21 Guns

I'm glad we can still be friends

I just talked to Christos and I'm thankful that we can still be friends.  He says he has no hard feelings and that he is not hurt, that he is fine now.  I now feel at peace knowing this.  He is an amazing man. 

Regrets

There are a lot of things I regret in this life, but the thing I regret most right now is hurting you.  You didn't deserve it, and I know I don't deserve to be forgiven.  I hope that one day you will forgive me, but if you don't I will understand.  I hope that your heart will heal and that you can be happy again soon. You deserve to be happy.  I'll always remember the way you smiled at me, and I hope you can be able to smile like that again.  I hope you understand that I never meant to hurt you.  I sincerely hope that one day we can be friends again, but if it's not possible, I'll just treasure the times we had.  I'll remember you as a man that I once loved.  Not just any man, but one of the most caring, generous, bravest, most loving people I have ever met.  I'll always remember how you unselfishly gave your support and your attention to me.  I'll remember and I'll still be thankful that I met you.  I know the word Sorry won't heal the hurts, but I truly am sorry.

Worries going on and off

Yesterday I was still worried and doubtful again about my relationship with Christos but after church I felt like my worries were all taken away.  It was as if God told me to leave the worries at the cross and then when I left church I felt like I was fine again.

But since today I was seeing the counselor at school I decided to tell her about my worries anyway to see what kind of perspective she would give me.  Unfortunately, after talking with her I am left with doubts again.

She said that I needed to think about why I started the relationship.  Was it to fill a hole in my heart?  Was it because I wanted attention?  Am I just doing that whole cycle again of trying to heal a past hurt by starting a new relationship?  To be honest, I didn't think about these questions when I started the relationship with Christos.  When I started the relationship I just wanted to be happy.  I was hyper, I wasn't thinking of all these things analytically.

I told Karen (the counselor) that I don't want to let him go.  And many of her questions I could not answer.  She asked me to think about the pros and cons of the relationship.  After listing out the pros, I felt like I was being selfish.

I don't know the answer anymore.  I was looking back at my old blog posts and it seems like I had the right perspective or at least seemed to when I started the relationship, and now I'm slowly losing it.  Maybe I need more time to pray about it and talk with Christos about it.  He told me not to think of these things but I feel like I need to get these worries resolved somehow.

Am I really trying to fill a hole?  Am I really trying to just get attention?  

Decision made

After praying about it and thinking about it, I have decided to leave children's ministry after May.  The future is unclear but I trust that God will provide.

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On another note, here is a song that I like:

Feeling better, but confused about job path

Hey friends,

Sorry if my last post worried you. I talked with Gloria about my relationship with Christos and I slept a whole lot more yesterday evening and last night so now I feel normal again and more clear-headed about the relationship.  I know that God gave me Christos for a reason and that right now I shouldn't worry too much about the future but to just be there for him and love him.  Not to think of the relationship as a stepping stone to something better and not to think of the relationship as using him or fooling around.  It's all about how you view the situation.  And I want to view it in a godly way.

As for my decision about job, I am still a bit confused right now but I'm sure I will have it figured out soon enough.  I really want to do outreach, what is stopping me is the job security, abandoning the kids, and whether or not it is the right time.  However I am leaning towards outreach, especially because of the dream of the church kids getting shot and the Luke 4 passage.  Pastor Fanco also talked with me and encouraged me to pursue what I believe would be my future calling which is outreach.

(I don't know what to name this post)

I don't know if I'm just still tired or what, but I feel more blah today.  I feel like everything that happened over the past week was a dream.  A good dream, but a dream.  It feels unreal.  I start to question do I really love Christos or do I really see a future with him, I start to wonder if I am a bad person for dating him, am I fooling around with his heart, am I this or that.  He really loves me, I can tell, and I don't want anything bad to happen.  He said one thing that annoys him is if I have doubts.  I don't know but I feel like these doubts are not going away.  I want to enjoy the relationship but maybe it's cuz I'm not used to someone loving me like this and also I'm not used to being in a relationship without thinking automatically about marriage.  Next week the bipolar mood is supposed to be depressed.  I hope I won't be depressed.  I'm already feeling too blah to smile right now, it's not good.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my times with Christos.  I feel happy when I'm with him.  I feel like I can be myself and I can share anything.  But I guess I'm just scared.

God, be the centre of our lives...

O Christ, be the centre of our lives
Be the place we fix our eyes
Be the centre of our lives

We lift our eyes to heaven
We wrap our lives around your life
We lift our eyes to heaven
to You...
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Dear Jesus,

It is because of You that I live.  It is because of You that I met Gloria.  And through Gloria I found Christos, so ultimately it is because of You that I found him.  It is because of You that he somehow got the same day off during the week so that he could come to lifegroup, so that I could get to know him.  So it's because of You that we are together.

It wouldn't be fair, now, if after me and Christos entered into a relationship, that we would shut You my dear Jesus, out of the picture.  I know my boo don't feel comfortable praying out loud with me, and he has a different theology than mine.  But Jesus I pray that somehow You will be the centre of our relationship so that it will be a long lasting one.

Jesus, You are my first love.  You should be the glue that holds me and Christos together.  I pray that as me and Christos gaze into each others' eyes, we will see You inside of the other person and help each other grow.  I want to become more Christ-like as a result of this, I don't want it to become another sexual relationship.

Jesus, teach me how to love You first and love Christos second.  Help me to be submissive to You and Your Word.  Because I know that if I do that, I will be most happy.

Thanks for listening and giving me such a big blessing in my life.

In Your name, Amen

Private bubble

Please do NOT tell Mary or my parents.  They don't know I'm dating Christos and life at home is already pressured enough as it is. 

Love this song!! I'm stronger!!!

Surprise! I'm dating!!! lol

Hello everyone,

I have an announcement to make but please promise you will NOT post it on facebook or tell my family!  Promise???  OK!

I am dating my friend/Gloria's friend Christos (nickname Zeus).  We decided this last night.  Karl is probably going to freak out and Allan is probably going to be mad.  My mom is already at my back for even hanging out with this guy even though she doesn't know I'm dating him.

I owe my mom 1000 dollars because I was out with Christos until 3:18am on Tues. night after a movie and dinner with Chris (aka DJChrissay) and Gloria.  It was a fun night by the way and Christos and me were talking until late and other stuff so yeah I thought my parents were asleep and my phone was being called by my mom but I didn't know cuz it was on vibrate and it like fell to the floor of the car or something.

Anyways I don't really care about owing her 1000 dollars I just feel really happy that I found someone to share life with and I feel that it's part of God's plan.  Yes I did pray about it and everything for some reason just seems to fall into place.  He is a great guy, good hearted, joyful, giving, forgiving, accepting, etc. etc. etc. a million wonderful things.

I don't want my sister and my parents to dictate my life anymore.  This time I'm not going to let them break us up and I"m not falling for my mom's emotional blackmail and brainwashing.
I will have to be strong and be stubborn for once instead of falling into their traps.

One day you will meet Christos but until then pray for me and him please! :) thanks :)

Totally unexpected

God always has a plan.  Sometimes the plan is not what you expect.  Last night, I experienced something totally unexpected.  Let me back up first though....

I recently found a new friend named Christos.  His nickname is Zeus but I only call him that when Gloria and others are around.  When I am alone with him I rather call him Christos because Zeus is a pagan god's name and I don't like that name Zeus, conjures up images of a wrathful mean god.  Anyways.  Enough about his name.

I found a new friend in Christos.  He is very gentle, caring, generous, caring... wait i said that already...  I liked him.  And now, I like him in a more than friends way.

Before you jump the gun and ask me whether I prayed about this and whether this is way too fast or whatever, I assure you I am not going to do anything stupid.  I have prayed about it and thought about it, and he is a good Christian.  His theology is kind of different than mine because he is Greek Orthodox but he is devoted to the Lord and very close with his priest, they talk often.

He has experienced many things which I will not share here, but those things have shaped him into the man he has become now.  I like who he is.  I see God working in his life.  I see his personality and how loving he is to others.  And I feel his commitment to others is what is most attractive.

I won't share many details of what happened last night, but let me tell you that I haven't felt this way in a very long time. I didn't feel this with Tommy.

Yes, I am falling in love, slowly.  Not crazily, not because I'm hyper, but rationally.

No, I will not have sex with him, not until marriage.  I know he can respect that.  I know it's too early to talk about marriage but I had to mention sex because you guys are probably worried that we will end up sleeping together and me pregnant or something.  No, God would not allow that to happen and Christos respects my body.  He didn't even touch my breasts or butt last night.  It's OK.  Trust me.

But my parents and sister cannot know.  Maybe later my sister but right now it's too early.  Even Christos didn't give me an answer yet cuz he needed one more night to sleep and think it over and check himself to see if this is what he really wants.  Whether we should date or whatever you want to call it.

He is a gentleman, a chivalrous guy.  He is not what you first think.

Jesus is still my first love.  But God really surprised me.  I mean, God surprised him too.  Christos usualy never has three Wednesdays in a row that are free to come to church life group.  But he did and that's how we got to hang out and get closer.  I think everything seems to be just perfect.  The way he touches me and cares about me, how he likes to write poems and listen to awesome epic songs and how he likes to smile with the scrunchy face and I even don't mind his beard.

I know.  So unexpected.  But isn't that what love is, unexpected??

It is all Gloria's fault, I am telling you lol because he is Gloria's friend and also Gloria chose a scary movie to watch and I was sitting beside Christos so I grabbed onto his arm for comfort and put my head on his shoulder for the scary parts.  He held my hand and I felt safe with him.

Gloria and I also made a hilarious bet that if Christos likes me then I would give him a kiss on the cheek and if he actually didn't like me then Gloria would give him a kiss on the cheek.  Funny huh?

Gloria won the bet.  Yes.  I did kiss him.  Hehe more than once too

Anyways too much information

I hope you guys can support me and Christos through this if this is actually God's plan for us to be together.  We will see what he says tonight because he has every right to refuse a relationship with me if he feels unsure.  Until then, I'm still happy and will continue to be happy even if he doesn't want a relationship  .  May God's will be done :)

On the up and up

After last week's depression I am back to getting hyper again.  I like being hyper, it makes me feel so happy and joyful, and more random like Gloria.  I wish I could be like this all the time and avoid the downs.  But I noticed I can sort of track my moods like one week I would be happy then the next week I would be medium blah then next I would be really down and cry and then back up again.

I just wish that my depression wouldnt affect my school and ministry so much.  When I'm at school people see me smiling because when I see my classmates and learn from the classes I AM happy but the truth is once I get home I am unmotivated most of the time and sad.  And they don't see that so they think I am happy all the time.

And people at church most of the time they see me as Blah.  So they probably usually think I'm really tired or hate my job but really it's because when they see me I'm at the Blah stage where I'm neither crying nor happy.  I wish I could be happy at church all the time but sometimes I am just really blah.

Anyway just a thought, describing my life over the past year and a half...

Here is a nice song just for the sake of making this blog post more interesting....Although it's sad but I do want to remember the Sandy Hook school kids who got shot, because I care for kids and I know it would be very hurtful if someone killed my kids at church.  May God bless their souls and their families and friends with comfort.

You guys can copy and paste the link cuz they didn't let me embed it here in this post.  But it's the song Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen and it's in remembrance of those lovely kindergarten kids who lost their lives too soon.  Rest in peace.

http://youtu.be/B-SeKsVm7YE

Another song to lift you up today:

How Jesus lifted me up

Thursday night when my mom made that hurtful comment (she didn't mean to hurt me but it did), I spiraled into depression, and yesterday all day I was so unmotivated and wanting to stay in bed and not face the world.  I lost sight of my goals, didn't care about homework, didn't care about doing stuff to serve God, didnt' care about anything, not even when I got an email from the Montreal pastor about my March missions trip to help their Montreal church (which is something I am usually SUPER passionate about).  Not even friends' encouragements helped much.  It just didn't really register in my head.

That's what happens when I am depressed.  The medication prevents me from killing myself but it doesn't prevent me from killing my hopes.

But thank God, I asked people to pray for me, and really God is the one who can bring me back up from depression.  My sister yelled at me to get out of bed but even that didn't really help.  I went and tried to study but failed so went back to bed.  I then after a while decided I would kneel down at my bedside and pray instead of just asking Others to pray for me, this time I would pray for myself.  So I knelt down and started talking with God and then I started crying and then I decided to crawl back into bed to go to sleep again ( I know, too much sleep )

When it was almost time to tutor Peggy at 5:30pm I decided to get up and watch youtube videos to pass the time since there was still time until Peggy came online (we were gona tutor on skype)  After helping Peggy for two hours of painful human geography articles, I finally got the strength to carry on with my life.

I did basically nothing for school but I went on facebook and saw some very encouraging things that I believe God used to encourage me.

First was a video about a true love story (23 min long, see below for the video if you like) where two people put God as first.  You have to watch the video to understand how much this story related to me.  Second, there was a Bible verse on facebook (Psalm 27) that told me "Wait for the Lord".  Thirdly, one of the professors from my school on facebook posted another Bible verse from Revelation (Remember your first love aka Jesus).

Even though my mom's comment was what set me off with the whole depression thing, the reason why I was depressed had to do with singleness.  I told myself I would stay single for the whole year but it's hard because I'm known to be the type of person who jumps from guy to guy to fill that gap that Jeff left in grade 10.  And to feel freedom from overprotective overbearing parents who always were the ones to break up my relationships. That's why I put Freedom on the tattoo on my back because I felt that I needed the reminder that Freedom comes from Jesus setting my heart free, I don't need any guy to set me free from anything.

So these encouragements from facebook really helped me.  Also today Josh B told me that dating, even if your relationship fails, you can always learn from it and you can figure out what kind of person would be right for you.  I think that is true. Sounds similar to what Thuy said except I often forget things when I'm depressed.

There are so many things to be happy about.  Singing and Christian inspirational music makes me happy (see below for a song) , friends make me happy, I have a family, I have jobs, I have good marks that God granted me, I know that God would provide for me financially and use all the weaknesses I have for His glory and to help others in the future.... lots of things to be happy about.  I just forget when I'm depressed.

God, remind me of what I should be thankful for and please remind me of Your truths.  Your love is always appreciated and I pray that I can become a more refined woman after going through fire.  Thanks for being there God and I will do my best to remember the big picture next time .  Please remind me if I forget.  In Jesus' name, Amen.

Dear Martine

Dear Martine,

I know it's hard for you to express your emotions right now and it's probably harder because Valentine's day is coming soon and Tommy sent you back your book and card today so you are thinking about him again, but listen... there was a reason for your breakup.  It was for the best.  He wasn't the right one for you, there were communication issues, culture barriers, it didn't start for the right reason, and he said he's going to Africa.  You gotta  let him go.  Depressing yourself over the fact that you don't have a boyfriend is really not going to help you in any way.

Your future is in Almighty God's hands.  Why worry?  He knows the best for you.  Looking back at the past won't change anything.  You have to let it go.  Who cares if Tommy or Selig don't love you?  God does and your friends do.  Isn't that more than enough?

You are not your past.  You are not your disorder.  You are a beautiful person, smart, caring, loved.

Your life is worth living.  You need to keep pressing on.  Don't lose hope.  Life is not made of the mistakes you made , it is made of the dreams you take.

Time to move forward, honey.  See yourself for who you really are.  Those voices in your head or those feelings in your heart are not telling you the truth.  You can do this.  Trust me.

Love,
Martine

Sad again ( only God would understand this post)

I am sad not sure exactly why but it could be a combination of things I think I am sad because of what my mom said about my bipolar disorder also cuz I don't have anyone right now sad because selig doesn't love me nor does any other guy that I ever loved except for Adrian I wanted to be happy single but it seems like not working out maybe I was kidding my self or I was trying just to be strong but I'm tired of helping people now because I'm the one who needs help. I'm screwed with my homework I haven't done much at all. I feel weak and tired sad I gave so much and now I'm empty

Tattoo

So I got the tattoo.  During the process, it felt like a drill on my back but it didn't hurt like hell, it just hurt.  Afterwards it didn't really hurt, was just sore.  I felt like I made the right decision to get the tattoo and it turned out well.  It means a lot to me.  It represents the freedom I have in my heart with Christ.  Not many people are going to see the tattoo since it's on my back, and I have yet to figure out how to tell my parents.  But yeah.

Recently I have been sad on some occasions but not like depressed sad just a bit lonely and sad.  It's hard to describe.  I think because I really want to be with someone but today I told God that if I were to be single for the rest of my life I would be ready for that.  Yeah, it's a big statement for me to say but I think I am finally ready to tell God that I am OK with being single the rest of my life.

Adrian tried to contact me to see if we could get back together but I told him that the chapter of our lives together is over but I can still be his friend.  He seemed ok with that.  Selig stopped contacting me and I guess it helped me to realize that I cannot cling onto him.  After all, he told Andrew that he would never date me anyway.

I am too busy for my own good.  I recently signed on to do more things and I think I am going to drive myself crazy.  This is what happens when you don't pray about things before you sign up.  Or when you always think you need to help when you don't.  Yeah, I think I'm going to go crazy.  Lord, save me.