Last Friday I spent the day numb.

Staring at my screen, getting nothing actually done except trying to process my feelings through pounding the keys on my Mac. From the outside I probably just looked like a writer, really into whatever she was writing. Inside, I was in turmoil. After skimming the headlines on my phone that morning and I made the mistake of clicking on an article regarding the pandemic. Of course, I was triggered by various statements written, meant to induce fear or inspire a specific action in whoever is reading. Logically, I know why these articles are written. I understand what the press is all about. Still, it triggers me, and I have to be careful what I expose my mind to during these times.

So, since panic seems to be rising along with the number of reported COVID cases, I wanted to share my heart and personal experience going through the last lockdown. I know some people will be able to relate and hopefully be encouraged as people talk of (or are experiencing) a second lockdown.

When quarantine started for us back in March, in the Netherlands, I went through quite a dark time with my depression. I know we all had unique + challenging situations in that moment. Elderly and other high-risk people were fearful over getting the virus (and even perfectly healthy people had this fear.) Singles could no longer see friends or foster romantic relationships. People lost jobs. Businesses had to close. Kids couldn’t play with friends and were at the mercy of however their parents were coping with lockdown. Working parents had to work from home with their kids present. Stay-at-home parents (or work-from-home) suddenly had their kids around all day with no reprieve.  

That last one is the camp I was in– the stay-at-home parent. I’m a chronic depressive, highly sensitive person who has strong physical reactions to stimulation, like loud, competing noises, touch, and temperature. Even things like caffeine and medication I seem to be more sensitive than others, and always have been. As a stay-at-home mom of three, I require at least some complete alone time each day to recharge from the often wild, loud, emotional interactions with my kids. (Even lots of happy, fun, joyous interactions wear me out.) Therefore, I was thrown into a tailspin of anxiety + panic when lockdown began and my normal way of coping was taken away. Suddenly my kids and husband were going to be there, in our Dutch rental, with me, 24/7. When others were saying what a blessing being closer together was, I was literally panicking.

In the first month of lockdown I had huge blow-ups with my husband, a “numbers guy” who would pore over CDC charts and relay all the COVID statistics to me until I literally begged him not to. “We can’t talk about this! Let’s talk about anything but this. Please.” So, for marital peace, he had to keep the statistics to himself and we watched Friends and The Office in silence every single night. I clung to any happy, carefree thing in our now tiny world. I wanted to forget, even for thirty minutes, the panic rising in my chest. Not panic that I would get the virus, but that our world would now forever be one of fear and darkness, with no end in sight. Also, that date nights would now consist only of Tiger King binge-watches, ridiculous amounts of takeout and whatever flavor of specialty ice cream pints the nearby tiny grocery still had in stock. I most definitely gained the Quarantine-15. Thank you Ben, thank you Jerry.

All lockdown jokes (realities) aside, there were moments during those many weeks I felt suicidal. Living with depression as a genetic mental illness is a daily battle that can be difficult even in normal times. Lockdown was riddled with triggers for me, and yes, I had many days that I wished for death. I never attempted suicide, I never have, and I hopefully never will, but I felt like death would have been better than what I was feeling, the way I was coping, the deep darkness inside my mind.

While some increased their drinking during lockdown to cope, mine stopped because I was afraid I wouldn’t stop drinking. I’m not an alcoholic but when in a dark place I avoid alcohol because I know it will only make the situation in my brain worsen. I so desperately wanted to be transported out of that difficult, uncertain situation that I feared I might have drank myself to oblivion. So I avoided adult drinks until things eventually seemed less dire.

If this all seems extreme to you, or self-absorbed because I just should have been happy I didn’t have COVID, well…good! Then it means you probably don’t suffer from severe clinical depression. However, please don’t assume that because you don’t understand something that it is not real or valid. Unfortunately, I can’t just “put on some positive pants” or simply “choose to be happy.” That kind of advice is trite and not helpful to someone with depression.

My saving grace was my daily run outside, while my husband paused his work and watched the kids. Every single day I ran for thirty minutes in the sunshine, which in the Netherlands was considered a miracle. Yes, six weeks straight of sunny days, beginning almost exactly when lockdown did! That strengthened my faith that God isn’t a cruel God, even in cruel times.

During my morning “quarantine outside time” I still struggled. Running, even in the sunshine, is arduous when your thoughts are racing and you feel like you can hardly breathe, but I just kept going. I literally ran for my life. Twice I had full-on panic attacks (the first ever I’d experienced) and had to stop in the middle of the path, unable to breathe, as though something was pressing hard on my chest suffocating me. My thoughts whirling with dire guesses about the future, and fears that there would never be normalcy again. Thankfully both times I was able to eventually slow my breathing and walk home, shaken but okay.

I hate to admit it, but I also became uncharacteristically paranoid, convinced there were conspiracies happening in the world and all the dystopian novels I had read were coming to life. It was nightmarish. I vowed to stick to happy reads from then on.

Mostly, I just felt really alone. Usually my depression can be easily hidden and glazed over, and it doesn’t bother me that no one else knows or cares about my inner struggles. I am considered “high functioning” in normal times, where my mental illness rarely interferes with day-to-day life or relationships. But during the lockdown I felt I was in a world where if you had mental illness you were forgotten completely. All that mattered was flattening the curve of COVID cases/deaths.

The phrase, “We’re all in this together” left a clanging in my ears every time I heard it, because I had never felt more alone, a captive of my depression.

This is my truth, and I’m not the only one. 

As the weeks wore on I learned to cling to every flower blooming and ray of light. I was thankful for the things that weren’t closed, thankful for any small happiness. Our family never got sick or knew anyone that did. Things got better, as thankfully, they always do.

While things are better now, a vaccine is apparently coming, and we are all more prepared for this second wave, I refuse to glaze over or ignore the fact that suicide and drug-related deaths continue to rise during this pandemic.

If you went into a dark place due to mental illness during lockdown, and feel fear/panic regarding another one happening soon, you are not alone.

I see you. I was there in the dark, too, and came back again. 

As much as I don’t want it to, it looks like things will shut down again, at least to a certain degree. Prepare yourself now. Get meds if that helps you. Find an online therapist if you don’t have one yet. Get systems in place to cope with the things you found difficult. Remind yourself of what you went through. You survived before and you will again. Severe depression requires digging deep and finding the will to keep going even when your brain is tricking you into thinking you shouldn’t, that you should just give up. Don’t believe those lies. You are so very strong. You are important and loved.

You can get through this (again.) Don’t stay silent about how you are feeling. You’re not the only one. 

If you know someone who struggles with depression and/or anxiety, please check in on them and yes, even hug them if they need it. That article I mentioned above was urging people to stop hugging loved ones. I pray that in all of this we do not completely lose our love, affection, and ultimately, our humanity.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline provides 24/7, free and confidential support. Call 1-800-273-8255 for help.

I am a classic introvert. Always have been. Nothing ambiguous here.

My mother says when I was two-years-old she used to come and try to get me after my naps. I would be awake in my crib, talking/playing contentedly. Upon seeing her enter the room I would flail and yelp, “No!” and Mom, hands up in surrender, would back out of the room and give me another hour of “alone time.” Yes, even at two I needed that space. (None of my three kids inherited this, unfortunately.)

As a young girl I loved hanging out with friends, but I reached my limits pretty quickly. I preferred one-on-one, close friendships over big groups of girls. However, since I went to a tiny school where there weren’t a lot of kids, I never struggled socially until high school.

High school, with its larger class sizes, bells ringing, crowded halls, and noisy lunchroom made me anxious and tired. I found myself checking out mentally, longing for the day to be over, when I could retreat to the car, and get home to the farm where I could walk, read, and just “be.”

Maybe I am an extreme case, or maybe I have just learned to self-reflect and accept that the “sorority girl/dorm room life” was never going to be something I would thrive in. Large parties are not my thing (too loud, too chaotic, too much small talk.)

Family gatherings have always been triggering for me. I remember hiding in my older cousins bedrooms and reading their (too mature for me) novels with the door shut, the din of laughter and conversation pleasantly shut out.

Even as an adult I still find time at family holiday gatherings to retreat to a quiet bedroom to rest or read — or if I am back at my childhood home visiting my parents, a hobby farm in Minnesota, no one is surprised when I put on my running shoes and walk the perimeter of the 11 acre property for an hour or so, daydreaming and enjoying the peace of solitude.

Do you know someone like this? They are not weird or shy…they just are an introvert, probably highly sensitive to stimuli.

I don’t think I’m shy or anti-social. I will speak my mind, be adventurous, and have a very loud voice, actually. (I get lots of stares from Dutch people here in the Netherlands when out to dinner, chatting with friends or even just my husband, when my voice reaches an excited level.)

Sometimes, yes, I wish I could be more of what the world views as “normal.” We are praised if we can stand out in a crowd, multi-task in chaos, be “popular” (as in, have lots of friends / quantity over quality) and now in the social media age there is this push to have lots of “online friends” – who will give you lots of “likes.”

As an introvert I have to keep myself in check. While I love social media in so many ways, sharing my life and journey while not having to have constant face-to-face interaction, it can still get overwhelming with the pressure to respond quickly. Sometimes my phone can seem as loud and demanding as one of my three loud blonde children! I have to set it aside, tell myself that it can wait, it can sit, until I’ve recharged my introvert battery enough to give thoughtful responses.

Can you relate to any of this? Whether you are an introvert or an extrovert, if you love this topic or simply struggle relating to the opposite of what you are, you will probably enjoy the book Quiet by Susan Cain. I’ve been reading it in bits for a while and finally finished on our flight back from Spain yesterday. So good from start to finish!

Don’t hug your friends.
Just a wave and an anxious smile,
No handshakes, please.
Yes, darling, I will kiss you…
After the recommended waiting period.
Let us trade passion for caution,
At least for two full weeks.
I would move mountains for you!
(As long as they are not in China or Italy.)
Forget roses – I have toilet paper and hand sanitizer.
I’ll leave them on the curb. .

I had to write something after being reprimanded by a Dutch gentleman at the mall for hugging my friend goodbye after our lunch date.

These are the times we are in. I’m sure the social distancing won’t last forever, but I was so taken aback by this!

Anyway, hope you are all staying well, wherever you are!

When I was a teen I would sit out on the metal field gate at our farm and stare up at the night sky, asking God for what He probably gets sick of hearing : true love.

But I had no idea what that meant, so God probably laughed a bit at this silly, overly-romantic girl with literal stars shining in her eyes.

Fact : I had watched WAY too many romantic comedies during my childhood. My mom loved movies and had a VHS/DVD library that would make your eyes goggle. Fond memories with my mom include snuggling up and watching movies nearly every afternoon in the summer when school was out.

Because of this obsessive movie watching, I didn’t actually want “true love” – I wanted “romantic comedy love.” I wanted Sandra Bullock While You Were Sleeping kind of love. I wanted Audrey Hepburn Roman Holiday kind of love. I wanted Aladdin and Jasmine kinda love. (Yep, I’d take even cartoon love.) A Whole New World played in my head anytime I daydreamed about the love I would have someday, which was often. Every turn would be a surprise. Every moment would get better. Right?

Clearly I was pretty naive, and had watched so many love stories unfold on the screen, that I had set myself up for a massive reality gut-check: real life love.

I met Paul when I was nineteen, almost twenty. My relationship with a nice guy from my hometown had just ended (read : I got dumped) and I did something many women do when they get dumped…

I made a completely rash decision.

I decided I would move across the country, from Minnesota to Oregon! I would start fresh! No breakup would keep me down! So I applied to a college in Portland, accepted a scholarship, and meticulously mapped out on my giant Rand McNally road map the pathway to my new life, where surely true love would find me. I told everyone my plan. I put in notice at my job. It was happening.

Two months before I was supposed to move I met Paul.

I came home from my job at a shoe store, opened the door to the apartment I shared with two other girls, and there HE was.

The breath nearly went out of me. I had never felt such a crazy feeling meeting someone. Paul had a huge dimpled smile and was wearing an Abercrombie + Fitch T-shirt that stated “I’m Easy” across the front. He stuck out his hand confidently in greeting and while I hesitate to say it was “love at first sight” I definitely felt something I’d never felt before or ever would again upon meeting a beau.

It was most certainly our “meet cute.”

To make a long convoluted love story short, we started dating almost immediately, had a whirlwind romance where we saw each other every waking moment for two months. And yes, I DID move to Portland, with the Dixie Chicks blaring out the open windows of my Dodge Neon…but after only three weeks I decided had to move back and give Paul and my relationship a fighting chance.

Best decision ever.

We dated another four months until he had to move back to finish school in Kentucky and then…we broke up. Lost touch, reconnected, got engaged, then I broke off the engagement. We both moved to Cincinnati, dated, broke up, got back together and got engaged again.

Nothing about our five years of dating would inspire a Meg Ryan rom-com. But it was true love, just as I had prayed for. It was real, and exciting, and romantic, and in many ways, at many points during, our relationship did live up to my movie fantasies.

But there were also the other parts. The dark parts. The lonely parts. The not knowing really what to do. The mistakes and hurts. The indecision. Because sometimes true love arrives before you are ready for it, or before you feel you deserve it. Sometimes you run from it (right Julia Roberts?)

The photo below shows two kids, in love, with absolutely no idea that they would arrive at marriage six years later.

The next photo shows us now, almost twenty years later. A bit grayer, hairier, heavier – looking a bit more Something’s Gotta Give than French Kiss. But that is okay. I still crave the romance and the movie moments (and sometimes I get them) but this is “real life love” and the realness is strangely what makes it so very good.

It’s 6am on a Friday morning and I’m about to hustle my three children and husband to get ready so we can drive to the airport, all in the hopes of seeing their grandpa on his layover for an hour. He is on his way home from Africa, where he and my younger brother attempted Kilimanjaro. This was one of Dad’s bucket list adventures, and I’m so glad he finally got to do it, at the age of seventy three.

Let me tell you a little bit about my dad.

As far back as I can remember he modeled a life of saying ‘yes’ to adventures – even if he didn’t have much money to spend. During my childhood we rarely got on an airplane, but we saw the world by cross country skis, canoe, brown Chevrolet conversion van, pop-up camper, or Purple Bus.

Our experiences were simple – but rich, nonetheless.

I have three siblings (two older, one younger) and the earliest adventures I remember us taking with Dad were hiking or skiing the bluffs in our small town, which was nestled within a wide bend in the Mississippi River. We did it so many times the trails and caves and views are etched into my mind, reminders of weekends spent outside, no matter what the season. You didn’t stay inside, you dressed for the weather.

In warm months he would take us canoeing on the Blue Earth River, navigating his indestructible green Old Town along to find hidden offshoots, to places called things like ‘Triple Falls.’ On these excursions we find a sandy beach or large rock and eat summer sausage and cheese and apples – simple meals Dad called “shore lunch.” Afterward we would pass a bag of wrapped caramels back and forth in the canoe, our teeth satisfyingly sticky as we dragged our hands in the water. Dad would J-stroke along, belting out John Denver songs, not worried at all at our lack of paddling or occasional need to pee…at which he simply hold us our tiny swimsuited bodies over the edge of the canoe and let us go.

In the summertime, as soon as we turned three, we were whisked out of our tearful mother’s arms by Dad to go with him and his twin brother (and our cousins) on week-long canoeing trips in Northern Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area. My memories of this include: huddling under green tarps in the middle of the canoe while the sky would downpour rain, eating fried Northern Pike alongside pancakes packed with fresh picked blueberries for breakfast, and my Dad banging pots and pans together while chasing away black bears who would wander into our campsite on occasion. At night there were loons calling, Northern Lights, meteor showers, campfires and lots of singing.

When I was old enough to join our church’s youth group (also led by Dad) I always looked forward to the annual summer trip. This is when usually 20-30 youth and counselors would board a purple school bus, aptly named “The Purple Bus,” and over the course of a week would bond while facing various physical and spiritual challenges. Dad was brave, energetic, patient, and passionate to give as many “young people” (as he called us) had opportunities to see the wonder of God’s creation first-hand.

Things always went wrong on these trips, but Dad seemed to hardly missed a beat.  There were times we had to sleep on the side of mountains because we underestimated how long a hike would take. We would unfurl our sleeping bags directly on the trail with grizzlies sauntering in the distance (thankfully steering clear of our noisy group.) There were Bus breakdowns on the highway in the middle of nowhere, but somehow we always got a tow or God sent angels in human form to fix it. 

It is because of my Dad and his relentless spirit of adventure that I got to hike the Grand Canyon, summit several peaks in the Canadian Rockies, raft the raging Colorado River, hike in the Tetons, and see a vast majority of the United States.

It is because of Dad that in my twenties I never turned down an invitation to visit a faraway friend, or take a proposed trip to just about ANYWHERE. It is because of him that Paul and I, while pretty dang frugal in most ways, are never uptight about spending money on travel – we have both adventured with my Dad and see the value. It is also probably because of Dad that I said ‘yes’ to our expat assignment here in the Netherlands. He definitely inspired me by taking a position to preach for a year in Prague, after he had retired from the ministry. He saw so much of Europe that year and when we finally visited (when Cormac was only eight weeks old) his stories completely captivated me. How could I say ‘no’ when later our own expat opportunity arose, after baby number three had just been birthed? Let’s do it! I decided in a postpartum hormonal haze.

Of course Dad asked all his kids if we would hike Kilimanjaro with him. For the first time I had to say no, simply due to the nature of my husband’s job and not living near enough to family right now to help with the kids.

However, I selfishly hope Dad has a few more incredible trips up his sleeve that I (and the rest of my fam) can be a part of. He is forever an inspiration as I raise my kids. I often say strange things to them like, when we it is taking forever to get where we are walking : Eat GORP, drink water, one hour max!” or “It’s just around the bend up there!” (It usually isn’t, of course, but Dad was/is forever an optimist.) Or if it is raining/extremely cold I harp on them to put a warm hat on, which was one of the few things that would cause Dad to get mad at his kids on trips. “Get your hat on! You lose all your heat through your head!” Which I’m not sure if that is biologically accurate either, but I feel okay repeating it to my three little ones, in honor of Grandpa.

I hope I can inspire them at least half as well as he did to have their own amazing adventures in this world.