Episode 33: The Problem With Long-Term Suffering
In our society, we are uncomfortable with suffering. We don’t do well with sitting with other people’s pain. We want things to be fixed quickly and for people to feel better fast.
So what do we do with suffering that lasts for a long time - whether it’s someone we know who is suffering or whether we are the one’s enduring the pain?
This is what I want to hash through with you guys today. As a complex trauma survivor, a chronic pain sufferer, and a mama to a beautiful boy with attachment trauma, long-term suffering has been part of my life, and it’s taught me a thing or two about empathy, the nearness of God, and how to keep moving forward when pain is a constant companion.
I sincerely hope this episode touches your heart.
As always, your ratings and reviews on the podcast mean the world! Please take a moment or two to leave yours. Thank you!
Scriptures used in today’s episode:
“But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” 1 Corinthians 1:27-29
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.” 2 Corinthians 1:3-7
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(TRANSCRIPT) Ep. 33: The Problem With Long-Term Suffering
Note: Transcript is created by AI. Please excuse any errors.
Gabi: Hey, beautiful friends. Welcome back to Pain to Passion Live. It's just me today. Just some extra G time for you guys. You know, life is interesting, right? I mean, that's like the understatement of the year, but life is interesting. I had some interviews lined. That we're supposed to be airing today and next week, and they just didn't work out because people got sick and stuff.
But I think it's all working out for the best because those interviews, which are gonna come later, are gonna be grouped together with some of the most amazing people. I cannot wait in a couple weeks to start dropping these interviews that are like, They're just gonna bless you guys so much. I'm so excited.
Um, and I also just had some extra things on my heart that I wanted to share, and I've been hearing from some of you that you're enjoying. Um, when I do my solo episodes on Fridays, That are the coffee with Gabby episodes. So why not just spend a little bit of extra time with you guys and share some of the reflections and things that I have been thinking about that have been on my heart.
Um, also this week is an exciting week for me, and I am going to North Carolina this week to be a part of Amber Lee Lagos Unstoppable Success. I have been super privileged and blessed to be part of her mastermind for the past, um, five months, maybe , five or six months. And all of us mastermind ladies that are in her mastermind group get to go and speak at this event.
So I have been working hard on prepping for that. We're doing TED style talks, which is a first for. It's definitely a bit of a challenge and, uh, I like it. I like being stretched to try something new and grow into something new. So basically, if you don't know what that means, like a TED style talk, um, we have 15 minutes to give a presentation basically.
So, um, it's a lot more like scripted. Than I would usually do at events. But again, it's been really good for me cuz I've had to be really precise about my timing, be really clear on what it is I want to say. So I'm getting there, I'm getting close to feeling like the talk is ready to go. So I'll be working on that some before I head out to North Carolina and I'll be there for a few days and get to connect with some incredible people and I'm, I've just been looking forward to this for a long.
Because I really do want to speak on more stages. I have felt that for a lot of years and for a while there, for those of you who don't know, I was traveling consistently overseas to speak at different women's events, and I loved it. I absolutely loved it. I also spoke at some women's events, um, state side.
And those were amazing too, but it's been a couple years since I've been able to do that just because of moving and transitioning careers for me and my husband and so many different things that have happened. Obviously, C O V I D. Put some stops in place for some things, but I have been walking into this new season where I've been doing a ton of personal development, personal growth, invested in myself a lot, invested in um, my skills and learning significantly and the amount.
Of stuff that I have on my heart to share. Just grows and grows and grows. And sometimes, like, I feel this level of angst and frustration of like, okay, this has to come out somehow. So all that to say, I'm excited for this because I do believe that it could open some new doors of opportunity. And also if you're listening to this and you're looking for a speaker for any events, um, any Christian events or, um, Church events or even not Christian events that people just need to be encouraged, given a safe space, um, learn how to take care of their mental health, learn how to grow their faith, anything like that.
I would love, love, love. To speak, um, for you and your people. And yeah, I just expect that some doors will continue to open after this event this weekend. So I am excited about that and excited to continue to use my gifts. and all that said, today I wanted to talk about a topic that is not the most pleasant, but I feel like it's really important to talk about this because I think a lot more people deal with this kind of stuff than we realize.
Um, and that topic is long-term suffering. . I think I posted something about this on Facebook maybe a month or two ago, and it resonated with some people. And as I've been considering what content to use for the podcast, I knew that I wanted to put this in there. So when I say long-term suffering, this could really mean anything.
That has been a long-term period that's been painful. Um, we are not comfortable. People and their long-term suffering, if we're really honest. We, especially in our American Western society, love to give people solutions. We love to tell people like hacks to get their lives back on track. We want people to feel better because we're uncomfortable with dis.
Which makes sense. I mean, the word is discomfort, but how can we begin to be a bit more comfortable in the ambiguity that is long-term suffering? And how can we show up for people who are experiencing long-term suffering? I don't want this to become like a gab story at all. So I'm not gonna go into tons of details because I want the, um, lesson of this to get through.
But I know that personal stories always make an impact. And as you can tell from this podcast, I love stories. So one story from my own life that has to do with long-term suffering is long-term, um, health issue. I have dealt with chronic pain issues since I was about probably 13 or 14 years old when I started having migraines.
And we've talked about some of this in prior episodes, but you've probably heard that phrase. The body keeps the score. Basically what that means is any painful or traumatic experience that you have gets literally stored in the memory of your body. Often this can show up as inflammation and chronic pain or even chronic illness.
I obviously had no context for that when I was 13 and 14. Um, But I do know that my life got significantly more stressful at that point, and it really has not led up since . Um, with my own complex trauma history and all of that, it doesn't surprise me at all anymore that I have this struggle. With chronic pain, it does seem a bit unfair to me, right?
It seems a bit unfair that those people who experience the most mental anguish or the most relational trauma, et cetera, continue to carry pain around in their bodies as a result of that trauma. It's pretty wild, but it is a bit validating as well. Um, just to remember that. This isn't my fault. And that's one of the big things that I've had to learn because what I was raised to do was to either keep my pain quiet or to shame myself for any pain that I felt.
Because I was raised in a context in which if anything bad was happening to you, you must have done something bad. So I was always. Parsing out anything that could have caused the fact that I was in pain and I, that's still my default to this day. Not intentionally, it's just a default. I have to intentionally hack that and tell myself the truth.
So like if I get a migraine nowadays, I'll be like, oh, well, I should have slept in a different position last night, or I shouldn't have eaten such and such, or maybe I shouldn't have tried to engage in that stressful conversation like it's my fault. I shouldn't have done. But I have to intentionally go to myself and say, no.
Like, no, that's not true. Part of the, part of that coping, part of that is a coping mechanism, like just to protect yourself from the grief of the fact that you're in pain, but. Back to the point that has been something that I've dealt with for the better part of my life since I was 14. I'm 38 now, so that's 24 years, 24 or 25 years that I have dealt with chronic migraines.
Um, there have been some moments of respite and I can correlate those two. Um, Two spaces in my life where I felt the most free and alive, which is super interesting, but for the most part, it's something that I've had to deal with for a very long time. For a while there I was getting really intentional about my gut health, which I still am.
It still has made a huge difference, especially in my chronic fatigue, and I would not stop. Taking my gut health supplements, but for a while there it really helped a lot with the mitigation of my migraines. But in the past couple of years, they've gotten increasingly worse again. And I don't need anybody to like come at me with helps or ideas.
I have a team on my side. I am getting as much help as I can from my naturopaths and my doctors and people who understand this well, and I'm on a special restricted diet and all the things. Um, but the fact is that this is something that I deal with pretty much constantly. And it's really hard. It's really hard in my body, but it's also really hard because it messes with the person that I want to be.
And I feel like often I have to show up in a way that I actually don't feel, and I'm sure a lot of you can relate to that because when you have dealt with something long-term, you really don't want to be a burden to other people. Part part of that, because you want to be kind and you don't want to make other people feel bad.
But part of it is also that you've probably experienced that people get weary of your wariness. So there's not a lot of space in the world that's safe to be held for people who have long-term suffering. Another aspect of long-term suffering in our lives has been everything that's happened since our adoption, um, eight years ago.
And I wouldn't trade it for anything. Absolutely would not trade it for anything. Just got to spend the last few days with my kiddos over the weekend, was feeling so grateful and blessed and all of the things. I have so much love for my kids, but our adoption journey has been anything but smooth and easy and along the way we have faced some very, very dark, very, very serious and significant.
Struggles and because it wasn't a quick fix, because adoption trauma is not fixed by affection and what people say, just love 'em till they feel better. It's not fixed that way. People are not comfortable with that, and we lost a lot of friends. We lost a lot of friends and we had to distance ourself from a lot of people, family and friends, because there was just so much judgment involved in the situation.
And this is something that we continue to deal with every day of our lives. It's a long-term thing, and I don't know when or if there will be a time at which we can say, this is in the past. So with those examples, I am sure you can think of someone who either has a chronic illness or is dealing with a complex, chronic relational issue that just goes on and on for years and years.
Or maybe that person is. Maybe you're the one who silently carries suffering with you every single day. Maybe you like me, find it really difficult to chase down joy on a daily basis. By golly, we try so very, very hard. I'm honestly like a really fun loving and funny person, especially when I am feeling like happy in what I'm doing.
I'm around people that are life giving and all of those things. I love to have fun and be funny and all the things. But sometimes it's, it's hard. It's hard to chase down that fun-loving part of yourself when day in and day out you're experiencing pain in your body and in your heart. And there are relational issues that are heavy.
And sometimes if you're anything like me, you probably question God, like, why? When is this ever gonna get better? Why is this happening? However, on the flip side, As I have learned about trauma recovery and I have learned about safe spaces and I've learned about attachment, I've also found so much beauty in what I have learned about, um, compassion.
I don't know that I would be half, half as compassionate, safe, kind, empathetic. as I am today if it wasn't for all of the things that I have been through and that I continue to go through. So while I can't always say that I'm grateful for the pain, I am grateful for the ways that God has taught me through the pain and the way that he has used me because of it.
Um, but I do believe that there. More that can be done by the communities around us when we encounter chronic long-term suffering. And one of the biggest things I think that I would recommend to someone who knows of someone who's going through long-term suffering is just to ask the question, how are you like on a regular basis?
And be the kind of person that they know that they can. Realistically and that you would know that when they say, I'm in pain and this sucks, that that's okay. Like you don't have to fix it. You literally can just say, I am so sorry, like this is so stupid that you have to deal with this continually. I'm so sorry.
That in and of itself provides significant. Believe it or not, just to have someone where you can be honest and you're not having to hold it in like a secret anymore. You can be honest, you can be frank, you can let it out. It provides relief. So if we can be that space, And also just to understand that any room that you're in with more than two people, is going to probably have someone who's dealing with some kind of long-term suffering.
This is one of the reasons why I sometimes struggle at personal development events. is because it feels like a lot of the messaging that happens at those events does not take into account that some people are dealing with things that are long-term. I don't think it should be an excuse for not chasing your purpose, for not developing and growing.
I don't think. . But I do think that there's a better, more compassionate way to do a lot of development and a lot of growth and a lot of dream chasing that is sometimes overlooked in those kinds of spaces. So if you're ever in a room with more than two people and you're talking, just keep that in mind, like temper your words with the.
of perhaps there's someone here who has long-term suffering that they have no actual control over, or they're doing everything they can, like I am with the migraines to mitigate it. But that's the best that can be done. And additionally, if you know someone like that, be willing to learn from them because the odds.
that that person has paid a great price for their suffering and has learned some really good things about relationships, about love, about showing up for people, about empathy. Even practical things like how to set up a day in order to maximize your energy. What kinds of spaces and places and relationships to be in to.
Make your mental health better in spite of what you're going through. There's so much to learn from people who are suffering long-term. In fact, I started reading in First Corinthians the other day and, um, I have such a heart to more and more incorporate the Bible into what I teach. It's been my passion for forever.
I can't even begin to tell you what the word of God has meant to me in my life, and perhaps that's another story for another podcast, but it is. Life. To me, it really is, and with the way that my life is right now, I haven't been able to study as much as I like, but as I reevaluate everything that I'm doing and my time and my energy and where I wanna go, I know for sure that at the top of my list is studying out the word and what it says about different things.
But as I was reading first Corinthians the other day in chapter. I read this in verse 27 and um, 27 through 29, but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong God, chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not to bring to nothing.
Things that are so that no human being might boast in the presence of. Okay, that's like thick. There's a lot in there that we could dig into, but what I just wanted to focus on for the purpose of this episode is that God has chosen the things that seem small, weak, and frail to perform miracles basically in this world, to be the power of love in this world.
To bring forth godliness in this world. And when I read that, I found so much comfort in that because so many times I have felt like the long-term suffering situations in my life have kept me from living fully into my potential. Like I'm not as big. And active and successful, whatever that means, as I would like to be, but maybe that's not the goal.
Maybe having to stay small and having to be so dependent on the grace of God for literally every single day that I live and every single thing that I do is where the power is. Because he says he chooses what is foolish in the world to shame the wises he chooses. What is weak in the world to shame the strong?
I have no interest in proving to people that I am the best, the strongest, the most successful, the fastest growing the whatever. What I want people to see in me is that Jesus lives in me and that their lives are changed by that. and the fact that he, in these words is saying like he dwells with people like me who are weak to shame.
The strong, like to basically show people something beyond what they're experiencing from the big buzzing. Names that are out there, not trying to bash anybody, but that there's something inherent about those of us who suffer significantly, that other people want. And I think it's the, just the nearness.
It's the nearness of God. It's knowing safety in a quiet and broken. Being vulnerable, being able to show your true authentic feelings. Everyone's longing for that, right? We hide so much. I still learn every day things that I'm covering and hiding, but every time I let down my guard and let light in, and let love in and let vulnerability in, it changes me, and I really believe that's what the scripture is saying.
Furthermore, if Second Corinthians, if any of you know, second Corinthians says a lot about suffering, um, but it, it just blows my mind every time this scripture. In second Corinthians one, starting in verse three, that says, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God for as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings.
So through Christ, we share abundantly in comfort. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. And if we are comforted, comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken for. We know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.
It's such a beautiful passage. You could just meditate on that for days. The fact that he's the God of all comfort who comforts us in all our affliction. That speaks volumes to me, and maybe it speaks volumes to you as well. There have been so many times in my life when I have been suffering significantly, and I had no one.
No one to draw me close into their arms. No one to say it's gonna be okay. No one to minister to my pain, but there was always Jesus. Always, always, always. And as I reflect back over my life. I see how he was this God of all comfort in my sufferings. And not only that, how it's really created my purpose, how I sit here now, just I love, I love to love people who are hurting.
I love to tell them that they matter and that they're worthy of continuing to pursue their. That they're not forgotten, they're not forsaken, that there's healing, safety, beauty for them and their lives. The only reason I can share that message is because I have been comforted in my suffering, and that to me is a beautiful gift.
I hope that that encourages someone out there too. I have met some of the most incredibly vibrant, light beautiful people on social media who have become my friends. And what's really interesting is you don't really think of suffering as a light, vibrant, beautiful thing. But man, these people have been to hell and back.
Let me tell. Something about that refining creates this like window pain where the light can come through in a way that really, you don't see it in those who have been, who haven't been through suffering to this extent. And I feel so honored to know these people who have been through so much and they shine so brightly like that is such evident.
Of the miraculous love of God that is talked about right here in this scripture.
I'm so amazed by these people truly, who have lost literally everything and stand up and declare the glory of God and declare the comfort of God, and just shine so brightly and, and still smile and laugh. The laughter of someone who has gone through long-term suffering is such a gift and such a treasure.
It's such a miracle, like to witness that because only with God is it possible to laugh again after some of the things these people have been through. Um, so yeah, that's really what I wanted to share today. Really wanted to just share my heart, be vulnerable. Hopefully it has touched your heart as well. I would love to hear your.
Please don't hesitate to reach out to me on social media or via my website, um, because I love to hear from you. I love to hear your stories. I love to hear how this has impacted you, and it means the world to me to get to know you guys and to know that this podcast has been touching your lives. Thank you for all the downloads and listens recently.
It's been really fun to see. And if you don't mind spending two minutes to just pop over to Spotify or Apple Podcast or wherever you're listening right now and leave a rating and a review of the show, that would mean so much and it will help other people be able to find this space and hopefully find some hope healing.
Excitement about chasing their dreams again as well. And some of these stories can touch their lives too. So without further ado, I will say goodbye for today. This will be my only podcast this week. Since I'm going to North Carolina. I produce all of these on my own in my own little house. With my own little dog that's next to me snoring right now.
Um, so I just don't have the capacity for two episodes this week, but I will be back with you guys next week. And then the following week we're going to start a flurry of incredible interviews. I literally cannot wait for you guys to be introduced to some of these people that I get to chat with over the next few weeks.
So buckle up and get ready, and until then, take care of my friends. Remember to take care of yourselves. You matter. You're worth it. I love you, and I'll talk to you next time.