I suffer from a chronic condition in which my perspective is often clouded with the heightened emotions due to pregnancy and postpartum hormones raging through my body. Sense I have had 4 babies in past 6 years I have been dealing with this for just about 6 years straight. My condition will leave me unable to see past my anger, anxiety, despair, frustration, and impatience. I suffer from the Hormone Perspective.
So here is a little disclaimer to those who may read this and have suffered debilitating postpartum depression; I have not suffered enough to need medication. I understand that that does happen for some people. I am addressing my experience and am not saying those whose hormone induced depression are at fault or wrong for seeking the help they need.
Just today as I was getting in my truck after exercise class I heard a couple of the ladies talking about getting together, making it to this or that, and I started feeling sorry for myself. Why don't these ladies invite me? Why is it that I feel like I have to beg for time with my "friends". What is it about me that they don't want to get together with me? Am I that "needy"? Do I give enough in my relationships? You can see how this is spiraling downward. It happens so often with many different situations. I begin to think I know what others are thinking and feeling and it ends up with me either feeling completely down in the dumps or really mad (usually at my poor husband). All because of my own assumptions.
The question I have to ask myself though is, when I am in the midst of this, whose perspective am I looking at the situation with? Is my husband really out to hurt me? Is it really hopeless? Is God really in control? Does He got it covered? Is it always going to be like this? All these questions point out the fact that I am not looking at it with the proper perspective because they are questions full of anger, anxiety, despair, frustration, and impatience. Which if you hold them up in the light of scripture it shows that I am sinning. That I am not trusting God and his plan for my life and those of my husband and children. That I am not believing his sovereignty, goodness, and faithfulness. How then do I combat this when it comes up?
For me, the only thing to combat this from spiraling out of control is to go to the Bible and see what God has to say about these issues. There are so many verses for each of these emotions and what we are to do with them. The main point I want to get to when I need proper perspective is that of truth. If I can't see the truth because of out of control emotions I have to ask my Lord to help me to see things through His eyes. One verse that helps me a lot in this area is Philippians 4:8.
"Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of respect, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if something is excellent or praiseworthy, think about these things." Emphasis mine.
I remember when my sweetheart and I first started dating I dealt with a lot of anxiety and fear about what his intentions were because of my ex-husband. The Ex had just been looking for a wife to check off that box on the list of goals in his life and I was a good candidate...for a while anyway. I wanted a man to be with me because he liked (and eventually loved) me not because I fit the checklist for a good girlfriend/wife. So, I eventually made a list of what I knew to be true about my sweetie and chose to dwell on those things and not the "what if's". It is my choice either to dwell on truth or dwell on unknowns.
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