This is Me, Uncovered...

  I began a bit earlier responding to my nephews comments on the blog before this one. As I began to write, I realized two things. First, I am not known as the long-winded responder here on line for no reason. I am exactly that. My responses sometimes look more like "short stories" than simply replies to a comment. To some that is a good thing and to others... well. I stopped my reply to Joshua and decided to write it here instead. I found that I had more to say than perhaps should be in a comment section. Thank you Josh for writing and allowing me the chance to do what I love to do. That is, to write. Though I am responding to Joshua's comments, I believe that many can feel and understand the words here.
 Joshua, I too am glad you found your way here though I will say again, it is with an amount of uncertainties still, for now at least. I am extremely open in my writings here and endeavour to reach out and touch lives. Lives that sometimes believe they are very alone in the many things they experience on a daily basis.  Far too often, a soul becomes lost simply based on the feeling of being odd or a freak because of some of the issues they must deal with daily. Fears that are very real. They all have the ability to separate people from others in an attempt to conceal the issues they do not want the world, especially family, to know they suffer from. How sad that there are more families than you might even want to believe that refuse to believe or acknowledge that someone they love may indeed suffer from a disorder such as bipolar or Tourettes or that they may be Manic. A denial that normally comes from something so simple as not understanding. And as I am known to say often, that which is unknown or not understood is either feared or shunned by those not inflicted.
 Far too often, that soul becomes lost simply because the very ones they love refused to listen to the issues they must deal with daily. Not knowing always if there is somewhere, someone to turn to that will listen. They Know God is Always there as I truly do know. But sometimes the soul yearns for a more human touch of the heart to show them they are not so different, not experiencing things that many others in this world do, each and every day. There are so many different forms of depressions and mental disorders today but most, if not all of them have one thing in common. They leave the inflicted feeling very alone and sometimes even ashamed that they can not always fight these issues.
 I said earlier that I was glad that Joshua had found my site but not without some fear or uncertainties. In reading more and more of my blogs, Josh is going to read things about myself that he may not know. He will see sides of my depression and the effects that the Bipolar and Tourettes have on my daily life that I may have been alright with being less known. But he will also see the love and devotion I have to My father in heaven. the faith that I placed in him with My Sheila for 25 years. He will see the Blessings that God has given to me in learning to take the saddest, hardest times of my life and make them lessons to grow by.
 Joshua was responding to a blog concerning the feelings of selfishness when we take time for our selves. Feeling that in taking time for our own selves, we are taking away time that we could have been devoting to someone that truly needed our help. He made some really good points in saying that though it is easier to give of our selves to someone else than to our own selves, if we do not take time for us, then we may not be good for anyone else. The words do ring with truth but often applying those words to our own lives isn't as easy and does not seem as important. Feeling undeserved of the very love and inspiration we strive to have others believe they DO deserve is a way of life for those like me. A thought process that echos over and over that We are not here to make our selves feel good but to reach out to those that feel alone or lost or different.
 A song rings in my ear that I have loved for as long as I can remember hearing it. Bless the Beasts and The Children. {Karen Carpenter sang it beautifully} It says to bless the beasts and the children for they have no voice or choice. Give them warmth when darkness surrounds them and give them hope and love. That is my true desire and I would do without if it meant another would not. And so it brings us back to the beginning in pondering the thought that if we want to have time to ourselves, are we selfish? Did wanting someone I love very much to Not visit one day leave me marked as cruel and unfeeling? Was the suffering and tears I cried for that day worth the time I Took for myself? Or would it have been better to simply say No to myself and allow the visit?
 These are just some of the things I struggle with daily. This is but a tiny part of what my world is like up close and personal. The fear inside that someone close to me, dear to my heart, will now see things about me that may turn them away. Please readers, do not believe for a moment that a loved one would not do such a thing. If this were not so, then we would have a lot less sad, lonely people that one day simply say "Enough... I can't live in this sadness any longer" and give in to something that can not be undone. God's perfect love is that we turn away no one and yet, still, in this world there are those that are loved more and shunned less by strangers {perhaps Angels Unseen} than by their own family.
 Remember, smile at everyone you see. You have no idea what battle they may be fighting inside. Your smile may be just what they needed to say, "It is worth another day."