TFWH: LYDIA'S STORY OF SOBRIETY

I have heard that it is important to know where God has brought you from so that you can get a more clear picture of where it is God is going to take you. Well I would love to share with you my story of what God has brought me from. My hope for sharing this story is that someone, somewhere reading this story would know that there is a God that is desperately seeking to have a relationship with you. That when you finished reading my story you would know that there is no place you can go that the love of God canʼt reach. Godʼs love will meet you where ever you are, in the middle of our mess, that is where I found God. God is not surprised by our stories, instead He is a transformational God that wants to redeem and restore our lives. My God does not use the perfect, the healthy, or the wealthy ones- no repeatedly, God uses the willing, the weak, the broken, the ‘poor in spiritʼ; He came to save us all. He loves us in our sin, in-spite of our sin and says,” Here is the way out, follow me, I will show you the way.” 

This is my story of how God met me in the middle of my darkness and brought me to the light. My life has been restored and redeemed in a way that I never thought was possible. You see God did for me what I could not do for myself, He saved me from myself. 

I grew up believing in God at a very young age and I remember asking God into my heart at a very young age. 

Actually, I remember asking God into my heart almost every day. We would watch this gospel video and at the end was an invitation to invite Jesus to be your Lord and Savior and to come and live in your heart. Every time that show would end, I would ask Jesus to come and live in my heart. My childhood was normal from what I can remember, its all that I knew to be normal. I am one of 6 children, I have two older brothers that are 11 and 10 years older than me, my sister, myself and my twin, and then my younger brother. I was born a twin, however my twin was born breach. My parents choose to do a home birth and my twin brother never took a breath on his own. As a child I believe that I suffered from survivors guilt and so much sadness. I felt like a part of my heart was missing and as a family we just didnʼt really talk about what happened. Talking about this loss made everyone so sad that I just stopped asking questions. We didnʼt talk about him and there was so much pain there that wasnʼt really processed until I turned 30. The weight and depth of this loss meant more to me after becoming a mother and I was able to show so much more empathy to my Mom that I had ever been able to show her before. Sometimes I leave this part of my story out but I do think that it is important to get the full picture. I used to feel this huge sense of responsibility to make sure that my life was something amazing! I was living for two people, that is how I absorbed his death, it was my responsibility to make my life count. 

Growing up, my Dad owned his own business and my Mom worked along side of him. We had nice things, nice cars, nice clothes, a really nice house, all of my immediate needs were met. Then came middle school and everything changed; there was life before my Dadʼs heart attack and then there was life after my Dadʼs heart attack. He was in court for his second DUI and had congestive heart failure, which is where your lungs start filling up with fluid. He was airlifted downtown to Jewish Hospital and taken into surgery where he coded on the table. He had quadruple bi-pass surgery and it was nothing short of a miracle that he made it out. He was in the hospital in and out for the next 3 months with staff infections and just his overall recovery. 

It has taken me a lot of hours in therapy to finally get to a place where I could remember the events that happened during this time and they are still a little clouded. What I remember about this time is that everything felt in chaos. My Mom was not ok, she did have an emotional break down and was later diagnosed with Bi-Polar disorder. It felt like I lost both of my parents and in a way who they were before this event was lost. My Dad would stayed in the hospital recovering and my Mom tried to hold down his business and the family. 

Getting past “middle school” Lydia has been challenging at times. To get past the confusion, feeling scared alone and uncertain of what was going to happen next. One response to trauma is to freeze, I froze there in this emotional state, unable to move forward for a long time. This event forever changed my life and changed the life of my family. I learned to be quiet, to be small, to not ask for help, to stay out of the way, to be self-reilant. This also bred a lot of resentment within me, I started resenting the fact that my parents were not able to be who it was that I wanted and needed them to be. I resented that my home felt different. I felt ashamed, I felt embarrassed about the behaviors going on at my house and hated that I was not able to explain some of the insanity that went on behind closed doors. 

We were Christians, we believed in God, we went to church, if looked at my family from the outside you would have thought that we had everything, yet we were not doing ok. Just underneath the surface was resentment, fear, alcoholism, mental illness, disappointment, and shame. 

I began looking for acceptance, for love, for belonging, for something or someone to make me feel better; different and enough. I began comparing my insides to other peopleʼs outsides and feeling inadequate, that I somehow lacked what everyone else seemed to have. It started with, if I could just be popular, if the “cool” kids could just accept me then I could feel enough, then it was if I could just make the cheerleading team then I will feel enough, if I could just have the right clothes, if I could just date the right guy, it was always something on the outside that I was looking to, to fill this ache inside of my heart. 

What I found at the end of high school and college was the combination of alcohol and sex; the alcohol made me not feel, it helped take the edge off, it helped me quiet everything that was going on inside of me. It did for me what I seemed to be unable to do for myself; somehow it made me feel enough. It made me feel pretty, funny, social, and warm all over. It also made my inhibitions go out the window and I was all about having a good time, so I thought. The attention that I received from men was also an addiction for me, it was something that I craved, it made me feel desirable and wanted. The problem with both of these appetites is that I continued to need more and more in order to get the same ‘highʼ and to not feel the shame. My drinking increased in college and I did, said, went and took my body to some places that I am ashamed of. I compromised everything... my morals, my beliefs, I felt my whole life was one big dishonest lie. There was who you thought that I was, and then there was who I knew that I was when no one was watching. 

I did meet my first husband in college, he was older than I was and treated me differently than anyone I had dated up until this point. He was focused, determined, stable and felt safe. I think that he continued to think that I would faze out of my drinking, that eventually I would be ready to settle down. I continued to try and change him too, I thought that if he were only more like me we would have more fun. I wish that I had been a better wife to him, I wish that I had been able to show up to our marriage the way that I committed to show up to our marriage, but I simply was not capable of it at the time. I was not able to be honest with him about my drinking, about who I was because to be honest I donʼt think that I truly even knew who I was. I donʼt believe that we can allow someone to love us until we know and love ourselves. 

I was unfaithful in the marriage, emotionally first, continuing relationships with past boyfriends that didnʼt have a place in our marriage. The next piece is still really painful for me at times, but I was not able to be physically faithful in our marriage. I was unable to control my behavior when I drank and often would black out. The night I cheated on my then husband was one of those nights. A night that started out like most but a night that would forever change my life. I remember waking up that next morning and literally wanting to die. I remember thinking, you have done it this time Lydia, you have totally ruined your life. You canʼt tell anyone. You will have to take this secret to your grave. 

I often say that the best that I can do while drinking is to let the person that I loved and cared about know that I had cheated on him and that I wanted a divorce from 3 states away. I think that I felt like if I said I wanted a divorce first I could save myself from the pain of what I had done. There were a lot of decisions that I made during that time that were very hurtful, filled with anger, and I was not capable of looking at my part. I was so broken, so lost, and continued to hurt those around me and those that were closest to me. I spiraled, continuing to look for something or someone outside of myself to make me feel enough, valued and loved. 

My drinking actually increased for about 3 months after this happened. During these months I moved back in with my Dad, I was at the house that I grew up in. I will never forget this moment, I was trying to put by curtain up in my room. I tried over and over to do it alone and could not do it by myself. I burst into tears and decided to go outside and sit in our gazebo. I remember looking up at the sky and crying and questioning God. I told God, I canʼt...I canʼt keep carrying this shame around, this façade that everything is ok, that I have got it all together, I canʼt keep going out every night and drinking myself into a black-out, making decisions for myself that I would not make otherwise, I canʼt keep going on like this. I felt so broken, alone, rejected and full of shame. Then the most beautiful song came to my mind. It was a song that I had sung many many times and it was simple, “Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so, little ones to him belong, they are weak but he is strong. Yes Jesus Loves me, Yes Jesus love me, Yes Jesus loves me, the Bible tells me so.” My whole life I heard that God loves us just as we are. If that was true then i decided that God had to love me exactly how I was, broken. In that moment I knew that I not only wanted God but that I desperately needed a savior. I accepted the gift of salvation in that moment for what I believe was the first time. 

I was stuck in the bondage of shame, that if you really knew the true me that you would reject me. What I know to be true today is that, the enemy has used this lie against me for far too long. The exact opposite has been evident in my life. Once I was finally able to break down the walls that I had built up around my heart Godʼs love started pouring in. Shining the love and the light of Jesus into all of the dark places, all of the places that I thought I would never share, never expose to another, Godʼs love started to pour into those spaces. I accepted the forgiveness that Jesus came to give a sinner just like me. For I was lost but now I am found. I was blind but now I see. God came to save a broken sinner just like me and what a relief that the only requirement for forgiveness is acceptance. I was never able to get past being a victim of my circumstances, of growing up in alcoholism and mental illness. I was unable to see my part, to be completely honest with myself and with others. I got to a point in my life 9 years ago where I could no longer blame my circumstances on anyone other than myself. I had created my own caoce through my choices and mainly my choices while drinking. I hurt my ex-husband, a lot. I was not able to be the type of wife that I committed to being, to be faithful to him only, I was not able to do that while I was drinking. One of my largest regrets, my greatest source of shame, God was able to use to push me closer to Him. I have come to understand that this is how God works, through our weakness he is strong, a source of strength and hope. 

My sobriety date is July 29,2010 and for that date I am forever grateful. I havenʼt done it perfectly. What I have continued to do is not take a drink a day at a time, no matter what. I have continued to grow along spiritual lines, to seek, to look at my behavior. I have had to look at how am I showing up to my life, for those I love, in all of my relationships? To be honest no matter what, to let people in, to let the light of God into my life. 

A lot of life that has happened in the last 9 years. What does it mean to be sober and sparkly, 9 years later? It means everything. Sobriety has given me a life beyond anything I could have ever wanted or expected for myself. 

What I would tell my 25 year old self from 9 years ago is this, you will get to be a wife again, you will get to a mother, you will be able to love deeper than you even thought possible, you will experience bliss, joy, gratitude. You will also experience moments of grief, sadness, loss and disappointment. You will question yourself, you will question God. You are about to go on a spiritual journey and your life is about to be transformed. It is an inside job, so get ready. Girl, YOU can do hard things!!! You can. You will. You are resilient, you are beautiful, in all your humanness, in all of your imperfections. Donʼt worry love, God will use it all. Every hurt, every hardship, EVERYTHING... He uses it all. You will know peace, happiness and a sense of belonging. You will rise from the ashes a new woman. You will learn how to give love to your own self, you will learn how to live and love and be present for those you love. The very best years of your life lay ahead of you. Brene Brown talks about how sobriety is her super power and I can 100% relate. Sobriety has saved my life. 

The message that I hope to share with those around me, those reading this, is that more than anything there is NOWHERE that Godʼs love canʼt reach. That there is a God that loves you so much that he will search for you, he will wait for you, His love is long, and wide and deep. There is no mountain he wonʼt climb up, no wall he wonʼt kick down, no where that Godʼs love wonʼt go coming after YOU. We are not saved by “doing good”, being good, being well liked, pretty, rich, or successful. We are saved by and through grace. We have been given a free gift, a gift of love, grace, acceptance and freedom. 

Freedom to walk out of the chains of bondage. The bondage of alcoholism, the bondage of shame, the bondage of co-dependency, the bondage of self-seeking approval, the bondage of dishonesty, the bondage of guilt, the bondage of who and what social media says that we need to be, the bondage of never feeling enough, the bondage of if only I can get somewhere else then I will be happy. God sent Jesus to save us all- we are all in need of a savior. A God that is in the making all things new business, in the making a way business, in the transformation business. I would love to introduce you to my friend Jesus, in him I have found everything. Forgiveness and newness of life, a plan, a purpose, a freedom, a happiness, a joy that cannot be contained, a love that has healed this broken heart and made it new. My life has been transformed, it has been redeemed, restored, and renewed. Godʼs love transformed me and it can do the same for you when you surrender your life and accept the free gift that only Jesus can give. There is nothing that this world can offer than only a spiritual solution was meant to fill.