An Essay by Kristine Amundrud

Grandfather’s hospitalization was a secret I stumbled upon, news revealed in conversation with an aunt our family had been estranged from. I never knew my grandfather, but I recognize his handsome and stoic face from sepia photographs. I know he sold his accordion to afford marriage, and I understand that he worked his fingers to the bone.

What I will never know is what precipitated the frightening break in his psyche. In the middle of the night, he woke his wife and three daughters, voicing an urgency to get into the car. With a rifle in hand, he drove to the closest neighbors, fueled by paranoia. In an era when mental illness was shrouded in stigma, shame entered into my family line and never left.

My grandparents sold the farm and moved to the city. Anonymity was a safe friend, and the psychiatric hospital was nearby. My two aunts moved away to attend high school, but my mom stayed. Part of a generation that couldn’t access healing, I wonder what those days and years were like for her. She kept this part of her story fiercely hidden.

Years later, with our relationship in turmoil, I sought to understand the root cause. I asked if she would tell me about her childhood. Looking deep into my soul, she said without hesitation that it was perfect.

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“I don’t know what to do about your mother.” Mid-twenties, I was oblivious to any challenges in my parent’s marriage. “She’s depressed.”

It was a farmer’s best diagnosis. Shortly after this conversation, my dad died suddenly. I was flung into navigating the stages of grief while planning my wedding. Battling my own periods of depression, I wondered if I was okay.

“Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts!” (Ps. 139:23, ESV)

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Growing up, I was taught to pity the person prescribed antidepressants. “Believers don’t need medicine! That’s nonsense!”

I had a skewed picture of what constituted a healthy mind and, in turn, sound relationships. Mental health was a taboo topic. I walked through difficult seasons and scenarios unable to ask for help, believing my pain had no place in the light.

There are times when scripture will not be not enough. There are times when we trade our fears for the courage to reach out. To everything there is a season so we keep our eyes fixed on Christ.

“The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” (Ps. 51:17)

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They say that life’s major stressors consist of things such as death of a loved one, starting a new career, moving, relationship struggles, and marriage. No stranger to anxiety, I experienced all these within a year. In a northern community, without a family doctor, I begged the on-call GP for a prescription of Ativan. He thought I was an addict and sent me away.

“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our bodies.” (2 Cor. 4:8-10)

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As a young mom, overwhelmed and at the end of myself, I drove east to drop in unannounced on my mom. Bent over laboring in the garden, she said that it wasn’t a good time. Her face was hard like ice, cut off from caring. I imagined myself slipping and falling into the dugout pond over yonder, sorrow swallowing me half alive. Tears blurred my vision as I drove home, a dust cloud of anguish billowing behind me.

“For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the LORD will take me in.” (Ps. 27:10).

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My friend urged me to the front of the church for prayer. I was a visitor, uncomfortable with drawing attention to myself. The Nigerian man put his hands on my head and prayed in his mother tongue. He spoke with fervor, and his hands trembled. Several minutes later, a loose translation was shared.

“I prayed for the chains to be gone,” he said. I knew that the stranger was referring to the chains in my mind, and I wondered if indeed, they had been broken.

“So, we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.” (2 Cor. 4:16)

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I hid in the closet the other day. The sky was grey, and winter stretched colorless into my soul. Milk had been spilled, and I could hear the children arguing. Feeling ill-equipped to meet the demands of the day, David’s Psalm of Ascent comforted me:

“But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me.” (Ps. 131:2)

There is contentment rooted in God and not in the things of this world. Moments of despair will dissipate, and mercies will become new. And still, I wonder if I am okay.

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Have you ever been Doubting Thomas? Jesus reached for his hand and said, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side” (John 20:27). He didn’t ask Thomas to simply look at his side. He did this to let Thomas know that He was raised from death back to life. Thomas had parts of his life that were dead, and so do we. My family of origin has dark stories of pain, mysteries that cloud the mind and spirit. God lovingly extends a hand into our wounds, to heal.

“For I will restore health to you, and your wounds I will heal, declares the Lord” (Jer. 30:17). This is our resurrection hope, and we do not lose heart.

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