Perfect Love Casts out All Fear

I have such a hard time believing that God loves me just as I am. Even worse, I have a hard time loving myself. I am scared of being left by those that I love the most, I’m scared of not being good enough, of being weak, of not praying right, of not going to Mass enough, of being bad, of saying the wrong things, of not writing enough, of my house being dirty, of not being a doormat, of being a bitch and so many other things. I live my life on the edge of a cliff of fear all day long and the saddest part about it is that I didn’t even realize it until four days ago when the lights went out in my home and I had flipped out after months of learning how not to flip out. I had no clue where all of that fear came from or why no matter what I did it wouldn’t go away. I had done novenas, confessions, general confessions, spiritual direction, Al Anon, therapy, and tons of Masses, yet it was still there; sometimes hidden, but still there.

I had every right to be upset and concerned about our light situation, but what I didn’t have a right to do was act as if my husband is just another child for me to handle. Especially since most of my days have consisted of lying on the couch hating my life and being on Facebook and neither of those pays. It is hard to detach from the feminist narrative that men are to be tolerated as long as they behave and do as they are told while being treated like another one of our kids that we have to “put up with”. Even after all these years of coming to understand that my husband is the leader of this family and all that means, including the fact that doesn’t mean he gets to oppress me, I still act as if he is another child around here. What I fail to do is look at how I contribute to the problems around here and realize that I am the only person in this house that I am in control of.

My husband is not perfect, he has plenty of his own issues, but what I am figuring out is that I have never really sat down and really taken a long hard look at how my own actions. I can take a look at my sins, confess them, relish in absolution, but when it comes to what fuels those sins, I just try to say that is “just how I am”. The truth is that it isn’t how I am, it is how I have become after a life of having my heart broken from not having a father and mother who loved each other teach me how to love myself and others by modeling it for me and raising me in a safe home. Not having that left me with a huge fear of abandonment. I am living life reacting to all of my wounds instead of giving them to the only Person who can heal them; Jesus.

This past weekend I went to a retreat called Healing the Whole Person. I mostly went thinking that it was to fix my husband and my marriage. I didn’t think that I really had any use for it at all because I have dealt with so many of my issues already and the one who hasn’t (in my opinion) was my husband. What a lie that was. During the closing Mass God made it very clear to me that He has tried to get me to understand that I am a stumbling block to Him being able to help my husband. That I need to stop trying to fix him, our marriage and everyone else and learn how to love and it starts by forgiving people.

I hold grudges like they are a life saver when really they are causing me to drown. One of those grudges has been against God Himself for letting me go through what I have gone through in my life. I had no idea. I had come to the conclusion that God allows all things out of love for us, and I knew that He can use everything that has happened to me for the good of others so I thought that I was over it. I was wrong. I was not over. I sat there in Adoration yelling at Him for giving me shitty parents, allowing a man to abuse me while He watched, letting me fall for these men when all I wanted was love and all they wanted was to get in my pants, and for letting me marry a man who obviously didn’t love me enough to stay awake during a retreat.  Everything that I had held in to be “good” and not “offend God” came out, and He took it. I have a choice to hold on to that anger and unforgiveness or I can choose to detach myself from it and go to Christ who is always waiting for me with open arms.

In the name of Jesus, I renounce the anger and unforgiveness and in the Name of Jesus I renounce the lie that I am not loved, that I am not good enough and that I will never let anyone hurt me again. In the name of Jesus I renounce all the fear that comes from those things. Perfect Love casts out all fear.