All this month we’re playing clips from favorite episodes of 2024. Each week, a different member of our team will choose one episode to look back on, and we’ll talk about why it was one of their favorites.Today we are talking about one of Marissa’s favorite episodes, Getting Out of Bed When You Don’t Have What It Takes with Alan Noble.
Dr. Alan Noble is an associate professor at Oklahoma Baptist University and the co-founder and editor in chief at Christ and Pop Culture. He has written for the Atlantic Fox, the Gospel Coalition, Christianity Today and so many more. He is the author of multiple books, including the one that we’re discussing today, called On Getting Out of Bed: the Burden and the Gift of Living.
As single parents, many of us wake up every morning and have to decide, Am I going to get out of bed today? There are days when it all feels like too much. The challenges seem insurmountable and the lure of staying in bed and hiding feels like the only solution…especially during the holidays.But we have to get out of bed. Our kids depend on us. Their worlds can’t run without us. So what do we do when we feel like we don’t have what it takes?
I (Marrissa) chose this episode because the process of becoming a single mom was horrible for me. After my husband died, my motto was: If you don’t like today’s problem, wait 24 hours. It’ll be worse tomorrow. I lost friends. I had lawsuits coming out of everywhere. It was a nightmare of insanity. And there were times when I felt like there was no hope.
Shortly after, I (Marissa) met a woman on a plane who was paralyzed from the waist down in a car accident during her senior year of high school. When I met her, she worked in California with kids who had lost their eyesight from terminal cancer. And she had seen child after child die because she was taking care of them. And I thought, My goodness. That woman knows what it’s like to suffer. It isn’t just me.
And that is one thing that came through in this episode: Suffering is common. Everybody goes through it. There are going to be days when it’s worse than others. It doesn’t mean you’ve done something wrong. It doesn’t mean your faith isn’t good enough.
Another thing that came up is this technique trap where we start thinking that there should be a technique for everything—especially in parenting. I remember books people put in front of me, and I’d think, I can’t read some of those chapters because I’ll find out that I did things wrong and I don’t want to find out that I did something wrong.
Life is simply full of suffering. There are some places where no good technique can fix it, but you’re not alone in it.
Christmas is supposed to be about joy and laughter—and it is. It’s the best news that this world has ever known: God is with us. But that doesn’t mean there’s no suffering in this world. In fact, the Bible says that God is close to the broken hearted.This is the season where we actually begin to understand how close God is to us, right?
So, how do we wake up, get out of bed and continue trudging through until the suffering calms down enough that we feel like it’s not the only thing defining us? That’s what I (Marissa) love about this clip; it has some practical ways that we can deal with suffering and depression.
[BEGIN CLIP] In these moments where we’re feeling so much of the bitterness and the rage and the envy, how can we overcome that and not let it overtake us?
The first thing you have to do is recognize it, right? I think the second thing you want to do is have patience for other people. Recognize the bitterness that you’re feeling is unfair to them, that it’s not an act of love to them. That the loving thing to do is to rejoice with those who rejoice, to allow them to feel joy and to not be bitter.
The next thing is to focus on you and what you need to be doing. In my experience, you don’t find joy by trying to feel joyful.You don’t find peace by trying to feel peaceful. You find those by doing behaviors that bring peace or bring joy. So what I would say is you ask yourself,Okay, what behaviors can I do today that have historically brought me to a place of peace?
So for me, every night I have a cup of ice cream. Maybe it’s not the healthiest thing, but this brings me a sense of peace. It gives me a sense of completion for the night and a sense of peace and a sense of joy. So, have concrete things that you’re pursuing that historically have brought you joy because you’ve got to get your mind off of what other people are feeling and thinking. Those thoughts are going to come; that bitterness is going to come. It’s natural, but you’ve got to shift your attention away from that because that’s a dead end. It’s a way of comparison, and it’s never going to bring you any resolution.
I (Robert) identify (especially in the throes of some of the hardest days that I faced as a single dad), with this situation you talked about: “You can be having a breakdown in the bathroom, and your kids will knock on the door and ask for a glass of water. Your loved ones don’t stop needing you just because you’re suffering and stuck in your head or pinned to the bed.” And I will tell you, there is this uncanny ability of our kids to know the moment that you’re at the bottom and you’re in the corner of a closet or in the bathroom or whatever, whether it’s I need a glass of water or Dad, Zoe just took my hairbrush. It’s Murphy’s Law. There’s always that moment where they need something right now when I’m just trying to have some reprieve.
So how do you show up for your kids when you just don’t have it in you and you feel like you are bottomed out?
There are times when you are literally bottomed out, when you need to tap out and you need to say to your kids, “I’m sorry, you’re going to have to watch something”. Or you call a friend or a neighbor and you get some space. I want to acknowledge that there are places you can get to where you don’t have any reservoirs, you don’t have anything to pull from to do more, and you really need to call for help. I don’t think we can always muscle through, but most of the time we’re not in that place. We might feel like we are in that place, but most of the time we’re not. Most of the time we are suffering terribly and we’re having a very difficult time, but we still have the resources to pull from to be there for [our kids].
And in those moments, what we have to do is acknowledge that their lives don’t stop just because our lives feel like they’re stopping. People still need us, people still love us, people still rely on us. And we have an obligation to show up and to be present and to be there. Part of what we have to do is shift our focus out from ourselves to the people around us who love us. And often those moments create momentum. Once you take a moment to shift your attention to the needs of your kid who’s hitting his sister with a hairbrush or something, your gaze is going to shift away from yourself and your own suffering. And it becomes a little bit easier to be present for them, but it’s going to take time. We need to recognize that we have duties and we can’t just check out most of the time.
A long time ago I (Robert) did a seminar with somebody who talked about the importance of pattern breaks—interrupting a pattern. In hearing you, it made me think about if I’m in that situation, I’m in the bathroom on the floor and one of my daughters needs a glass of water, there actually is value in breaking a pattern, getting up, getting a glass of water and that can actually serve you in your pursuit of mental health or finding peace. I don’t mean running from it, but I do think that pattern interruption is a thing.
And I (Alan) think that’s especially true when breaking down doesn’t serve you. We need to be self-aware enough to figure out how our behaviors are functioning. So sometimes when we’re on the floor in the bathroom, we just need a good cry. You give me 15 minutes on the floor crying and I can get back up and I can be dad. Other times it’s not serving us. Other times it’s harmful, it’s distracting, and it’s not actually bringing peace. It’s not actually purging us. It’s not actually bringing resolution. It’s more anxiety-driven. What we need to do is act. We need to get up and we need to be present. We need to be moving, we need to be doing things. So especially in those latter cases where our behavior is not serving us, then I think breaking those habits can be really valuable and important.
What would your encouragement be for single parents who just give and give and give and give until they’re running on less than empty?
Growing up in the late eighties and early nineties, the concept of self-love was taught by society. And I was always highly skeptical of it because it sounded like squishy pop psychology. Especially because when you would ask someone, “Well, why should I love myself?” The answer would be essentially going back to technique: “It’s more efficient. If you love yourself, you’ll take better care of yourself, and you’ll have a better life”. Well, that’s not a reason to love myself. That just means that it’s a more efficient way to live. And I was highly skeptical of it. And then recently in preparing to write this book, I came across this profound insight from Joseph Peeper.
Essentially, if God loves us, and we can’t possibly know better than God, then we ought to love ourselves. And I was just like, “Oh, that’s the reason. That’s the reason.” I wanted somebody to answer the question, why should I love myself? That’s the reason. If God loves us, whatever reason we have for not loving ourselves is nonsense compared to God’s love for us. So if God loves us, we ought to love ourselves. And if we ought to love ourselves, then we ought to take care of ourselves. We’re actually echoing God’s act of creation and preservation when we choose to take care of ourselves. And that means setting limits, knowing boundaries, doing self-care. All of a sudden self-love seen in that light is not a selfish thing. It’s not a virtuous thing to run ourselves ragged. It’s actually a virtuous thing to care for ourselves, to make space for ourselves. Because what we’re doing is we’re saying, “God, it was good when you created me. You had a reason and you continue to have a reason for preserving me. So I’m going to honor that act by caring for this creation: me.” [END CLIP]
One of the things you said that I (Marissa) liked was how your kids always need something when you aren’t in a place to give it. You brought up the concept of pattern breaks and how sometimes it’s a good interruption to have to go deal with something. So, how can we leverage those?
One of the other tools brought up was about joy—that we don’t find joy by trying to be joyful. There’s other ways to seek joy. He talks about eating ice cream every night. There’s so much good stuff around us. It’s just that the hard stuff is yelling so much louder. You have to be able to say, I’m going to take a break from the crazy and I’m going to intentionally do something that I enjoy.
With my boys, at the end of the day, we would get on my king-size bed and turn on a show and watch it together. Then, we’d talk about the day and sometimes it would be hard stuff and sometimes we’d just laugh and make fun of it. Like, “Of course your teacher would say that. She doesn’t understand this!” Or, “I know Donuts with Dad is tomorrow and you don’t have a dad to go with you. Maybe you should bring the dog—what would they say?” That was the place we found joy. In all the crazy mayhem, it was a safe place, and we looked forward to being in that place where the three of us knew that together we could make fun of all of the hurt.
The third thing was self-care. For me (Marissa), self-care is hard. That part of that conversation really helped me not feel guilty for doing things for myself and has given me permission to do what I need to do to take care of myself.
Listener Question
How do you make healthy friends and find the support and help you need as a single parent when you don’t have any friends or family close by?
I (Elizabeth) know the person who sent this question in and I think she’s asking, “How do you make in-person friends?” People that you can touch and hug and be with face-to-face.
I (Robert) guess it depends on what’s available in your area, but I think finding affinity groups of other people that like doing pottery or cooking or a book club or whatever. Friendships happen when you’re in proximity and have a shared experience.
There was a while when I (Marissa) went on a chase for hobbies because I felt like if I could find hobbies, I could find people who enjoy doing things I enjoy. So that’s one technique.
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