susan

hello everyone,

i hope spring break (for some of us) is going well and school (for the other ones of us) is also going well.

i kind of have a prayer request right now. 

i don't know who's been keeping up with the news, but there has been intense violence in the past three or four days. a pastor got shot in illinois on sunday; a community lost ten members during a shooting rampage on tuesday; a school lost students to a gunman that ended up killing fifteen on wednesday. 

i don't know why, but shootings - school shootings, to be exact, but in this case, shootings - have always incited in me a greater fear than most people feel. of course everyone is sad, and everyone is scared, as well, but my fear and sadness go beyond what everyone else seems to feel. while most people forget - or at least aren't persistently traumatized - within two weeks, a month, even, my fears persist for months and months on end. my closest friends from home have heard me cry for hours about how scared i am. i've never had an experience with anything even close, but it just scares me to death. 

when virginia tech first happened nearly two years ago, i was so scared to go to college. i couldn't sit still in school; i had a swim coach who was also the school psychologist and sometimes i would just sit in her office and tell her how scared i was. i cried to my best friends. i didn't believe their reassurances. i would be scared of the windows that our doors had on them; i didn't want a seat that was in direct view of such a window. i was so scared. aside from being heartbroken for the victims, i found that i was consumed with fear for myself. i literally felt like jello sometimes during class, and the slightest disturbance scared me so much. 

then on valentine's day last year, a school shooting hit so much closer to home than i ever could have imagined. i was at a scholastic bowl meet, on a team with some of my best friends. the tv was on in a room while we waited for a match, and the breaking news was that a school shooting had just happened at northern illinois university. my heart skipped a beat as i looked over at my best friend, whose older brother went to niu. as she walked quickly out of the room i ran after her, through my arms around her, and both of us burst into tears. 

her brother was fine, and she was mainly worried for her brother. but me? i was scared to death again. it had taken me months to be able to basically forget virginia tech, but i was going to have to start all over again. it was horrible. 

towards the end of my senior year, there was a threat found on our bathroom wall with a specific date. i begged my mom to let me stay home that day, but she didn't think anything would happen. while she was right, that was possibly one of the worst school days i have ever had in my life. i was texting my friend at another school the entire day, unfocused, nervous, scared, jumpy. i was so lucky that i had my friends around me, people who knew about this great fear that i had. throughout the day i was constantly being watched out for, reassured, comforted. but still...

coming to penn, one of my friends reassured me that something like this would never happen at a school like penn. i smiled my way through to believing him, but i can't get rid of the persisting fear in my heart, the lump in my throat, the rush in my veins. i need help, and i need prayer. 

i should know better, i know, especially now that i've come to gcc and come to know an all-powerful being called God. but i can't let go of this fear. i hate feeling scared like this. i know it's going to take me at least another month to be fully comfortable again. i want so badly to give it all up to Him, to know that i'll be loved and protected. to believe that i'll be loved and protected. 

so yeah. if you guys could just...yeah. that would be really, really good. 

thanks.