I didn’t notice anything different that day; it was a day
like any other - a Wednesday and my first day back at work after a long
weekend. I went along with my flatmate
to home group like I do every Wednesday night.
Tonight’s session was on John Chapter 18 and 19, the crucifixion of our
Lord and Saviour. I quietly observed
that the turn out wasn’t as big as usual; a few of the girls I usually see
weren’t around on this particular evening.
As one cell member was moving house during the course of
this week, a couple of guys and girls departed to go and lend a hand in box
moving while the remainder of us stayed for discussion. I sat next a regular in the circle - a very polite,
traditional and friendly man who was always welcoming and happy to have a chat. We started off by watching a dvd clip about
the persecution Jesus faced in the lead up to his death, the beatings he
endured and then finally his death on the cross (parts of which I had to avert
my eyes from).
Still nothing unusual.
Jenny* was leading the study tonight, we listened to her and
there was a bit of feedback from around the room. I remember thinking that Jesus cried out “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
just before he died on the cross, but this wasn’t illustrated in the clip we’d
just seen.
Next Jenny decided it was a good idea if we went around the
room and read a paragraph or so each from John starting at chapter 18 and
working through to 19.
I remember thinking I wanted to do this, I wanted to
contribute as much as the next person and I was willing to do it. I know I am reserved, and in group situations
I tend not to say much, if anything, simply because I am inclined to go blank
in groups. But reading – the answer is right there in front of me, isn’t it? I was the second to last in the circle who
would read. And as each person has a
turn and my turn gradually approaches everything changes....
My heart starts pounding so hard I can hear it in my ears, I
don’t want to look down at my shirt as I’m certain the pulsing can be seen from
the outside. My hands sweat and I
remember when I was a teenager in high school and how I didn’t like to read
then either and I’d get sweaty hands.
Actually, I didn’t even like to answer during roll call in high
school. You’d think saying something as
simple as “yes”, exactly the same as everyone else in the room wasn’t a big
deal. But for me, it was, it was the
cause of much anxiety every morning and half the time I would loos my voice and
when I went to speak nothing would project out of my mouth.
I prayed. I prayed to
God, and pleaded for Him to help me, to settle my nerves and to allow me to
relax and be myself. But I also feared;
I feared He wouldn’t come through for me.
So much praying I have done in my life and I can’t really recount the
times it seems my prayers went a miss. Tonight,
unfortunately, was not an exception. The
chap next to me reads, and I wonder how this is going to go. I think that once I start reading, and I hear
myself and know that I can and am doing it, it will all be ok. So goes my turn. I start reading, and my voice is loud enough,
but it isn’t easy and I know this instantly.
I need to breathe more, I need to swallow saliva, how do I time this
with reading though? And so the panic sets in. I don’t know how convincing that was to those
around me. I wonder if they think I’m
overcome with emotion by the topic, as this is how my voice sounds - almost like I’m trying not to cry. I end and pass the next bit on to the girl on
my right.
It doesn’t stop there though, apparently we are good for
another round. Why can’t one person just
say “yep, I’ll read the rest”, but no.
We’ve still got all of chapter 19 to go and I thumb through to see
exactly how long it is (long!). There is
certainly enough to come around to my turn again, and then some. I can’t
take it - I don’t want to be here. This is ridiculous, I think in my
logical thinking. I count the people in
the room and there are twelve. Only twelve I think to myself, yet I’m
not comforted in the slightest by this seemingly small number. There might as well be twelve hundred.
My heart is hammering with almighty heaves once again and
this time I don’t know if I really can go through with it. With a lot of things in life, even when I’ve
been initially anxious, what I’ve found is that once I’ve done it and I’ve seen
that you can do it, it gets gradually easier from there on in. But I failed round one tonight and the
combination of everything going on inside my head and in my chest makes me feel
highly emotional.
Run to the toilet and
save yourself, I keep thinking. I
seriously consider this as an option, and looking back part of me wishes I had
done it. But I’m feeling faint, my hands
are shaking and sweating, and the rate of my heart is scaring me. If I pass out in the toilet, how long will it
be before I’m found? And when I am
found, passed out, crying or otherwise, how will I explain this to
everybody? How can I talk to them at all
about this embarrassing ordeal when I can barely read aloud a few simple
words? I contemplate blurting out “I’m
not feeling well”, then walking out or asking flatmate if he’d mind taking me
home. At least it’s a little more common
than “I think this reading in a group is going to give me a heart attack”. But that is literally how I feel, on the
verge of a heart attack. If I say I’m
not feeling well I suppose they’ll ask flatmate if I’m ok. And he’ll say what he knows – that as far as
he knew I was fine. And I was fine,
before now.
Now I read again, but it’s the worst out loud reading I
think I’ve done in my life. My heart is
relentlessly pounding and I can barely restrain the quivering in my voice. Run! I don’t though, I press on, because I want to
be normal. I want it to be simply my
turn with no strings attached. I want to
feel what everyone else in the room is feeling right now – relaxed and thinking
about the topic at hand. I have no idea
what I read or what it was about. I only
remember having to stop after every three or four words to try to calm the
inner turmoil enough to huff out another few.
This is one of the hardest things
I have ever had to do. Why? Why can’t I be normal? Stop it
I tell myself, and God please make these feelings disappear. But they don’t.
I’m so embarrassed I want to run to the toilets and
cry. I want to run in there, climb out a
window and never be seen again. I’ve got
no escape though. I think I probably
only read three sentences and then allowed for girl on right to take over.
I wonder what everyone is thinking. It’s so obvious
something is not right with me. I can’t
believe this has happened.
I spend the next while staring down at the floor. I don’t feel like I’m really here. I can hear people talking but I’m not aware
of what they are saying. I feel like I’m
in a dream and it is all surreal. It
reminds me of waking up after a fainting episode.
We go on to prayer requests next. I try to mimic what everyone else is doing:
look at the person who is speaking, nod, act interested. But that is all it is – an act. By now the other five are back from box
shifting and this brings the total to 17.
It could be worse I tell
myself, yet really it made no difference.
I ponder telling them that I’m not feeling well as my prayer request,
and if they ask for specifics I could just say I don’t want to offer any more
details. I consider telling them I just
don’t feel myself and am unsure what is going on. But I don’t.
I only mention something I think is socially acceptable – I’m starting
part time business studies, I need energy and sufficient time to get everything
done by. Yes, well done, no one will ever know now that you are screaming on the
inside.
Except for flatmate, no one knows. I’ve considered telling a lady at work who I
can talk to very easily about anything, but when the opportunity presented its
self I just couldn’t. I’m still
embarrassed, I’m still emotional about it and I am scared of what will happen
going forward. I told flatmate I didn’t
think I’d be going back to home group.
He said he realised it wasn’t for everybody, but I forced myself to
admit to him that wasn’t the reason. I
went quiet, I heeded the emotion, and then I let it out. I cried and again I felt overwhelmed with
embarrassment. I’m a Christian, cast all
my cares on God, fear God not man, I can do all things through Christ who
strengthens me. Yet I had nothing
tonight but a commotion in my chest and a raging war to settle my
emotions. It’s not that I want him to
know, what I want is to be natural and confident. Seems that isn’t me though. Not now.
I have to throw away the worries of what he might think, and just be
honest. So I spill my guts, and admit
I’ve always been terrible in groups but tonight was something else. I confess I wouldn’t particularly like
addressing a crowd even if it was twenty of my closest friends. I tell him I wanted to run to the toilet but
I’d be even more embarrassed, if that was possible, because I don’t like
bringing attention to myself.
I do feel scared. I
didn’t see that coming and I’m worried it will happen again. The thought of not going back though because
of sheer fear makes me feel isolated. I
want to go back. I want to be
normal. But I can’t relive that experience
again.
Since Wednesday night I’ve managed to pull off being my
usual self very well. On Thursday
morning I woke up feeling so low you’d have thought a great tragedy had taken
place in my life the day before. That
was my aftermath. But I managed to
conceal it completely to those at work and at home. Yet no matter what I’ve been doing since
then, even when I’ve laughed out loud, there is this blanket surrounding me
with an achy silence, a still reminder.
-Dressed in Pink
*This event took place in October of 2010
-Dressed in Pink
*This event took place in October of 2010
