Humble.

I just got back from taking AMP, my youth group, to junior high church camp at El Porvenir. The week was challenging and wonderful. I felt a little out of my element since I had never been to that camp before but I was definitely willing to make the most of it. The kids totally made it more than worth it- I love them so much. It was too cool to see them truly seeking God and wanting to learn about Him and get to know Him.

The disclaimer here is that this entry is going to be pretty dang long and I'm about to say a lot of true things that (maybe) you:
1) Don't believe in
2) Think is a load of bull
3) Are going to get bored with and stop reading halfway through

During the week we had talked about sin (thumbs down) and how God is so holy that He cannot be in the presence of sin, hence, Jesus coming to pay the price of our sin making the way for us to have a relationship with God (thumbs up).
To be honest, I have been feeling a spiritual block lately. I have felt so alone and weak, like God has been distant from me. I haven't been able to feel His guidance- like I had been left in the dark, which made going to camp even harder for me.
So while we were talking about sin at camp, I started thinking about my own not-so-clean-slate. I started thinking of some things that happened about 5 years ago.

For those of you who knew me back then, you know that I had a fainting condition. You know that I was passing out everyday, sometimes 2-3 times a day. You know that I suffered from migraines and body aches that would keep me from getting out of bed for days, sometimes weeks, at a time. If you went to school with me you know that I would be at school one day and then you wouldn't see me again for a week. Maybe I'd be there for 2-5 days and then not for another 2 weeks. This all began when I started going to public school after being home schooled for 8 1/2 years. I started getting headaches and dizzy spells. I would go home in the afternoons because my head hurt so bad. Eventually, the dizzy spells turned into losing vision for a minute or so, everything just fading to black. My mom started to get really concerned and going to the doctor became a regular activity. In fact, going to many cardiologists, neurologists and endocrinologists from the four nearest cities became pretty common too after I told my mom that my losing vision had turned into full on fainting.
I cannot count how many different fainting and migraine medications I was put on; trial-and-error wasn't just a vocabulary term from my science classes anymore.
This all lasted for a year.
One day we went up to ABQ for a tilt table test. Long story short, a tilt table test can last up to 45 minutes. If you faint within the 45 minutes, you suffer from Syncope Episodes (a fancy way a saying "fainting spells").
I fainted at minute 9.
They labeled me with "Extreme Syncope Episodes"
They put me on the right medication and since I had found a working migraine medication, I was golden from there on out.

Fast forward about 5 years.

I'm at camp. We're talking about sin. God is clearing up some blurred lines for me.
Convicting my heart, telling me I need to make things right with the people in my life.

I have been a liar for the past 5 years. But please know that everything I said above about my 8th/9th grade year was and is true, EXCEPT, that during that time I was not actually fainting (except I actually did faint on the tilt table test, which I doesn't really make sense, but it's true). I would come very, very close, sometimes to the point of my hearing started to fade out, but I was NOT actually fainting. I faked many "fainting spells" and after spending too much time in my head, I believed that I actually had fainted in class that day, or I really had fainted in the pool, or I really had fainted at the sleepover. There were times where I would try to sort out real from fake in my head and it was all so confusing that I decided to come to the verdict of "I don't know."

God gave me clarity to see what was actually going on back then. Knowledge is the one gift you can't give back right? So every day that I don't tell the truth to everyone who knows me to be the girl with the fainting problem, is a day where I have been a liar. So here I be, publishing this for the entire WWW to see.

I called my my parents, my sisters, my best friend, and my boyfriend today to tell them all personally how sorry I am for not being truthful and have asked them to forgive me.Which they did (thumbs up).
Nearly all of them asked why I would lie about something like that and the answer is not one I am proud of (which isn't a shocker considering I am not proud about ANY of this).
As twisted as it sounds, I was scared of not being cared about. When I saw how concerned my mom was about me during that time I didn't want to lose that. Ever. I was scared so I felt like the situation needed to intensify so I wouldn't lose that feeling of my mom caring about me so much. I hated it at the same time though. I felt so guilty for worrying my mom so much but I had already built up this elaborate story. It was unthinkable to admit that I had been lying about the fainting.

So I've apologized to my family, but there are countless others I need to apologize to, so if you are one of those who knew me as "the girl who faints" or if you just heard about that story, I am very sorry for lying to you. I know that this "confession" will either point you one of two ways:
1) You'll peg me as a liar and not believe a word I say from here on out
or
2) You'll trust that I am telling the truth from here on out since I just came clean about all of this.
              Honestly, I don't hope for either of those but I am asking for your forgiveness.


"Answer me this: How do you forgive yourself for the things you've done and then forget about it?"
"You don't forget. You forgive yourself and then let it humble you."