My head's clearer today

Despite saying that the mood had lifted just by talking about it, it pretty much settled for the rest of the weekend.  There were some random and scattered good moments and I've discovered that one of the ladies from church is actually worse than I am at having days where dealing with People is just plain impossible.  I was supposed to sit with her at lunch yesterday but, by the time I came back to sit at the table with her, another family who I don't know so well were also there and I just couldn't face putting on a any sort of mask, even though I know that they're all lovely people.  Instead, I ended up sitting with our placement student and one of his friends who's in my home group and listened to a highly improvised little ditty in praise of Mississippi mud pie and then joined in a highly geeky conversation about measuring the speed of light by taking the turntable out of a microwave and putting a large block of chocolate in there instead.  Much more fun to talk about nothing in particular than to have polite conversation and people asking how I'm doing.  According to some random scale of conversation topics, technically, speed-of-light and chocolate would be a Level 0 conversation and "How are you coping with stuff?" would be something like a Level 3.  Lower level conversations aren't supposed to be any good for useful human interaction (I may be wildly over-simplifying things here though).  However, I honestly feel that, in terms of "team" bonding and stuff, random conversations like that are just as important in their own way as anything supposedly more meaningful.

So yeah, spent much of the weekend feeling crap.  The birthday party on Saturday was good but I do need to explaing to my mum to stop pestering me with questions at times!  I'm both shy and an introvert at heart (although the world should probably be forgiven for thinking that I'm neither of these things!) and it can take me a little while to assemble the right mask to use at each individual social event.  Unfortunately, Mum can generally see straight through the mask-building process, pesters me with questions that I'm trying not to think about the answers to and generally, winds me up so much that it takes me forever to be able to reassemble the mask again.  I knew enough people there that I didn't need much of a mask and didn't need to wear it for that long but I still needed time to work that out.  "Normal" people would probably just use alcohol but a) I couldn't because I was driving and b) I wouldn't because of the promise to myself that I'm sure I've mentioned earlier.

And so to the evening service on Sunday.  I went because I knew that I needed prayer which I hadn't been able to receive in the morning because it was a big baptism service which was being run with people from our sister church.  Worship and communion were both okay and then it came to the talk.  The focus for the past three weeks has been on healing.  Part of me has been really quite impressed that I'd kept going through all the services so far without a problem but last night was different.  The woman who was speaking used an example of a miraculous healing that involved someone who was in ICU and was brain-dead.  I'm guessing that the story turned out well but I didn't get to hear that bit of the talk.  I got to the point where the husband and random-friend-who-happened-to-work-at-the-hospital were praying for her and stuff happened at which point, I just couldn't sit there any more and ran out of the room in complete and utter floods of tears and shouting, "It doesn't work like that!". I'm not entirely sure if I went cannoning through the double doors into the foyer or whether my friend who was on the sound desk opened them for me.  I'm not sure that I could see properly at that point.  I know I sank to the floor sobbing for ages (by my standards) and there were three people sat with me, praying, when I "surfaced".  It had just all hit far too close to home.  I've stood in ICU with my hand on a leg because it was the only part without any tubes or wires attached.  I've both stood and sat in ICU praying that mad, desperate prayer, "Just heal him, Lord".  I know that feeling of nothing whatsoever happening.  I really didn't need to hear a story where the prayer was answered.  Our minister had said something about giving all our burdens to the Lord at the start of the service and I realised that my heart was too heavy to lift everything to the Lord so I told Him that He'd have to pick them up from where they were.  In doing so, it looks like He made me deal with some of them at the same time.

Anyway, the main outcome of the biggest sobbing fit that I've had in ages is that I feel quite a bit better for it.  I'm still going to keep an eye on how I'm feeling generally, just in case, but I think I really will be all right.

(ps. For those who may be mildly curious as to why I only seem to cry at church.  It feels safe.  There's always someone around to help me and throw boxes of tissues my way.  There's always someone to dispense hugs as required.  The flat frequently lacks all of those (although it does contain a bearded dragon who's clearly been put on this Earth for comedy purposes only).  I've spent too long in previous lives crying by myself in my bedroom and outright avoiding walking into my room if at all possible because all that will greet me is tears and insomnia.  I'm not at uni now though so I can't sleep late and struggle to get up in the same way that I did back then.  I still do both of those but I generally still make it into work before 9am whereas in my uni days, I'd have been skipping lectures left, right and centre at various points by now!)

(pps. Ow!  Tension headache approaching!  Right, I'm definitely calling it a night now.  Redbush tea, paracetamol, ibuprofen and a Bagpuss heatpack on my shoulder and I'll hopefully feel fine in the morning.)

(ppps.  There was something else I was going to say, now what was it????  Ah yes!  I can't remember what the last update was on friend-who-I-have-an-unsuitable-crush-on but everything seems to be a lot more ... suitable at the moment.  Hugs are in pure friendship, there's no warning signs flashing wildly any more.  I think we might be okay there now.)