2016 has taken off at full speed here. The days are racing by and I am overwhelmed when I think back on all that has happened in this last month. My memories of the last 31 days are a blob of emotions; joy, sadness, excitement, anxiety, exhaustion, frustration and triumph. I was overwhelmed with joy as I spent the Christmas holiday with my boyfriend and his family. It was such a special gift to sit with a family who is experienced in this type of work and just be. We explored a lot of Spain, ate too much food, played a ton of games, laughed and rested together; it was a fun time of really getting to know my boyfriends family and taking a breather from life here. However, in that time and especially upon returning here I also experienced a lot of sadness. It is an understatement to say I missed my family. I knew it would be hard to be away from them, but I was surprised by how hard it was over the holidays. Thank God for Skype, email and the amazing letters (and pictures) I got from some friends to lift my spirits. It reminds me that I am truly blessed and loved by people at home. Even though Spain was so much fun, I was genuinely excited to return to my home here. I felt revived and filled with hope as I was itching to see my friends, catch up with them and talk about the holidays. Language was very hard to start again, but I was so happy to be back in the swing of things. That emotion didn’t seem to last long, because anxiety quickly crept in. All of a sudden I felt like I didn’t want to go outside. Things felt so intimidating and every time someone talked to me, in arabic or in english, I felt like I was going to fall apart. I didn’t want to talk to my roommate and was often annoyed with her for no reason and she felt the same. I felt a heaviness sit on me when I walked outside and sleeping though the night seemed impossible. Exhaustion swept in next along with a cold and sinus infection. Being back in the craziness of the city while trying to function in Arabic again and keep it together emotionally just felt like too much. My energy seemed to leak out of me no matter what I did. One day, my roommate and I were so tense with each other that I just had to break the tension. We were so frustrated when we both communicated that we were feeling the same way. Both of us were experiencing a feeling of spiritual oppression. Both of us couldn't sleep, both of us felt out of balance and both of us felt like we were being divided from each other. That conversation was so pivotal in how we decided to fight this fight. We could both sit separately, like the devil would prefer and try to function at a normal level. Or we could draw our energy and trust in the One Who Gives Us Strength together in community. Since our time of prayer together, both of us have felt more connected together and have also strived to be more honest about how we are feeling so that we can ask for the other to intercede for us. It’s a slow process, but we are both feeling small amounts of triumph and seeing the fruit that comes when we choose to hope in Him.
I also feel like I have experienced other wins, especially this week. I feel like in a lot of ways, I have turned a corner in how I am feeling. I am working to create more balance in my life to make sure I am taking care of my self so that I can love others well. This week has been a lot of fun! I have been feeling a lot more confident in my arabic. I have decided to put myself out there a little bit more and walk down a particular street that is full of refugee people and shops every day. I just walk by stores and say hi to the 3 people I know and then I smile and say hello to as many women as I can. The people I have talked to are very surprised and complimentary with my arabic ability (especially because I am learning past tense now) and are so loving. I also went to visit a friend by myself for the first time. I went to her house last night and she just happened to be home. I ended up eating dinner with her, her daughter, her friend and a girl who is staying with her that just happens to be 20 years old. We spoke about 85% in Arabic and it was so fun. The 20 year old girl also just moved to the city and we are hoping that we can spend more time together because she wants more friends! This is a HUGE answer to prayer as we have been asking for connections with women who are in their early 20’s! Today we also dropped off our paperwork for our visas. Please pray for provision there. We will hopefully receive another 3 month visa tomorrow morning when we go back into the office. Everything was very fast and smooth today and we had nice people working with us. The three of us that are new here went alone and we now have enough Arabic to get our visas by ourselves. Praise the Lord!