Redeeming The Negative Turn

In my last post I discovered a key reason of why I have been struggling with depression. I am definitely feeling better but I know that's not the end of the story. I received many personal messages that were so encouraging to me and I am feeling more confident in the urge to write and share. I believe this will bring about healing in my own life and can also be used as a tool to help anyone else out there who has similar feelings.

Cross at the Capuchin Center

I am working through the workbook Storyline by Donald Miller with my friend Avery. I've been wanting to delve into the process of discovering my story again for awhile and it was so great when I found someone to do it with me. It has kept me accountable and I love that I have someone to share and discuss the process with. 

In the first part of the book we had to plot on a time line our positive and negative turns in our lives. I was really struggling to put down a whole lot of negative turns and I realized that most of my negative turns have turned into positive. Not the positive mushy gushy feelings kind but the kind where you can see redemption in them. This last chapter we worked on we had to take our negative turns and write how they had been redeemed. 

One of my negative turns are our times of infertility. It took two years to conceive Catina with help from doctors and then another two for June. Ada's process wasn't short at 11 months. I struggled with why God would make it so hard for us. Why didn't my babies come to me easily? 

Donald Miller paraphrases in Storyline about when he read about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. 

"Bishop Desmond Tutu was put in charge of a commission to bring healing to his nation after the atrocities of Apartheid. When asked what kind of people he wanted to serve on the commission, Tutu said he wanted victims. Victims, he said, whose lives had been torn apart. He wanted those who had been raped, who had seen their parents killed, who'd had their houses burned to the ground.

But, he said, they cannot have stayed victims. If they serve on the commission, they must be people who have forgiven their oppressors. These people, Tutu, said will be the wounded healers of South Africa."

I am now a wounded healer for those who struggle with infertility. I'm not perfect in it but my heart is always thinking of those who are struggling and The Lord hears my heart often as I pray for their empty arms. I know The Lord is doing the same thing with my new role as "Therapy Mom." My friend Kate sent me a card and wrote that even though I "may not be library mom or homemade bread mom, you are still 'has time for friends mom,' 'girl girls will always know they are loved mom'..." 

I am going to trust and believe this is true and be the best mom for my kids. I am and will continue learn to be a wounded healer for those who are living a different life as a mom than they thought they would. This negative turn can be used for good. It will be redeemed.