Like many others, 2020 seemed to be the year that finally broke me. It was as if the culmination of the last 8 years finally all came together and completely destroyed me. Yes, I had some things in which I was truly grateful, like being able to have my fourth baby. However, this feeling of being stuck, of not being good enough, the feeling of not really dealing with things, well it almost destroyed me.
Recently, I started reading “The In-Between Place” by Kat Armstrong. I saw it show up in my in my email as an opportunity right after I said I wasn’t going to take on any more reviews for a while. However, the synopsis made me say yes because it seemed like something I needed to read at the moment. And it definitely was. So today, I am going to share a little about unpacking what I have read and how it relates to where I am at this moment. As always, I am not sharing any of the following for pity, but in authenticity and in knowing that some of you may be where I am and have been.
I received a copy of book “The In-Between Place” by Kat Armstrong for my honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
A little About the Book “The In-Between Place” by Kat Armstrong
Jesus’ journey to the woman at the well in Samaria offers insights and hope for women today to make peace with the past, find hope in the present, and step into the future.
God wants us to move toward the goodness He has planned for us. But what do we do when challenges stop our forward momentum? What’s the next step when we fall into a pit of despair with the determination knocked right out of us?
On his way from Judea to Galilee, Jesus traveled through Samaria, a broken place everyone knew to avoid. In Samaria he stopped in Shechem, where evil had gained such a foothold of power that it eventually reigned. Yet the place once condemned as somewhere no one wanted to visit—let alone hang out in for a while—was the location of one Samaritan woman’s most hope-filled encounter with the Savior.
The In-Between Place offers deeply important insights to anyone who feels stuck and can’t see a way forward. It is for the person who feels that if they look left, their face will be scraped by an immovable boulder, and if they look right, they’ll see nothing but hard to handle. It’s for the person who feels lost and is not sure they are worth the effort to be found, for the person who feels overlooked and unfulfilled. Because sometimes Jesus saves our greatest spiritual breakthroughs for our in-between places.
I have been that person lost…
The description of who this books is for seemed to describe me perfectly at the moment. I have been feeling like I am drowning for quite a while. I keep lugging around all this baggage from things from my childhood, from my accident, from feelings of failing as a parent, from my losses, and from the health issues I have faced in recent years.
I feel frustrated most of the time…from trying to find proper health care, mental health care, trying to find a career that works for me, and from feeling that I will never be able to truly get what I really want out of life.
How 2020 seemed to be the crescendo of it all
One of my biggest desires for a while has been wanting to have a career of some sorts. After having to close my shop while dealing with my health issues and then not being able to go back to college like I wanted, I decided to take my talent for writing and social media and work towards making a career out of it. My feeling was that I enjoyed it, and also it was something I could do even if I had a relapse of some sort again.
2020 started out as my year for all of this. I found out at the beginning of March that I was pregnant and then also started lining up a lot of paid work for my blog and social media channels. Everything was coming up Prissy Missy…until it wasn’t. Once the lockdowns started at the beginning of the pandemic, my contracts started to fall apart as brands pulled out due to the pandemic or now tighter budgets. The joy I wanted to share with my pregnancy started to feel as if it was being dimmed as I dealt with being stuck at home, with my kids being stir-crazy, and with a lot of mental health baggage in regards to my PTSD and anxiety that began to manifest often.
I spent most of my pregnancy in a dark place. Then to compensate for that, I tried to throw myself into working on my blog and social media in hopes that I could start to get somewhere again. I just felt so stuck. The more I tried to do more, the worse I felt. I kept taking on more projects in hopes that it would equate to more paying gigs. It didn’t. All it did was lead me to feel worse. And that…well all that AND fluctuation of hormones from just having a baby is what led me to being suicidal just after Thanksgiving.
How reading The In-Between Place fits into all of this
At the beginning of December, I found myself in the hospital trying to deal with everything that happened. I would like to say that it was a helpful experience. However, all it showed to me was just how broken our system is. While that is a story in itself for another time, I did eventually find a path for help as well as a good therapist once I came home.
It was just after all of this that I got an email about reviewing this book. I am gonna admit that reading something religious wasn’t exactly something I wanted to do at the moment. However, I said yes and have been working my way through the book.
This book brought up the subject of suicide pretty early on, and there wasn’t this feeling of judgment that came with it. Seeing that made me want to read more. Having someone normalize the fears of being stuck and the feelings of anxiety and not being good enough and then showing how God works in those moments made me keep reading.
What I love About this Book
One of the biggest takes from this book is the idea of God changing your story. If you have ever been at that rock bottom place, like me, then you know that feeling of despair and wondering if you will ever get out of this. If you have ever had that feeling of being stuck, then you know how hard it is to imagine moving forward or getting to actually do what it is you want to do.
You know that saying, “God’s time is not our time.” Sometimes I need that reminder. It is not saying that we won’t ever get to do what it is we want. However, it is saying that maybe it isn’t our time yet. I needed that reminder of learning to trust God and talk to God in those times.
This book helps in doing just that. The book is broken into three parts. Each chapter has study questions at the end of it. This is great if you decide to read this book with a friend but works if you read it on your own.
This book talks about deep issues instead of sugar coating or judging. I have been taking my time with this one because I really need to soak this all in right now. This is one of those books that has made me bawl like a baby at times as I reflect on everything from recent events and desire to seek God in dealing with my issues and moving forward.
The Wrap Up
You can find “The In-Between Place” by Kat Armstrong by going to her website or by finding it on Amazon. It is a wonderful read, and one I highly recommend.
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