this morning i have been catching up on blogs (and a big thank you to everyone who supported us by linking and talking about our trip). i left around lunch time to get a diet cherry dr. pepper from sonic (coke light didn’t cut it for me when i was gone) and drive around. it’s the best way to process stuff for me.
ipod charged and plugged in, it didn’t matter what i was listening to. i cried.
for three hours straight i cried.
for what? i’m not sure. for lots of things. the heaviness in my heart. the jumble of confusion in my brain. for our little girl linet. for missing new friends. for missing old friends in kansas and in dallas. for our trip to scotland two years ago. for the homes we visited in uganda. for the children too sick to get up at the aids clinic we went to. the adjustment from living in kansas and dallas and oklahoma all in a three-year time frame. for the fact that today i’m 28 years old and have less of a clue about anything than i did when i was 23. for my friends who live across the country that i can text and email and how they respond within moments saying they’ll pray. for other friends who bend over backwards to help me understand not only the things i feel now, but deeper things that are surfacing with my emotions as raw as they are. for the million happy birthday messages on my facebook that make me smile and the voicemails of friends singing it to me.
three hours straight i’ve cried.
wait. didn’t i say i was a thinker?
so much for that.
Comments
38 responses to “jet lag? maybe.”
I returned from Africa in Nov. I still cry. Don’t stop crying. Not until life gets better for our friends in Africa.
I had that moment except it was on the airplane. I could not stop the tears! I knew all week that there was going to be a breaking point. It almost happened at the aids clinic but I was able to keep the tears down until last night. However there is something freeing about a good cry! Happy birthday my new, well kinda new friend! H
Don’t watch The Notebook anytime soon.
Or ET.
Thinkers are ALWAYS feelers in disguise. They just have control and vulnerability issues. When they let their guard down…BOOM!
Like a firehose through a straw…
Seriously, JP Moreland told me I needed counseling because I was not a “feeler”…I thought he was crazy until I had one of those Bridget Jones Diary moments…good times.
Thanks for all the updates on your trip.
My wife and I decided to support some orphans in Bolivia after your guys’ trip.
Cheers.
If it makes you feel any better, I have cried the entire time you guys have been gone. And. . . I wan’t even there. What does that make me???? Crazy, maybe?
Right after I posted, I realized that you are on staff at LifeChurch.tv. I am in a learning group, III Text, with a guys from there, Paul Baird. I noticed you guys were friends on Facebook. . . small world. And, Happy Birthday!
Thanks for sharing your trip with us! Awesome! And I totally understand crying for not particular reason but just about everything all at once. Stuff can get overwhelming – happy and sad – and crying is one of the best ways to deal with it in my opinion. Just make sure you don’t have plans right after – I get puffy eyes. :) Did I miss your birthday?? Dang! When was it?? Happy Belated!!
Happy birthday, Anne.
I’m really sorry all this is hitting on your special day. I’ve been doing the back-and-forth to east and central Africa thing for ten years now. I always think hard on the way home and then cry when I have to go to the grocery store. It’s something about there being so many choices, when I know how few choices others have.
I’ve come to believe that those thoughts and feelings are God’s call, and that the hardest task upon returning is deciding if my life is going to change, or if I’ll go back to normal. Changing and engaging with it makes you an exile. If you go that route, you’ll never be fully at home here or there again. But going back to the way it was before isn’t living the call. And in my experience, it’s worth it to respond and to rethink priorities and habits and lifestyle.
hey, friend…:)
ya know what? i think it was nothing more (or less?) than the Holy Spirit weeping and groaning what could not be spoken. let Him guide you through this.
maybe there are parts of you that are being wrecked and rebuilt…in a way that draws you further up and further in….
welcome home…
I’m definitely a “feeler” so when I read about other people crying, I tend to tear up as well. I’m glad that you were able to stop holding in all the emotions. I think it feels good to let it all out. Now, hopefully, you can go out with Chris and enjoy your special day (and then crash for a long time!!). Happy B-day:)
Happy birthday! And I’m not surprised you have been crying. Trips like that are always emotionally exciting and draining and overwhelming all at the same time. :)
Happy Birthday Anne, keep feeling…and thinking.
feliz cumpleanos!
I cannot tell you how I found your site….except that the Lord lead me to it…I have never been to Africa but almost everyday I feel guilty for all that I have, freedom to worship and speak of my Lord openly, a roof over my head, clean water, heat, health care insurance….etc….we give to many needs and needy but it never seems to be enough….God Bless you for listening to the Lord and going where He sent you and sharing with the rest of us. Pam, South Bend
sometimes the feelings are too much for the human form to handle. when we’re three, we fall on the ground in a rage. when we’re sixteen, we call our friends and rant. when we’re twenty-whatever, tears are the only thing that can relieve the pressure of trying to contain both the greatest joy and the greatest pain.
And wasn’t it nice for the Mavs to hold off trading for Jason Kidd until you returned to the States?
Happy Happy Birthday!
happy birthday, annegirl!
glad you made it back safely. glad so many things happened on your trip (and will happen as a result of your trip). loved you are…
The Earth is groaning, and it’s no surprise that you are feeling that in a really visceral way right now. Just let it come, it’s for a reason!
Peace,
`Arianne
I’m a “thinker” too and totally identified with that post AND the one today. There are just some things so big even a thinker cannot help but be wrecked emotionally.
I’m almost 50 and continue to be blown away by how God moves. Always thought that by this point we’d [finally] be settled. HA! I’m learning Spanish and getting ready to move to South America. But why should I be surprised? Periodically God simply moves us, sometimes abruptly, and always into completely new “careers”. I’ve learned to just hang on and enjoy the ride :-)
Will pray for you! And Happy Birthday!
First of all….happy birthday!
If you didn’t come home and question everything about your life, your environment, your country, then I would wonder about you. God changed something deep within you.
I’m so amazed by all that you experienced and shared…and for what you are yet to share.
God bless you!
I can only imagine how emotional something like that would be. It had to be draining, both physically, mentally and emotionally.
Brad Ruggles
http://www.bradruggles.com
I wonder if what you’re describing isn’t the answer to a prayer first prayed long ago, and then repeated through the ages…
“Your kingdom come, you’re will be done, on earth as it is in heaven…”
Thank you for letting us in…
Thanks for your honesty…
Tears of Joy for you and your Mavs….Jason Kidd.
Feliz Cumpleanos!
Anne,
Happy Birthday. I appreciate your heart. Keep living the journey becomes clearer.
Happy birthday Anne, fellow thinker and part-time feeler. Thank you for sharing everything you could from your trip. I know blogs and video can only go so far, but no doubt there has been impact on the online community. I look forward to seeing God expand your heart even more.
Anne, your blog (and all the others’) have been such a blessing this past week. Lots of tears – some for the abject poverty I was seeing through your words and pictures and then some for the amazing hope that was visible in the lives of the children and their families that have sponsors. I cried every night as I read, and I prayed, and I cried some more – then I signed up as a sponsor for a little girl named Jully. Thank you for being brave and entering a world so very different from the one most of us are so comfortable in every day, and then sharing it so vividly. Love you, Cindy
Anne: Welcome back, thanks for sharing your heart, and Happy Birthday! There’s an old timie song a Soloist used to sing, titled: “Tears Are A Language God Understands”
There’s a reason for those tears and I tear with you. You have a tremendous heart of love. May God truly bless you in a great way and I know He will.
So it’s your birthday on the 19th – in another galaxy far far away I was born on the 19th also – I attained the wise old age of 60 on the 19th of February. So happy birthday to us BOTH – about the crying – and the being a thinker – God installed all the components so using them is good. Christ cried – you are following in divine pathways. Birthdays are good times to reflect on how blessed we are –
Rawness is a beautiful thing. I pray you keep a piece of it as you get back to life… it’s a hard thing to hold on to…
I was hoping you liked the song :)
happy late birthday! if it makes you feel any better i had a dream about you last night! (random, I know). i don’t remember where we were but i got to meet you and carlos…lol and you asked me if i liked to dance..! anyway, thought it might give you a laugh! :)
luv the stream of thoughts thing you got flowing.
if you want to throw some logic into the madness..
48 hours of sleeplessness = 3 hours of crying
simple math
Happy Birthday, and thank you so much for sharing with us. I sponsored Bridget, age 3, from Uganda as a result of everybody’s sharing. You can see her picture at my website.
Anyway, I come out a feeler on the Myers-Briggs, but all the teasing I got as a child and other stuff in my life has kinda made me a little more of a thinker day-to-day but when something (or someone) opens up the “flood-gates” it is hard to stop. Let it come, let it flow, because it is the Holy Spirit working in you.
This morning, 5:30 am, Kim and I were talking. Quietly. 5:30am talking. She said the trip was so weird because of how intense it was on my end and how far apart we were. She said for the first time ever it seemed like I didn’t miss her.
Bang.
Uncontrollable tears – the whole week of tears. I didn’t manage three hours – well done! – but I did ok. I’m still there… right on that edge. I hope I always be.
Feelings & tears. Its how we know we’re alive. Happy Birthday!
yup. I love you.
Wow..I would totally expect that to happen but didn’t see it coming.. Did you feel better after those three hours?
A little…