Day 17

There are countless experiences, lessons, opportunities and people who have had a tremendous impact on my life as recently as last year in late summer and fall.  I really need to write it all down sometime soon, because I can feel some of it fading from my memory, and I never want to forget how miraculous a change I experienced.  Part of me is afraid to write it down - do I write it publicly (on my blog) or privately - how much detail is necessary - can I handle, emotionally, the feelings that would wash over and no doubt try to rest on me as I re-live some of that - what if I forget something important and it doesn't get recorded - what about the things I already know I've forgotten?  The other part of me feels strongly that my story needs to be recorded for my family and others who prayed so hard for me, so that they might know the depth to which their prayers were answered, and also because I would hate for my hard experiences to benefit only myself.  I've always been a person who learns really well from other people's experiences, and to think of keeping my successes all to myself feels selfish.


The ultimate impact came from my Father in Heaven.  Even if I look at this from a non-LDS, non-God-fearing perspective, I think it would be hard for me to believe that all the things that came together at once to change my life happened by mere coincidence.  Even from my own perspective, I'd come to a place where I truly had no hope that I would ever feel better while in this life - I had absolutely no belief that I could medicate, exercise, buck up or serve my way out of the dark, suffocating, ruthless and unsympathetic pit of depression.  In fact, I still have absolutely no belief that I could have done it.  No amount of therapy or medication could break the vicious cycle.  I was depressed because I could not do what it took to make myself mentally healthy, and I couldn't make myself healthy because I was so depressed.  It sounds so trite...but there are those of you who know exactly what I mean.  If there are any who don't, simply understand that there were many things which were physically and mentally impossible, and I don't use that hard-core word lightly. 


You know, I'm getting the feeling that this all could sound a bit melodramatic, but if that's the case, I think it's because these are not things we generally talk about outside the privacy of our most intimate relationships, if at all.  Talk about this kind of suffering can be awkward and uncomfortable, particularly for the listeners, and for many reasons.  Regardless though, I have to be bold and honest in order to accomplish my ends, therefore I hope I will never cease to declare that the change which I experienced was nothing short of an act of God. 


I guess I've made a start on my hope to get all this in writing.  Perhaps now it won't seem to hard to keep going.  That being said, however, I'll come to the point of this post - a picture of someone who has made a huge and recent impact on my life.  No, it's not a picture of God - it's a picture of the creature He hand-picked to send me, one whom even He loves very much.  It's a picture of Jack, without whom life simply wouldn't feel worth living, even now.  It's a fact that the creatures on this earth know their Master; they know His voice, and He uses these precious animals He created to help and bless the lives of His children.  Jack is one of the animals who loves and obeys his Master, and although animals are not sealed to their people for time and eternity, I have every reason to believe that Jack will be with me in the next life; that Heavenly Father knows that these animals fill a very special place in our hearts and simply would not part us if we follow Him.  Everything will all work out, of this I'm sure.