My Heart is Heavy

Sometimes I wish I was more in tune with the feelings of others. I try hard to do what it right, but I inevitably do or say the wrong thing, and I feel awful knowing I can't fix it.

My little sister is in a treatment center again to help her gain some ground on her battle with her eating disorder. Yesterday she sent an email asking if we would be interested in coming to a family week to help us know how to better support someone with an eating disorder. I responded that I would love to come down if I could. To which she responded that she was hurt. She is sorry that I have issues and do not want to open myself up to being a support to the family, and that she would not count on me being there.

I was livid to say the least. After I calmed down, I realized that she is desperately reaching out for help from her family, and wants us to be the support she needs us to be. However, I honestly don't know how to do that.  My heart is heavy because I do love her, and I want her to get better.

What frustrates me the very most is that while she is going through all her therapy and treatment center stuff, they try to figure out why she feels the way she does, and they put blame on something or someone. They tell her to reach out to her support system, and teach them how to help her. When Alison does this she recognizes that she is distant from her family, and assumes we feel the same way. She decides we are broken as a family, and that we must all be having issues like she is having. She does not recognize that she has separated herself.

Yes, I recognize that we are only as strong as the weakest link, but I don't feel like I am hiding or pretending to be something that I am not. Pretty much I live with my feelings on the outside for everyone to see. If you read this blog you pretty much know that. I have to apologize all the time. I don't however apologize for having bad days. I know I am not perfect. I know I am the one that needs to pick myself up to do better the next day. I don't expect others to make me happy. It is my attitude that I have agency with, and most of the time I choose to be happy. My biggest fault right now is that I am too judgmental with people in the Church. I want to love them as I know I am supposed to, but when I see them not acting as I think they should, I have a problem with that. I expect people to step up to serve. I also know it is my problem. I know that I am at fault, but does that make me broken? Does that mean that I am hiding something? Does that mean that I am not  supporting my family?

All this came about because I told my sister that I could come on Thursday and Friday, but I could not come on one certain Saturday. That Saturday might be the day we would do fun activities including a ropes course. I made the mistake of telling her I didn't need to do that. She assumed it was because I was scared. Never mind that I am almost 50 and have reached the point in my life that I don't need to do things to prove to myself and others that I can do hard things. REALLY.  I have learned that lesson the hard way as I.held a friend who was losing her son to cancer, or a daughter as she learns to stand on her own, or when I stood up alone in my community when they treated a friend unfairly because of the color of her skin, or . . . bottom line "Life is Hard."

I know my sister doesn't feel my love because I have let her down, because  I haven't fought for her as much as I have fought for others, but honestly it is not because I am broken. It is because I don't know how. When I pray to know how to help her, I get the answer to love her without judging her.

I know on this one I have to be still and trust the Lord, but I don't know where the line is between leaving it up to him, and doing my part in helping him as He does his work.

I feel so helpless, and this is why my heart hurts today.