We are all imperfect beings, though the world seems to glorify perfection. We will never be perfect beings, but we can be whole. It’s taken me a lifetime, but I’ve finally reached the place where I’m unapologetically, gratefully, imperfectly whole.
At the age of 19, my life changed in a way that altered me to my marrow. All it took were words. Words uttered harshly and repeatedly by the one I’d committed my life to.
The words struck as hard as any fist. They seeped under my skin, beneath my bones, and created so much doubt. Doubt that destroyed the girl I thought I was. She ceased to exist. A traumatized, misguided, and destructive soul took her place.
It would take three decades to overcome. Three decades to embrace being imperfectly whole.
An excerpt from Four Weeks by Jennifer N. Fenwick:
It wasn’t long before I’d flung myself fully into an eating disorder that would follow me for years to come. Years that far exceeded the short eighteen months that would mark my first marriage, from wedding day to annulment.
The scars I bore on my soul from that time cast me headfirst into a life of searching for perfection. Into an insatiable hunger for completeness. Creating within me a desperate longing for anything that would fill the void threatening to consume me.
Mirrors became the looking glass that reflected my flaws, my imperfections, my shortcomings. Scales became the enemy, never revealing the numbers I thought they should. Running became my salvation, the fiery force through which I burned and expended the energy needed to keep me alive. Food became my tormentor. It was always too much or never enough. Food taunted and tortured me until I either starved or purged my body of its grip.
For over thirty years, it held me in chains.
My eating disorder came with me into my second marriage. It tormented me through my two pregnancies. Prevented me from enjoying the miracle as my body fought against giving up control.
My eating disorder sidelined me from life. The reflection in the mirror or the number on the scale dictated the course of my days. It clouded and colored everything in a deep and dark storm of chaos and disillusionment.
The world around me spoke louder than any inner voice. The images in magazines, in movies, on television, became my ideal. I pushed my body past endurance, starved my soul past salvation, and broke myself against a standard I’d never reach.
And still I plodded onward; too tired to scale the mountain, but too afraid to stop.
Then, I found myself seeking new and more destructive ways to feed my soul.
The numbness of alcohol became my reprieve. Attention and praise from others became the barometer against which I measured my worth. As the numbness receded, an ever-increasing desire for more took its place. Then, I’d sink back into numbness, overwhelmed and ashamed.
The cycle persisted for decades, slowly weakening my body and destroying my soul. Until the day I couldn’t breathe anymore. The day the darkness closed in, surrounding me in its unrelenting totality. Until the day I thought death would be better than living in that darkness any longer.
That day was the turning point; the crossroads on which I stood. Rather than standing on that precipice, I fell to my knees and surrendered the fight. It could do with me what it wanted. I was done.
March 22, 2018, was both an ending and a beginning.
That was the day I entered the Orlando Recovery Center. The day I surrendered. The day my recovery journey truly began.
During the four weeks I was there, I journeyed deep into the darkness and finally came to understand it. I cried countless tears. I battled, with God’s help, all the demons clawing at me.
The power to withstand, the desire to reach the shore, it didn’t come from me. It wasn’t my strength that pulled me from the abyss. No. The power, the strength, the deliverance came from a source far greater than me.
The power was God’s and God’s alone. And it had been there all along. Waiting. Available. Abiding and faithful.
Once I moved into it, placing my trust and my brokenness within its shelter, the storm receded. The fog lifted. And the peace I had longed for finally enshrouded me.
It was as hard and as easy as surrender.
Giving up all control; giving up my past, my present, and my future. Placing everything into God’s hands, I tasted freedom. A freedom unlike anything I’d ever known. Freedom that surpassed anything the world could offer. It was all-encompassing and beautiful. It promised deliverance forever from the chains and complete redemption for my battered soul.
In its warmth, I found healing and untold strength. In its promise, I found the pathway out of this world and into the life of the world to come.
I could breathe again.
I had a purpose. And it had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with God’s plan for my life.
In grateful surrender, I let go, and in letting go, I was freed.
“I suffered in my search for peace. Again and again, I suffered. In surrender, I awakened to peace. For peace existed all along. It was never a thing to be attained. It was always there. In surrender, I simply acknowledged its existence within me. And what is peace, if not the end of suffering? We’re all given a choice. And yet, so often, we still choose to suffer.”
– Jennifer N. Fenwick, Four Weeks: A Journey from Darkness
I do not walk this recovery journey alone. Visit me on:
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