The Crush
of Shame
Sexual addiction will abandon you every time, always
making you face the burden of shame and loss alone.
Here’s
how shame works: Shame brings misguided rules and regulations, a world of
hiding and lies and make-believe with ruthless consequences for failure. Shame
is an existence of personal condemnation. Shame makes us wonder if God regrets
creating us. Shame makes us feel as if everyone else would be happier if we
just went away. In shame we become our greatest judge, and addiction becomes
our personalized form of self-execution. Shame erodes our bodies, our physical,
emotional and spiritual health, making us feel mentally, emotionally and
spiritually sick. Shame causes us to prefer to be alone, and this causes us to
feel isolated and lonely most all the time. It’s like shame moves in,
contaminating us from the inside out. We try to make peace with ourselves but can’t.
Shame blocks our best efforts to heal and we stay stuck in self-loathing. In no
uncertain terms we are, as it is written in the Psalms, “sick at heart” (Psalm
6:2 NLT).
Our
loved ones made repeated attempts to call us back with their love. But we ran.
They were willing to make up the distance between us. But we ran further in
shame. We promised them sincerely we would “straighten up.” But sadly, after
they repeatedly offered us love and understanding, which we so often rewarded
with habitual deceit, our families and friends would begin to lose hope.
Feeling abandoned and hurt, we would agree with them, feeling as though we were
infectious somehow. It would feel like no one lived in our world and resentment
would drive us further from our loved ones. Sometimes our friends and families
had to make the decision to cut all ties with us for the sake of their own
emotional survival. Who could blame them?
I wondered where God was. Why didn’t He solve
my problems? Why didn’t He straighten me up? Why wouldn’t He straighten me up?
In my denial and shame, I had become an enemy to myself, and, unknowingly, at
war with God and others as well. I was alone, desperate and dying and did not
even consciously realize it. Many others have experienced this very same thing.
Sometimes you’ll know it, sometimes you won’t.
My
disgrace is before me all day long, and my face is covered with shame at the
taunts of those
who reproach and revile me, because of the enemy,
who is bent on revenge.
Psalm
44:15, 16 NIV
copyright 2012, David Zailer
Click link to purchase When Lost Men Come Home
Hopelessness Ruled
Having lost the ability to stop my addictive behaviors permanently on my own, the only life I knew was a life of hopelessness. I had tried everything I knew to try and nothing had worked for me. I hated my behaviors and most of all I hated myself. Destruction grew inside me, and consequence grew around me, spilling over into the lives of others. Though I wanted to with all my heart, I could not stop the accelerating madness that characterized my life. At times I thought I had proven to myself that everything was going to be okay. But I was only deceiving myself, suffering one of the key hallmarks of addiction: denial, which is another way of saying, “I don’t even know I’m lying.” Also, denial of addiction is where we use seemingly rational and
copyright 2012, David Zailer
Click link to purchase When Lost Men Come Home
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