Chapter 20

20.  Darkest before the Dawn


The next morning, I went over to my parents’ house before breakfast as I headed out to work.  I told them that Mario and I had gotten engaged and hoped that they would be happy for us.  We talked about some things and I shook the whole time.  I didn’t want to do anything that they didn’t want me to do but I really believed that I was walking in God’s will to be with Mario.  Solving nothing in that conversation, we went to our separate jobs.

The next few months were my most difficult and yet most happy times.  Mario and I planned our wedding for May 2002 and I became a chief-delegator sort of bride.  It took no time at all for us to choose our hall, photographer, church, cake baker and sign up for pre-marital counseling.  In order to make doubly sure that we knew what we were doing, we took counseling classes at two different churches.  For the rest of the wedding tasks, I made a list and gave it to April and my best friend.  I figured if it happened, it happened.  If not, oh well, I was still getting married in May.  

At the same time, April and her husband were building a new house and in November, I decided to buy the house in which they were living.  Mario didn’t have enough credit to help me purchase the house so a family friend put a down payment on the house and I agreed to be responsible for the other two-thirds of the mortgage.  Wasting no time at all, I moved in immediately.  I was now a homeowner!  

As the year ended, we were excited about our upcoming wedding.  In 1999, after April’s wedding, Mario had started a side business with a jazz ensemble playing music at wedding receptions.  He also worked as a janitor at a huge church nearby.  Soon his little side business quickly expanded to include DJ services and he was in high demand around the area.  I became his manager and an event coordinator, organizing wedding receptions and making all the announcements.  In addition, I was very busy at my corporate job and although things were getting a little weird there, I was easily distracted by wedding plans.  I also decided that I would work during the evenings at the same tax agency again that tax season in order to make extra money for the wedding.  Knowing that I needed to save both time and money, in January 2002 I made up all the boutonnieres, corsages, flower arrangements, bows, baskets and bouquets, including my own with silk flowers painstakingly hand picked by me.  Although it might seem like it would have been a lot of work to do alone, it actually was very therapeutic to be able to design the arrangements, putting them together with love and pride. I'm happy to report that they turned out beautifully!

Perhaps you might be thinking that I placed a lot of pressure and expectations on myself at this particular time of my life.  You would be correct.  But it had become a habit for me by then, to overschedule and overwork myself.  I didn’t know how to operate any other way.  If I wasn’t busy all the time, if I had any moments of stillness, I believed that I was failing somehow to be all that God had called me to be.  As you can imagine, this began to take a toll on me both physically and mentally.

I survived the next few months and on May 3, 2002 my father walked me down the aisle and I married my best friend and love, Mario.  My father and mother were there and he walked me down the aisle, not because they agreed with our choice but because he wanted Mario and I to know that regardless of his opinion and no matter what was to happen in the future, he and Mom would always be there praying for us.  Since then, we have developed a friendship and relationship with them that is solid in Christ’s love and mercy.  We are honored to have them in our lives.

The stress of my personal life those past few months paled in comparison to the next ones at work.  After returning from our honeymoon in Cancun, Mario and I settled into married life in our new home quite easily.  We had our disagreements and (honestly) rip-roaring fights but we were happy and very much in love.  But things at work were no longer so honeymoon-ish and the undercurrent of unrest was beginning to take its toll.  I can not be specific about the situation there but I can say that my boss and I were no longer getting along.  Emotionally, I felt like I was going to school and a bully was waiting at the corner to beat me up.  Don’t get me wrong, my supervisor was not at heart a bad person nor was I but our communication had deteriorated.

I know now that I was treating him as though I knew more than he did about his job and our division.  I did control a great many aspects of our section but I think that perhaps I didn’t need to communicate that to him.  He, on the other hand, felt like I was pushing him out of the loop.  Other managers would speak directly to me, the sales guys were communicating exclusively with me, if you needed it done, you came to me.  We had heated arguments about reports and meetings.  I had panic attacks nearly every day either on the way to work, while at work or just after leaving work.

He accused me of deliberately sabotaging his authority, told me I was "moronic" and "catatonic" while I worked, rolled his eyes when I asked for time off because of my health.  The straw that broke the proverbial camel's back was when he literally yelled at me after I refused to change some important details on a report I had generated.  I contacted the human resources department several times over a period of 6 months and received no help or advice.

It got so bad that the year after I got married, while we were on vacation for Memorial Day in Canada, I became so physically ill with the intestinal problems I had a mammoth panic attack and ended up in a hospital in Sarnia, Ontario.  After treating my symptoms there for seven hours, I was finally released and we crossed the border back into Michigan.  On our way home, I called my supervisor and explained to him that I wouldn’t be in to work the next day.  Though it is true that I had taken a lot of sick days and time off in the past year, his response was cruel and rude.  After hanging up with him, I cried all the way home.  We made an appointment with my doctor in the morning and at that consultation, my doctor advised “you either have to quit that job or plan on being sick for quite a long time.  The stress is destroying your health.”

Shocked, Mario and I prayed about it that evening.  We realized that I had been to a hospital or the doctor at least four times in the past eight months treating the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome as a result of panic attacks.  The doctor gave me an anti-anxiety medication and I felt at a loss.  I was a child of God, raised in faith believing I was healed in Jesus’ Name!  I was a walking miracle already and I was struggling with a panic disorder?!  


“A failure,” I thought, “I am a spiritual failure.  Why am I so weak?”  But I did not share these inner thoughts with my husband.  Instead we decided that I would speak to the vice president of the company and I wouldn’t discuss anything with my immediate supervisor at all.  So, I made an appointment with her.  After two separate meetings, she and I decided that I would no longer work at the company.  I committed to working from home for another month to set up training sessions, finish a few projects and say goodbye to my coworkers but then I would be done.  I never spoke to my boss again.

After the decision was made, I found that I slept a great deal.  I had received a severance but couldn’t bring myself to look for another job.  I was defeated mentally and physically.  Depressed without knowing it, it took me three months to get out of bed without having a panic attack.  I didn’t want to become addicted to the anti-anxiety medicine and only took it when the nerves caused the I.B.S. to flare up.  I constantly thought about how I had failed, that God must surely be disappointed in me and what a horrible example of a Christian I was.  Mario struggled with this “new Angel”.  I was not the strong, capable girl he’d known for six years and he wondered how long it would last.  I wondered too.

Chapter 10

10.  Shining His Light
I could spend hours telling stories about being on tour that summer but I suppose I’ll have to be satisfied with a few highlights.  I'll begin by saying that a bus built in the early 1970’s might not last a whole three months of driving over 5 hours every single day.  In the summer.  Down South.  During a heat wave.  The air conditioning broke.  ......Of course it did.  The bus was about 30 feet long and there were approximately 20 of us on it for at least 5 hours each day. We would get on the bus early in the morning, travel through the day and debark in the afternoon at a church in a different city far from where we'd been the night before. We'd spend the day doing devotions, listening to music, sleeping (lots and lots of sleeping) and getting to know each other. Teammates had come from all over the United States, Canada and even one girl was there from France. We had different denominational backgrounds and I learned much about the beauty of tradition from some of my friends as they learned a lot more about the grace and freedom found in a personal relationship with Jesus.

Our mission was to bring encouragement and prayer support to churches throughout North America as we made our way to a coastal airport to depart for whatever foreign country in which we would perform concerts, bringing Jesus to a hurting world through music. We often prayed for the people for hours afterward as they lined up to receive a personal touch from the Lord. We saw many miracles both spiritual and physical.

Since our team was headed to Nicaragua, El Salvador and Belize for about 3-4 weeks from the end of July to the beginning of August, we started out in central California and made our way through the southern United States from the middle of June to the middle of July. When we were finished with the overseas portion, we'd fly back to Miami and make our way back to California, concert by concert each night for the final Homecoming concert at the end of August in Visalia, California. At that concert, all 7 teams would gather for a special "thank you" concert for the families and supporters of the ministry.

Each person on the team had a job to do and mine was to be the bus cleaner.  Another girl and I had to clean the bus after we arrived at the location every single day.  Every single day.  In the heat.  Without air conditioning (have I mentioned that?).  I remember being sweaty and dirty every single day before having to go inside a new church and be pretty & sweet for a bunch of people I'd never met before. I am a neat freak and hate being dirty at all, therefore while I was cleaning I know that I said words that perhaps were a tad bit colorful and certainly had to repent for later.  Oh well, I suppose you can always say that it "built character" in me.

I must mention here that we had the best director in the history of the ministry and he and I are still good friends today.  He was fun, intelligent, talented and had a true heart for God.  All the girls had crushes on him.  Except for me, of course.  Remember, I had my true love waiting for me at home.  Besides that tiny distraction, the girls on the team really developed strong bonds with each other and we made both hilarious and touching memories ministering, laughing, praying and crying together.  

I now call that tour “the spirit of Toilet Harrassment tour”.  This moniker sets it apart from later tours by being the only one during which a morning was not complete if one of the ladies didn’t get on the bus with a story about a toilet catastrophe at her host home, or the restaurant or at the church.  I remember that we were at a Burger King in El Salvador and one of the stalls had a toilet that wouldn’t flush.  So we agreed that anyone who “had to go number one” could use that one and anyone needing, um, more time should use the other stall.  

I should probably mention that while we generally did one concert per day in the States, we usually did two or more per day when we were overseas. So often times we wore our "concert attire" all day long. That year we had two dresses, a one-piece blue-green A-line skirt with button-down top and a fuscia one-piece A-line belted made of fabric which wrinkled easily and breathed not well at all in the Central American heat.  The ladies all had matching earrings and necklaces, black patent leather high heeled shoes and black panty hose. No, don't worry, I didn't have heat stroke by the end of each day (sarcasm inserted here).

Well, my violinist friend was the last one in to the Number One stall and as we're washing our hands, chattering and giggling, suddenly we hear her chagrined voice, “oh noooooo!”  

“What’s the matter?” someone exclaimed.  

In a deeply saddened voice she told us through the stall door, “my concert necklace just fell off….Into the toilet.”  

Groaning as one, we turned to the attendant – foreign restrooms often have attendants in them – who promptly said, “no problemo”.  When our friend came out, the attendant went in and fished out the necklace with her bare hands (feel free to be nauseous) and proudly tried to hand it to our friend.  Smiling weakly, she took the necklace gingerly between her index finger and thumb and gritting her teeth, she dropped it into the sink.  Washing it thousands of times would never erase what we all knew to be true about that necklace.

Throughout this tour and the next three years of college and other mission trips, I struggled mightily with panic attacks and an irritable gastric system.  Traveling only made it worse.  But I was determined to let God’s light shine through me.  I remember one particular afternoon in El Salvador, we were all visiting someone's home in the mountains overlooking an incredibly large lake and I experienced the same shortness of breath, tunnel vision and clawed hands that I had back in high school during my senior year.

I needed to get out of there but had no where to go. It freaked us out and especially my director, who'd begun to look at me as his little sister (I was 18 at the time). He carried me outside where the breeze from the water refreshed me as the team prayed for me. I was so embarrassed but also was scared. I was questioning the Lord, my body, my mind. I didn't know anything about "triggers" and if I had, I don't know that I could have pinpointed anything specific about why my body had rebelled against me. Of course, now I know exactly what was happening but at the time, it was merely something I tried my best to strive to overcome it myself.

In Belize, I had an intestinal episode that kept me running to find bathrooms at the most inconvenient times and places. Yet I managed to perform at the concerts, praying over others, watching them receive miracles from God and still act like I wasn't becoming more and more terrified of my own body and mind.

Only after my mother went back to college, earning dual bachelor’s degrees in English and Psychology, did the Lord show us that my episodes were bona fide panic attacks and were probably kicking off an illness known as irritable bowel syndrome.  Later when we were armed with this new information, Mom and I went to the doctor.  After many tests and years of searching I finally understood that I had these issues, what triggered them and that would have to learn how God could make a new miracle through me.