, Come Follow Me, and lessons in Sunday school, seminary, primary, and youth organizations relate to that curriculum.
• Visiting and home teaching were changed to ministering.
• High priest groups and elder’s quorum were combined into one elder’s quorum. Relief society and Elder’s quorum now have increased responsibilities in order for the bishop to lead youth.
• The young men’s presidency was discontinued. The young women have a new theme with increased class flexibility.
• Children and youth change classes in January and young men can be ordained in January instead of waiting for their birthday.
• Youth and children activities were changed to a worldwide program that is home-centered and church supported, that is more flexible.
• There were some changes in the temple, including making it a bit shorter.
• Temple recommend questions were revised and published.
• Many, many temples were announced.
• Women and youth can now witness ordinances.
• Increased emphasis on the church name.
• Missionaries can have increased communication with their families. Sister missionaries can wear pants and missionaries get their calls online.
• Most church pageants were discontinued.
• There were changes to policies regarding the children of LGBT parents.
• Book of Mormon videos were made.
• A new history of the church was started and published.
• There will be revisions to the hymn book and children’s songbook.

I have been nervous sometimes about any upcoming changes. Sometimes change can be hard. I’ve had weird dreams sometimes when something happens in the church and it isn’t right and I just feel weird and sick inside. And then I wake up and I’m glad it’s a dream.

But these changes haven’t been hard at all. They have been wonderful and exciting. They’ve enabled me and my family to come closer to Jesus Christ and learn together. It’s allowed more unity and more flexibility. I feel so happy when I think of them, and it makes me rejoice a little bit inside.

Sometimes it doesn’t feel like a change at all, more like things are settling and evolving into what I always thought they would be. I was doing ministering before it was called ministering. I had increased my gospel instruction in the home before Come Follow Me. I even had two-hour church for a while when a church building was being renovated.

The Lord prepares us so that when things change, we are ready, and the changes don’t seem that big at all. Even in my own personal life, as I have gone through some changes, when I rely on the Lord, nothing is too hard or too jolting and everything just settles into place exactly as it should.

I love that feeling of being able to start to see the big picture instead of individual puzzle pieces. Things just feel right inside–I feel peace and joy.

It’s been an exciting time. I can’t wait for what is to come and I know that I don’t have to be afraid. I can trust in the Lord.

Sometimes I feel silly putting things like time with my husband and kids on my to-do list. It’s important. But it’s not urgent. And it’s not something that I just check off and I’m done with it. It’s important and ongoing.

But when I start putting the important things on my to do list, I do them better. I spend more time with my family. I remember to spend time with other people. I remember that I should be serving instead of selfishly focusing on my own goals.

The important things really should be on the top of the list. Instead of cleaning my house first, I would much prefer to spend time with my kids. Instead of finishing my work on the computer, I would much rather talk with my husband.

So I’m going to leave the really important things on my list, and try to prioritize them above everything else.

Today I was a bit angry and I said, “I never get time for myself!”

That is a lie. I get plenty of time for myself. I take classes, I exercise, I read a lot, I go to book club. I enjoy cooking and hiking and I get to watch the movies I like. I have a lot of time for myself.

But I get selfish, thinking that it’s never enough. And the crazy thing is that time for myself doesn’t really make me happy at all. I am a lot happier when I with other people, teaching my kids and spending time with my husband and other family members and friends.

It’s selfish to think that I need more time for myself. I already have plenty. Happiness doesn’t come in self-fulfillment, but in giving your life to others and helping and serving them.

Last post, I talked about struggles with mental health. When I have struggled, I have often prayed, sometimes in desperation, asking over and over for help. And there have been often times when I didn’t feel anything.

I wanted the peace of the Spirit so many times, and I couldn’t feel it. Recently, I read the book Silent Souls Weeping, by Jane Clayson Johnson, and in the beginning of the book it talks about how people who are struggling and afflicted with depression and other issues sometimes can’t feel the Spirit. The book mentioned an analogy where there was electricity coming in, but the switch was off. The Spirit is like the electricity. And it is still there, but sometimes I have been unable to feel it because the switch was off.

I think sometimes it’s like noise: my brain gets so incredibly noisy sometimes with racing thoughts and overwhelming emotions that I literally can’t hear anything else. I can’t hear or feel the Spirit, even though it is still there.

Sometimes I have felt like I was all alone. But I was never really alone. And the Lord has helped me in the ways that I really needed it, through very small and simple things.

Now, I don’t have all the answers. Sometimes I wanted help that wasn’t there. I simply wanted healing and peace that didn’t come. It was really hard without a reason.

But other times, people have called or texted at the exact right time. My children have been protected from harm. I’ve been able to do things beyond my capabilities.

I’ve received priesthood blessings that have not only provided comfort, but have literally calmed my mind. I know that others have prayed for me as well when I have been struggling. My mom and my husband especially has been a huge support. One time, my mom came and helped clean up the cereal that was spread across my entire house. My husband has fixed meals and put the kids to bed and even taken time off work to help me.

And throughout this all, I am so grateful for the commandments that have helped me live my life without further complications. I had a happy home growing up. I have never tried alcohol and drugs. I always knew my values and the direction I wanted my life to go.

And I have relied on my Savior, Jesus Christ, knowing that he can heal me, and he can heal those that I have hurt along the way, especially my children and my husband. I know there is always hope in him.

I used to get in downward spirals of despair, thinking that there was no way out, that there was nothing I could do and I was worthless and beyond saving. Things just hurt sometimes. But when I remember the atonement of Jesus Christ, it shuts down those downward spirals and helps me come up again. Because I am never beyond saving. I am never beyond hope.

I know that know, more deeply than I did before. I can return to my Lord over and over again, and he offers healing and peace.

A few months after the birth of my third child, I was diagnosed with Grave’s Disease or hyperthyroidism, where my thyroid was working too hard. Medication worked really well, putting me back to normal with no side effects. I went into remission and then relapsed two and a half years later, but medication worked again. Overall, it’s mostly a minor and uninteresting part of my life.

But that’s not my only chronic health condition, and the second one is a lot harder to talk about. It’s been around a lot longer and it’s been a longer journey to diagnose and treat. And I hesitate to talk about it to people. I have mental health problems; specifically I deal with bipolar 2.

Quite a few years ago, I went to the doctor and mentioned depression and I was put on antidepressants that didn’t really work. One other doctor was simply dismissive, and none of them really asked that much about my symptoms. I set out on my own to try to fix myself, reading books about cognitive behavior therapy and other sorts of therapy. I exercised and tried to make friends and live the best life I could. But I really just wanted the issue to go away. And I thought it would go away, if I was strong enough and worked hard enough at it and my life was in the best place it could be.

The depression never really lasted that long anyway. The older I got, the more I wondered if I was really dealing with depression. I would read about bipolar or borderline personality disorder and sometimes I wanted there to be another name out there to describe how I was feeling.

When I looked back at my journals, I could see an instability in the way I felt and dealt with life. Some days and weeks were normal and good and happy and I felt like myself, with the normal ups and downs of living. But then sometimes those ups and downs would be exaggerated and all over the place. There were days when I could do so much, focused and motivated. But then I would try to repeat those days, and I couldn’t. There were days when I did very little, falling down into sadness and discouragement. And there were other sorts of days too: days when I would get extremely irritable. Days when I couldn’t really function and it literally felt like my brain simply wasn’t working. Days when I screamed or ran away or wanted to hurt myself because of the mental anguish I was feeling.

It has been really hard lately, and the last few months have been some of the most difficult in my life. I would search things and search things, trying to figure out what to do. I wasn’t depressed. I wasn’t manic. I was just not right some of the time and I didn’t know what to do about it.

And then I found a picture that sort of showed how I was feeling. It looked like this:

Source:  https://psycheducation.org

I read about bipolarity being a spectrum disorder. I read about people who felt like I had.

Every morning, I was reading mental health books, writing gratitude and doing therapy exercises, and I started meditating as well. One meditation I listened to talked about going and visiting my older self. And so I imagined talking to an older version of myself, and I told myself that I didn’t have to do this alone, and that I could go and get help.

So with finally understanding that I wasn’t alone in how I felt, I didn’t need to isolate and hide my problems, and that I really did need help and couldn’t fix it by myself, I finally called someone.

I went to a psychiatric nurse practitioner and I got a prescription for a mood stabilizer. I read about lifestyle changes that I could make that would help me more. I went to my mom’s house for two weeks to be around more people and get my feet underneath me again, since I had not been very functional.

And things are helping. I’ve finally accepted that this isn’t going to just go away, but I can deal with it too the best I can and seek help from others.

My conclusion in all of this is that if you are dealing with depression or anxiety or something that you don’t understand at all, you’re not alone. It’s okay. It doesn’t make you a bad person and there is help and hope ahead.

And here is my follow-up post about the Lord’s help through all of this.

I like to make lists. But then I have a problem: I am so caught up in getting the list done and checking it off that I don’t spend any time actually enjoying what I’m doing.

This creates a lot of stress in my life because I am rarely present and mindful. Instead, I just think about getting it done and over with. It drains enjoyment out of anything to think that way. When the biggest thrill in my life is checking something off, that’s a problem.

I don’t need to accomplish everything on my to-do list. It’s not the point of life. I don’t want to have a lifetime of just accomplishing stuff that doesn’t always matter that much. I want to develop relationships. I want to build up a home that is filled with love, instead of just a home that is neatly organized and clean.

Instead of just cooking a meal to get it over with, it’s so much better to slow down a bit and take the time to cook a nice meal and even make it fancy or different. Instead of just rushing through schoolwork, it’s better to focus on the problems and the papers and to recognize how you are learning and progressing. Smiling through exercise helps me do more. Laughing with my kids helps them feel loved.

Today I made a really long to-do list. There is no way at all that I am going to get everything done on it. But that’s sort of the point. I don’t need a perfect, productive day. I just need to live and enjoy all the interruptions. Sometimes I need to learn how to leave things undone, and keep living off of what I value instead of just trying to be a productivity machine.