I Would Not Have Gone Until I Was On Fire

I have written already about the morning I came home and found my wife still in bed, not sick, saying she did not feel like getting up. That morning is told in another article. This one is about how long I waited to get help, and what the first weeks actually were.

Before that time I viewed therapists with great suspicion. I cannot remember exactly what my concern was, but it had something to do with a worry that I would get my brain rewired and I would not like it. Tough luck, right, because what is done is done. Maybe my sense of humor would get messed up. I do not know. It really scared me.

The urgency of that morning swamped the fear. The next day the two of us went to see a psychotherapist. I remember leaving that first session feeling very relieved that the whole process involved us just talking. We returned weekly for several months. About eight weeks in, I could see that my wife was benefitting from the work she was doing. Not only was she gaining back her ability to function. I could see her beginning to thrive in a whole new way. That is when I decided I had some work to do as well. Some sessions focused on me. Some focused on her. Looking back, it has been one of the best things I have done in my life. A lot of anxiety, frustration, and anger left after that work. I received a lot of healing in the process.

For us to receive that kind of help, I had to get real desperate. There is no way I would have gone to a psychotherapist without feeling like I was nearly on fire. Once we gave it a chance, we learned a lot. We changed. We benefitted. We healed. I learned that therapists do not actually rewire a person’s brain.

In Mark chapter 6, in the story of the crowd that will not leave Jesus and the apostles, the apostles tell him what they have done and taught. The crowds press around them. They try to get some alone time. The people are so interested in staying with them that they walk on land to the place they expect the boat to go. That sounds desperate to me.

Earlier in the same chapter, Jesus had sent the apostles out to preach repentance, drive out demons, and cure sick people. They came back. The people sticking with them had heard the preaching. They had seen people get help. Some of you know chronic illness, or you love someone who does. If a solution comes along, you do what is needed to go get it.

When I look at what Mark has written, he is talking about people who first come because they need help with sickness. Then, once they are there, they listen to the teaching. They seem very interested in it, because once they receive help they do not leave.

This reading sits right before the feeding of the five thousand. People were so interested in being with them that they went without food. Mark records certain details: the time of day, how people were arranged. He also leaves something out. The last verse of the reading says that when Jesus saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity, for they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he began to teach them many things. The next verse says it was already late. What did he teach them? Mark does not write it down.

By the time Mark wrote, around the year 60, the Church was alive and growing. People learned what Jesus taught in the Church. Firsthand witnesses were getting old. Writers began to preserve the major events. If you wanted the teaching, you went to the living Church. That can be hard, because some of those teachings ask us to give up what we want to keep.

There is a reason Mark ties help and listening together in more than one place. I lived a lot of my life not wanting the teaching. What I have noticed is this: when I have been willing to receive help I did not want, healing has followed. I am not saying a holy life is a cure for depression. I am saying I would not have gone until I was on fire, and waiting that long cost us time we did not have to lose.

If you will not get help until the house is already desperate, start with a smaller threshold than fire. You do not have to wait until someone cannot get out of bed. Call the person you would call if it were already that bad. Make the appointment. The first hour will probably be talking. That is what ours was. You can leave if it is wrong. You cannot leave an appointment you never made.

If you are the one watching someone else go under, you may be more willing to get them into the room than to get yourself into it. I was. After about eight weeks I could see she was not only functioning. She was beginning to thrive. That is when I started my own work. Do not wait for their recovery to give you permission. Ask, in the first month, what your part is.

Fear of having your brain rewired, or of losing your humor, or of what people will think, is allowed to be in the car on the way there. It does not get to drive past the building. Help exists. I had to be nearly on fire before I would use it. You do not.

This is a pastoral reflection, not clinical care and not a substitute for it. If you or someone you love is in immediate danger, call 988 or local emergency services.

Drawn from a homily first preached in 2021.