On #BipolarAwarenessDay I am offering some of my book in progress - based on my experiences with bipolar...

PART ONE

Touching down in L A Martha felt free. She was relishing the elation after months of suicidal depression. Swanning through the airport she reflected on how her decision to take a few months away from her work in England, to visit her old friend Gilly, had in no time changed the direction of her mood...

The friends had known each other since they were toddlers. They were like sisters minus the family angst and couldn’t remember a life the other was not a part of. Gilly was the personification of a caring friend. She had lovingly prepared the guesthouse in her West Hollywood yard...comfortable bedroom with shower and loo ...and had held off selling her car so Martha could use it. It was one of those long, low Volvos, old and slightly battered. Martha thought it was perfect and could hardly wait to get behind the wheel, undaunted by the thought of negotiating the LA roads. 

Me far left....

Soon she was signing up for energetic step classes and made friends with Nancy the teacher. She frequented the nail bars, sporting bright pink acrylic nail extensions. She maintained her dope habit and one evening got completely stoned alone in the guest house before heading out with Nancy and two LA boys who looked like variations on a theme of Donny Osmond. They spent the evening playing pool at the Hollywood Athletic club, and in her altered state Martha found the whole experience quite surreal.

PART TWO

(Set in the days just after 9/11)

Martha paced restlessly up and down the dirty white corridors. Dazed and confused. Medicated to the eyeballs.  To the office to ask for a cigarette from her supply. To the smoking room. She inhaled deeply, trying to calm the sense of panic. It didn’t work. Back to the office to ask for another. She was a prisoner. Sectioned. She didn’t know how she’d got there. She didn’t know how, or if she’d get out.

A fellow inmate, glazed expression, nicotine stained fingers, grey uneven teeth, sits rocking manically. A large American guy dressed in a shabby tweed suit – his pockets stuffed with bits of paper is demanding loudly to see this that or the other person in a way which is almost impressive but tragically ineffective.

Martha felt disgusting. She isn’t allowed in her ‘room’ – mattress on the floor, clothes locked away, more of a cell really – for much of the day. She wanders around in a scruffy green velour dressing gown, threads hanging loose, feeling like a non-person beside the smartly dressed female psychiatrist.

She hardly eats believing they are trying to poison her. There are several televisions that blare out constantly. Some are tuned to CBeebies, others are on 24 hour news. Martha is aware that men she recognises as Tony Blair and George Bush are making lots of speeches together. Something bad has happened. She’s not sure what but she fears it may have been her fault...

Autumn musings

 ' In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.' John 16:33

Suzanne and me

This week, on the 25th September, I celebrate not just my brother's birthday (Happy Birthday Tom) but also the day I became a 'born again' Christian. Nine years ago I took the plunge (pun intended...sorry) and was baptised in Selkirk swimming pool in the Scottish Borders. My beloved friend Suzanne was the person who shared her faith with me, answered my billion questions, and invited me to Alpha. I praise God for her and for the fact that we met at a 'bumps and babies' group in 1999. Dorian (my husband) and I moved to Scotland at the end of 1998.  I was expecting our daughter (now 15, yikes how did that happen!) when I met Suzanne. I didn't know at the time but God was shining through her. I was spiritually 'searching' and drawn to her like a moth to light. It took years, from our meeting, until I was ready to take a leap of faith. I can remember so clearly asking question after question after question of her and her husband Michael.. Finally God revealed to me that there would never be a worldly, logical answer. The awesomeness of God, all that He is and all that He does is ultimately unfathomable. 'For we live by faith, not by sight'
2 Corinthians 5:7. Some way along the road from that step of faith I know beyond doubt that God is my rock and foundation and that He has transformed my life.

Like my painting I am a work in progress

Now back in West Yorkshire I am part of a great family at the Light Church in Bradford. I worship there with my sister in law Kim, and together we run a weekly home group in Halifax. I like the idea of God as tapestry maker. I always loved the Carole King record 'Tapestry' since the days I first heard it at my hippy boarding school in Devon in the 70s. I am in awe of the way our amazing creator God weaves all the strands of life together, through people He puts in our lives and where He places us. Sometimes we may not understand things that happen in our lives but God does. He is the Master Weaver. These past nine years have been a journey, and not, of course without challenges. There have been plenty of those. But, and it's a big but, it's totally different going through them, knowing that God is with me, He will never leave me or forsake me, and He wants to take my burdens from me. When the going gets tough I try to keep my focus on Him, stand on His word and trust, Isaiah 26:3. He will give me that wonderful peace that only He gives, 'not as the world gives' John 14:27.

I surrender my life to God, I want to be His vessel and shine for Him. I pray that just as Suzanne led me into the light, I can journey with others along the way. There are so many lost and hurting people in this broken world. I want to tell them about our wonderful Father God, the one who can truly heal us, He so wants to help if we would just open the door and let Him into our lives.

HOPES AND DREAMS 2014

At church on Sunday we had a wonderful illustrated talk from people who have been working in a variety of mission fields. There was a reference to the Isaiah verse 6:8:

‘Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ”Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said “Here I am. Send me!”

That verse appeals to me so deeply. I am one of those like a child in the classroom with their hand up, me, me, me, pick me. That’s how that verse speaks to me, and that’s how Sunday’s talk appealed to me. I felt like Tigger. I want to go, me, send me, Lord I’ll go. What, when, where, how, just pleeeeaseee can I go, pick me. In my head I was planning to see if I could tag along (with my 14 year old son – taking him out of school) on one of our leader’s imminent South American mission trips.

What I am not so hot on, is waiting patiently and quietly for God’s voice, waiting on God’s perfect timing. I’d be off like a shot, out of the starting gates if I could. And a lovely friend at church stood with and ‘got’ me and acknowledged what he called ‘my adventurous spirit’ and how hard that is at times.

Not least because maybe, I have to sit tight and stay put in my current mission field, in the midst of being Mum, (wonderful but challenging at times) and wife (ditto). 

I’d like to play my violin in the worship band, write a book, paint more, go on mission, be a good Mum, be a better wife. Live, Laugh, Love, Dance, and oh yes learn to be a DJ. I want it all, reach for the stars. You know me Lord and my adventurous, impetuous, enthusiastic spirit. Maybe being ‘out’ of my comfort zone is actually my comfort zone if that makes any sense. Staying put and being a housewife etc and doing dusting is so out of my comfort zone. What are you teaching me here Lord?

All I know is that I need to remember it’s NOT ABOUT ME, it’s about Him and what God has planned for me. I have to stop and breathe and be still and connect with God and trust that He is God and He knows best. So Lord this year I pray that each day I will get better at handing everything to You, trusting You and surrendering everything to You secure in the knowledge that You will work everything together for good. Thank you Heavenly Father. Amen