Recovery and Rebirth

[taniajc]

Hey all, I’m Tania, 27 years old.
I have struggled with anxiety and depression for as long as I can remember. I had started antidepressants at age 13 and have been on some kind of medication since.

I have been hospitalized twice for my mental health, both of which, in hindsight, I have realized I could feel God telling me to get help as certain urges grew stronger and as I made plans. I am alive because I listened to the intuition to check myself in to ensure my safety.

Before my second hospitalization, I had been struggling a lot with my faith for years, my entire life I have had difficulty, I always felt like I was trying to ask for help and that God “wasn’t listening to me” or “didn’t want to help me.” I felt like I was never going to be able to feel alive. I continued to convince myself that I was just bad at existing.

After my last hospitalization in August 2019, I have had faith and hope and light start to trickle in. I had been diagnosed with Bipolar II Disorder in March of this year, and started mood stabilizers on top of my 2 antidepressants, and my faith has continued to grow and grow since.

I was wondering if anyone else has had the experience of “mood stabilization” or treatment assisting in growing their faith? Or helped them to open their eyes to God’s love?

I know now that all the things I have been through were necessary to get me here and make me who I am. I am confident that God has given me this diagnosis as an answer. I look back and am in awe at the things I was so blind to, the hospital that I checked myself into both times has a statue of Jesus out front with open arms, I have felt the love of God in him urging me to stay alive and keep trying and giving me answers when I was almost ready to give up.

 

[St_Worm2]

Hello @taniajc, I haven't experienced the things that you've gone through health-wise, so I won't be much help to you about that (others here no doubt will be however ), but I did want you to know that I am praying for you, both for your health, and for your continued growth as a believer

I believe that your spiritual insight and understanding about the situation that you've found yourself in could only have come from God. I remember being very confused about all kinds of spiritual matters before I became a believer, but that all changed on the day I came to saving faith in the Lord Jesus (and so it is today as He continues to sanctify me ).

If you've not read it before, here is an interesting passage about why Christians are able to understand God from His POV, and why unbelievers .. see v14 (including those who will one day become Christians) cannot understand the spiritual things that those in Christ are able to .. 1 Corinthians 2:12-16.

I am 34 years a Christian now (I became one on 11/2/86) and I am more convinced now than ever before of His great love for all of us who are or who will be His adopted children, and that He not only 'wants' the very best for us, but will see to it that we 'have' what is best for us (even if we are unable to see it as the best thing for us in the moment ) .. Romans 8:28, 32.

Finally, did you know that as His daughter, there was never a point in time where God chose to love you? .. because He has ~ALWAYS~ loved you. He is from and to everlasting, without beginning or end, and so is His love for you as His adopted child .. e.g. Jeremiah 31:3.

As pastor/theologian Charles Spurgeon once wrote,

"Everlasting love shall be the pillow for my head this night" .. Morning & Evening, Evening, February 27th.​

WELCOME TO CF

God bless you! (Numbers 6:24-26)

--David

1 Thessalonians 5
23 May the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body
be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
24 Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.
​

 

[Fervent]

I've found that God is drawing me closer through all facets of my disorder, treatment included. Through the mood stabilization efforts I've found the joy of discipline. Prior to being on mood stabilizers, I had no "hook" in my day, nothing that was consistent from day to day just an endless stream of passing moments. But because I forget to take my pills if I don't take them at the same time every day it's forced me to set a schedule and stick to it, becoming far more detail conscious(definitely not oriented). Through this I have found ways God communicates with me that I simply need to pay attention to as He directs my life. This has opened up doors of expression for me I never would have been comfortable with, and turned me from someone who always sought to keep everything private into someone who is comfortable opening up to strangers if I think something from my story might help them. God uses all of the circumstances of our lives to grow in us, if we allow Him.

 

[Jeshu]

I was wondering if anyone else has had the experience of “mood stabilization” or treatment assisting in growing their faith? Or helped them to open their eyes to God’s love?

For me it was very much the other way around A.Ds and mood stabilisers would always put me in my lowest moods, and that is where i struggled the hardest with depression and psychoses.

Hence i found God in my lowest point in life, when i was suicidally depressed, and Jesus showed me how i had been sowing bad life in my heart by the bucketful agreeing with my depressive feelings.

Jesus rebuild me with faith in His love which conquered the power of my depression and instead of it sowing bad life in my heart Jesus helping me sowing good life there.

It is now that i understand that rock bottom depression lies about God, ourselves and our neighbour 24/7 and that staying in God's truth is the best weapon to fight its misery.

i'm really happy to hear that your recovery was with Jesus and that you found a rebirth in more than one way. At whatever stage we meet Jesus, His loving truth is very best.

Do ask Him to make you strong for when depression comes back, so that you will not again feel estranged from God because of your depression, but that you understand God can aid us at whatever stage we are in our lives.

Peace.