Move

Day 48

In Institute, my teacher was mentioning a statistic of the 3 most traumatic experiences for adults.

1. Death of a loved one
2. Divorce
3. Moving to a new community

I laughed. Truly. Out loud. I'm not sure where he got the statistic, or how old it was. And the point was not stressful events (for if it were, my guesses of marriage, pregnancy, etc. would have qualified). But whatever, it made me feel just a little bit better.

You see, I used to hate moving. But now I despise it. I've moved enough for it to go from hate to despise. And I have noticed in the last few years that I am not the most pleasant person when I move--both in preparation for it, the actuality of it, and the ends of it when I'm unpacking, etc. The whole change and everything is very wearing on me, and upsetting. And I come out as rather a beast during the whole affair.

In the last ~10 years of my life--which have been the years since I entered adulthood--I have moved 13 times. At least eight of those could be considered a new community as far as local things not being familiar and/or a completely new ward and/or completely new neighbors and such. No wonder some of my stress levels are so high!

And while I don't like to make excuses for my bad behavior, it was relieving to know that there was a "just" cause. A true reason. Over and over not only did the stress rise, but so did the trauma of having to adjust to a new community. New places. New roads. New laws. New taxes. New people. Considering my social anxieties, these are traumatic indeed. So, no, I'm not excusing my being a beast.

But I'm grateful to see some reasons behind the behavior, to know that the Lord understands what I'm going through, and to hopefully learn from it each one and be ready for the next, inevitable move that lies somewhere in my future.