Monday, June 25, 2012

Dear God



Let's chat...

I'm in one of the craziest places I've ever been in my life. Someone walked up to me at church the other week and said "Leslie, I'm praying for you. You've had a lot of death in your life recently." I tried not to focus on the words that she spoke. Within the next weeks of this conversation I lost a dear friend, a Great Uncle, a church member, Another Uncle, a former teacher and friend of the family lost her husband, and my sister in law lost her godmother. This is all within 3 weeks. Some would say that it's too much. All of this on top of life's everyday struggles but your grace is truly amazing.

It's 1:21 a.m. and as I sit here listening to the song "Amazing Grace" I think about the many places you've brought me from. I think about the journey that I'm even on now. I've been questioning your plan for me. I've been wondering why you took me out of one place to be in this place I am in now. I sit...confused wondering if you have forgotten me. Wondering if you have left me. Wondering why I feel like I'm in this battle alone. I can't seem to understand why you keep taking people away from me and from the people I love. I've been praying and asking you for answers...wondering if you've already given them to me and I've somehow missed them. Have my eyes been closed? Have I been so focused on other things that I've missed out on what you have for me?

So I grabbed a book that a dear friend gave to me for Christmas. I've never opened it because I was too afraid to know the things you were asking of me. I heard you tell me that with Death comes life...that although I am losing some in this earthly life, that you are making new life in some of your children. You've been telling me that though this world is dying, that you need me, and others that you have called to continue to bring new life in to you kingdom. So as I opened the book and turned to the lesson for June 26th I read these words: "My child, you know how much I love you. And I'm so glad you love me in return! But sometimes, when you are loved and content, it's easy to become complacement. I do want you to rest in me, but I also want your help in making my love known to others. When my son walked te eather, he saw so many people in need of my love. He observed their confusion, their helplessness, their aimless wandering-like sheep without a shepherd- and he responded with active compassion. Do you see them too? You have the peace, the security that comes from knowing me. Won't you share that with someone whose life needs my healing touch? The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Will you be one of my workers?"

As tears poured down my face, I had to ask myself "Leslie have you been selfish all this time? Only thinking of what God has for you?" I had to remind myself, this journey isn't just for me, but for those that you need me to reach. I have purpose...there's a reason behind everything that I've been through, and going through.

So I'm making a choice. God I'm working for YOU and only You. There will be some who may not understand it, but that's alright because I know you didn't bring me this far to leave me so I'll continue to trust you. I'm yours

With all my heart,

:: Elle-Aye::

Thursday, May 3, 2012

.: I need help :. [Part I]



"The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they're okay, then it's you." Rita Mae Brown

I guess I'm that 1 out of the 4? When did that happen?



[Thinking Back]

It was the winter of 2005. Night was my day. My eyes did weep, long nights, little sleep. Blankets over the window, darkness at all times. Restless...Alone...Abandoned. Whenever my eyes closed I had visions, dreams, memories of that night. Why did he? How could he? Why would he? This was my reality for many months.

Some believe that the only people with mental illness are those who are institutionalized. You know, those with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder...you know, the ones folks call flat out crazy. Did you know that there are at least 6 different classifications of Mental Illness. There are Personality Disorders, Impulse Control and Addiction Disorders, Eating Disorders, Anxiety Disorders, Psychotic Disorders, and Mood Disorders. The latter was my issue, mood disorder. For a long time I suffered from depression.

These disorders, also called affective disorders, involve persistent feelings of sadness or periods of feeling overly happy, or fluctuations from extreme happiness to extreme sadness. The most common mood disorders are depression, mania, and bipolar disorder.

Imagine attending a party with these prominent guests: Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Robert Schumann, Ludwig von Beethoven, Edgar Allen Poe, Mark Twain, Vincent van Gogh, and Georgia O’Keefe. Maybe Schumann and Beethoven are at the dinner table intently discussing the crescendos in their most recent scores, while Twain sits on a couch telling Poe about the plot of his latest novel. O’Keefe and Van Gogh may be talking about their art, while Roosevelt and Lincoln discuss political endeavors. But in fact, these historical figures also had a much more personal common experience: Each of them battled the debilitating illness of depression.

How often have we said, "I feel depressed."?

Let us remember that occasional sadness that everyone feels, that sadness that is often caused by life's dissapointments, is totally different from the brain disorder. In actuality, depression impairs the ability of someone to function in everyday situations. It affects the thoughts, moods, physical well-being, and behaviors. Some may feel it is a feeling of "worthlesness" You feel like you are disconnected from life, and the people in your life. For me, I didn't want to get out of bed. I slept during the day, and would lay awake at night. I didn't want to see anybody, and didn't want anybody to see me. I spent many days, trying to sleep my problems away, and every day I woke up with the same problems and issues. It became a viscous cycle.



Depression strikes about 17 million American adults each year–more than cancer, AIDS, or coronary heart disease–according to the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). An estimated 15 percent of chronic depression cases end in suicide. Women are twice as likely as men to be affected. Many people simply don’t know what depression is. “A lot of people still believe that depression is a character flaw or caused by bad parenting,” says Mary Rappaport, a spokeswoman for the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill. She explains that depression cannot be overcome by willpower, but requires medical attention.

Ignorant to the realities of mental illnes, many say, "there's nothing wrong me, I'm just having a bad day." "There's nothing wrong with me, I've just got problems." And how many times have we uttered the words "I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired" [Fannie Lou Hammer] Why do we hide our feelings? We hide our pain and sadness. We hide it from the medical professionals who can help us. So this illness goes untreated...it goes unnoticed...it goes mistreated.

End Results: Suicide...Violence

When will we lose the fear, and address the pain? I got help...when will you?

To be continued...

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

.: The Whole Truth :.

This post was sent to me via email but I felt the need to share with others...Racism in this century is still very present in our society....Sad but true.

The whole truth...
3/20/12

Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving entered holy matrimony in June of 1958, an event that was not unusual as better than 70 percent of Americans at the time married---a far cry from the fewer than 30 percent who do so today. What was unusual about their marriage was that it occurred in Virginia, whose state capitol, Richmond, once served as the capitol of the Confederacy and whose state law, specifically Section 20-59 of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924, held in pertinent part that “If any white person intermarry with a colored person, or any colored person intermarry with a white person, he shall be guilty of a felony and shall be punished by confinement in the penitentiary for not less than one nor more than five years.”

Virginia’s 1924 Act was not the first anti-miscegenation act or measure to forbid interracial marriage, as some form of the same existed in many colonies as far back at the 17th Century. The Lovings, cognizant of Virginia’s law, recited their nuptials in Washington, DC but upon returning home to Caroline County, Virginia, they were indicted under the Racial Integrity Act and later convicted and sentenced to one year in prison under the same. The Lovings’ sentence was suspended, however, when they entered a deal to leave Virginia and not return for 25 years. To comply with the deal, the couple moved to Washington DC.

Dissatisfied with their treatment under the law, the Lovings, with the assistance of the American Civil Liberties Union, soon appealed the court’s decision, thus beginning a legal odyssey that eventually ended with the United States Supreme Court’s “Loving vs. Virginia” decision of 1967. During oral argument before the Supreme Court in October of 1967, counsel for the Lovings argued that Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection and Due Process clauses. Counsel for the Commonwelath of Virginia argued that the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution reserved the right to regulate marriage exclusively to the individual states and that since the law punished whites and blacks equally, that the same did not violate the equal protection clause.

Chief Justice Earl Warren, writing for the majority ruling that struck down Virginia’s anti-miscegenation law reasoned that “at the very least, the Equal Protection Clause demands that racial classifications, especially suspect in criminal statutes, be subjected to ‘the most rigid scrutiny’…There can be no doubt that restricting the freedom to marry solely because of racial classifications violates the central meaning of the Equal Protection Clause.” While the Supreme Court’s landmark decision eliminated one of the last vestiges of Jim Crow, many states were slow to implement its dicta with the last, Alabama, finally eliminating its anti-miscegenation law in the year 2000.

As for the Lovings, Richard died in a horrific car accident that blinded his wife, Mildred, in 1975.