BibleReader Posted November 19, 2020 Group: Junior Member Followers: 1 Topic Count: 18 Topics Per Day: 0.01 Content Count: 98 Content Per Day: 0.07 Reputation: 32 Days Won: 0 Joined: 05/25/2020 Status: Offline Share Posted November 19, 2020 (edited) Her mother left the house when she was just a toddler and her dad did not express affection but rather frustration and anger for the most part. Now, she's an adult, but she experiences self-hatred and negative feelings. She does a lot for others since she has pretty much always taken her mom's place, but she doesn't feel that anyone really loves her. She's married, has a good husband, but constantly feels an emptiness inside. She has been praying about this. Thanks in advance. Edited November 19, 2020 by BibleReader 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnthebaptist Posted November 19, 2020 Group: Non-Conformist Theology Followers: 6 Topic Count: 118 Topics Per Day: 0.06 Content Count: 4,361 Content Per Day: 2.26 Reputation: 2,109 Days Won: 0 Joined: 02/25/2019 Status: Offline Birthday: 02/03/1953 Share Posted November 19, 2020 6 hours ago, BibleReader said: Her mother left the house when she was just a toddler and her dad did not express affection but rather frustration and anger for the most part. Now, she's an adult, but she experiences self-hatred and negative feelings. She does a lot for others since she has pretty much always taken her mom's place, but she doesn't feel that anyone really loves her. She's married, has a good husband, but constantly feels an emptiness inside. She has been praying about this. Thanks in advance. Paul tells us to pray constantly (1 Thessalonians 5:17). I might start there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GandalfTheWise Posted November 19, 2020 Group: Royal Member Followers: 24 Topic Count: 40 Topics Per Day: 0.02 Content Count: 1,459 Content Per Day: 0.59 Reputation: 2,377 Days Won: 2 Joined: 08/23/2017 Status: Offline Share Posted November 19, 2020 7 hours ago, BibleReader said: Her mother left the house when she was just a toddler and her dad did not express affection but rather frustration and anger for the most part. Now, she's an adult, but she experiences self-hatred and negative feelings. She does a lot for others since she has pretty much always taken her mom's place, but she doesn't feel that anyone really loves her. She's married, has a good husband, but constantly feels an emptiness inside. She has been praying about this. Thanks in advance. Often when we are young and vulnerable, things happen to us and we start to believe lies about ourselves. Those lies become so embedded in our hearts that we think of them as reality and we react and feel as if they are real. Lies such as "I'm useless", "I'm stupid", "No one could love me", "I'm a loser", "It's all my fault" can become things we believe about ourselves. We really need God's Spirit to work in us in some way to shine His light in our hearts to see those lies for what they are and reject them. I've heard testimonies where this just happened all at once when praying with someone. I've heard testimonies where it took some time with a Christian counselor. Here's a link to a page at the Transformation Prayer Ministry site. I've known some people who've been ministered to by this. God did some emotional healing in my life some time ago, and when I read about this ministry found that it was much the same thing. Ed Smith is a pastor and counselor who was led into a ministry to help people find emotional healing. That's an overly simplistic description, but this page has links to a few videos where he talks about this. https://www.transformationprayer.org/preparing-journey-introduction/ What we believe about ourselves, others, and situations can have a huge impact on our emotions. Ed Smith gives a good example. He talked about waking up in the middle of the night hearing something in the house. If you believe someone broke into your house, a lot of strong emotions will probably take hold. When you walk into the kitchen and find your dog digging through the garbage, you'll feel emotionally better because your belief now matches a more benign reality. When we believe things such as that we are useless or no one loves us, we tend to cease to believe anything positive people say to us and we interpret things they do in a negative way. Instead of being thankful when someone does something nice for us, we potentially get cynical and wonder what their ulterior motive is or think they are doing out of pity. There are some things in our lives that we change by working on them ourselves. There are other things that require some type of healing and help. Things like this often require God's healing touch in some way. For myself, I had a few ingrained lies for decades in my life. One of them was "I don't know what I'm doing." In a time of prayer, God had me reflecting on a time where I'd been essentially physically and verbally abused for "not doing something correctly" during a HS sports practice. As I reflected on it, I just suddenly realized, "Hey, I did know what I was doing. The coach was an idiot teaching bad technique." In that moment, that lie just vanished away. Within a few weeks, my wife and kids had noticed a difference in me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wesley L Posted November 19, 2020 Group: Advanced Member Followers: 1 Topic Count: 11 Topics Per Day: 0.01 Content Count: 304 Content Per Day: 0.18 Reputation: 186 Days Won: 0 Joined: 11/05/2019 Status: Offline Share Posted November 19, 2020 Is your friend a born again christian? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnD Posted November 22, 2020 Group: Worthy Ministers Followers: 0 Topic Count: 910 Topics Per Day: 0.19 Content Count: 9,667 Content Per Day: 2.01 Reputation: 5,844 Days Won: 9 Joined: 04/07/2011 Status: Offline Share Posted November 22, 2020 On 11/19/2020 at 8:38 AM, BibleReader said: Her mother left the house when she was just a toddler and her dad did not express affection but rather frustration and anger for the most part. Now, she's an adult, but she experiences self-hatred and negative feelings. She does a lot for others since she has pretty much always taken her mom's place, but she doesn't feel that anyone really loves her. She's married, has a good husband, but constantly feels an emptiness inside. She has been praying about this. Thanks in advance. Some of this IMHO (and now personally knowing the lady you speak of) is the plight of nearly all women who tend to care for others first and least of all for self in many ways. I say this as a husband who has on occasion had to assume the duties and responsibilities of my Beloved Bride when she had torn hamstrings, a hip replacement, and recently an almost fatal case of cellulitis. Guys, we all should walk in our wife's shoes for a mile, as the expression goes. It would kill most guys I am convinced to do all the things women do on a daily basis in addition to the "liberated" ability to have to work outside the home. Very eye opening. And just being able to sit down to eat or rest a few moments before cleaning up and preparing for bed time (and the next morning to begin again the whole daily process).... God is going to get his pound of flesh, his gallon of sweat. The ground is cursed because of our sin. In the case of the lady you speak about, is she unhappy with this? Or perhaps is it the way she simply chooses to be? Does she say it's empty? Is it permanent or temporary? Does she want any change of venue? I had a horrendous upbringing which I overcame. ← point being one can over come it. It was hard as hell and hard as hell on my patient Beloved Bride but we got through it. But I had to WANT to do it. Just saying I had a bad upbringing doesn't excuse anything or give me the right to sulk about it forever to my own and loved ones' demise. I am praying for her and all who are affected. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BibleReader Posted November 22, 2020 Group: Junior Member Followers: 1 Topic Count: 18 Topics Per Day: 0.01 Content Count: 98 Content Per Day: 0.07 Reputation: 32 Days Won: 0 Joined: 05/25/2020 Status: Offline Author Share Posted November 22, 2020 Thank you all for the very insightful comments. I gleaned important points from each of your posts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Who me Posted November 23, 2020 Group: Royal Member Followers: 5 Topic Count: 17 Topics Per Day: 0.01 Content Count: 3,327 Content Per Day: 1.70 Reputation: 1,701 Days Won: 0 Joined: 01/27/2019 Status: Offline Share Posted November 23, 2020 If I may add a few suggestionsthat she be encouraged to talk about her feelings to her husband, or to her pastor, or to a councelor. In turn they need to show her, remind her that no matter what happened in her childhood she is loved and valued for her self. It might help if she also expressed her feelings about this to God and asked him to deal with her feline of anger, resentment and worthlessness. Note checks not to manufacture feelings of forgiveness, just to express her feelings to God and ask him to deal with them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts