Today there was a bug in my bedroom. I had to deal with it by myself. I was able to do it and afterwards I didn’t spend hours feeling like something was crawling on me. That isn’t normal for me. What is normal for me is having difficulty with killing the bug, not being able to dispose of it myself, and then spending hours feeling like something is crawling on me even when it isn’t.
The only change in my life is my mother has died. I couldn’t figure out how my mother not being in my life could possibly have anything to do with my phobia with bugs. Then, my husband gave me the idea that if you remove one stressor it is easier to deal with all the rest.
The easiest way to put it is a metaphor. My mom was like an electrode that would randomly buzz me all the time with painful pulses of electricity. I would never know when the buzzes would come or how painful the pulses would be. I would be in a constant state of dread and anxiety knowing that at any time I could get hit with a painful pulse of electricity. In that state, anything else that caused me anxiety would be difficult and challenging to deal with because I was already in a heightened state of anxiety. Once my mother passed away, those pulses went away. I slowly stopped being in that heightened state of anxiety. Slowly things that were challenging to deal with weren’t that bad because I wasn’t dealing with so much anymore.
When my mother was alive, I often told my husband that I wasn’t going to be happy or sad when she passed away. I told him I was going to be relieved. I am finding her death is much more significant to me than I ever realized. I am finding myself in a great state of relief. I spent so many years on guard constantly trying to protect myself from the pain and now it’s over. The strangest part is I don’t even realize how much a difference it makes yet. I feel like I am living in a strange brave new world.
I would be scared except now that she’s gone, I know that I’m okay. God will be with me always and I don’t need to constantly be on guard anymore. I don’t need to constantly be paranoid. The world isn’t a dangerous place. It is a gift given by God. And no matter what happens now, I am grateful every day of my life for it.
My faith saved me. May God’s peace reside in all of our hearts.
