About two months ago, I was sitting in church service, minding my own business. We had just finished worshiping through song, and our Missions and Outreach pastor was talking about  upcoming summer missions trips, when suddenly my friend turned and slapped me on the leg and said, “You should go to Puerto Rico.” I chuckled and rolled my eyes, then went back to focusing on service, but her words lingered in my mind as a tug started in my soul. I ignored that feeling and went about my day. That evening, when I went to one of my  small groups, Puerto Rico came up again. I told them what had occurred that morning and laughed it off, but they did not. I told myself that it didn’t matter, though, because I was not going.  A few days later, I was working remotely, sitting at my writing desk, when I felt it again, this time not a soft prompt but a Jesus-just-used-my-full-legal-name kind of way. “Nope”, was my only response, then I tried ( and failed) to argue. I remembered back in November when the first of the 2026 Mission trips were announced. The anxiety that rushed through me, I remember begging God not to ask me to go. I didn’t want to go; it was too soon after everything that happened in Mexico. It had taken weeks for me to feel fully physically better after Mexico, and several therapy sessions and prayer to get me mentally better. As one of our pastors continued presenting the vision for the next trips, I held my breath, please God, pleeeeeaassssse don’t ask me to go, just give me a year here, I pleaded. I will go again, I want to go again, just can’t commit right now, I will do all the local community projects and serve at church. For a few moments, I sat there like a child in class, praying the teacher did not call on me. The moment passed, and I sighed in relief, not only because God didn’t ask me but because I felt like it was okay that I wasn’t ready to go again yet. Just one year, I promised, just one year.  

Jump back to my argument at my writing desk with the Holy Spirit about Puerto Rico, “I am not going,” I kept thinking over and over in my head while trying to focus on my work, but I couldn’t shake it, that relentless pulling. I started listing all the reasons I couldn’t go this time, and reminded God about the year we talked about in November. I kept listing reasons I could not go there, as I looked at the online information, even as I finally realized the date of that Mission trip, August of 2026, which means 14 months after Mexico. One year, I had asked God, I mumbled something about meaning one year, as in all of 2026, not 12 months, as I finished my makeup. Finally, I said, Okay, if I call my brother and see if he would be available to take my dog that week, will you stop bothering me? “Yes,” the relentless voice in my head said, and then I was able to focus on work. After work, I called my brother and asked. He agreed to talk to his wife and get back to me. “Great,” I thought, see, I faced that fear, and I kept my word, we are done right? Wrong… “get the information packet,” the voice said. I agreed, but I wouldn’t see our missions and outreach pastor until sunday so now I can just relax and go about my evening. I arrived at church for the Alpha course and walked into the room, and guess who was standing in the room? Yep, the very pastor with the information I needed, I set my stuff down and stepped outside to pace back and forth. “I am not going, I am not going, I am not going,” I kept repeating my head over and over, but that tug just wouldn’t let up. I walked back into the building and up to the pastor and asked her for the packet, assuring her this was just a “face my fear” and an exercise in working through my trauma from the last trip. I sat down with my packet, flipped it over so no one could see it, and started to mingle with the others there. A good friend (who normally doesn’t come to Alpha) looked at me and asked, “Are you going on any mission trips this year?” I swear I could feel Jesus smirking at me. I told her I had not planned on going on any this year, content to leave it at that but that voice, that tug, “tell her” so I did, she laughed hard and full in the way that is so charcisially her and said “sounds like you are going to Puerto Rico”, I sighed and turned back to my papers and my bible in my hand.

    That packet sat on my dining table watching me for several days. By this point, while I was still being stubborn, I also had become curious. Why didn’t I want to go? What was I afraid of? I thought I had dealt with everything that happened in Mexico, but maybe I hadn’t? For anyone who doesn’t know, I was asked to prayerfully consider filling a spot on a trip to Puerto Penasco, Mexico. I did end up feeling called to go and say yes. So a little more than 40 days later, I boarded my first flight to journey to another country for my first mission trip. Many good things happened in Mexico. When we left, I was in a really rough spot spiritually. I had quietly been deconstructing my beliefs, traditions, and political views for about a year and had reached the height of it on Easter sunday just a few weeks before this trip. I didn’t know if I beleived in church or missions trips or evangelism or anything, I asked God to show me the truth and to answer some of my big questions, which He did. There are so many blessings that came because of that trip, but towards the end of the trip, I ended up getting sick, very sick, as in hospitalized overnight in a foreign country sick. I had never been hospitalized before, and when they told me I would have to stay overnight, I lost it, I bawled my eyes out, and the panic started to set in. I wanted to run, I wanted to flee, but I felt trapped, hooked up to an IV. My church family was so supportive, they prayed, stroked my hair, held my hand, and even gave me the choice and autonomy to stay or return to the mission. I ended up following the doctor’s advice and staying overnight. When I came back, I had to work remotely for a week because I was so sick, I lost weight, muscle tone, and my digestive system was wrecked from all the antibiotics it took to kill that bacteria. I was so weak by the end of the summer that I was sore from playing with my niece and nephews for an hour, and then could not pull myself out of the pool. I knew that the trip had been caused by trauma, and so I immediately started journaling when we got back, praying and talking to my therapist, who has helped me overcome a lot of my trauma. I thought I had dealt with all of it, but if I had, then I was still so anxious and fearful about saying yes to this one. I knew I was afraid of getting sick again, as anyone would to some degree. I knew that it was natural for my mind to warn me of potential danger, especially as someone who has CPTSD, but there was something more, something else that was feeding this fear.

 Of course, I did sign up to go to Puerto Rico, even though I insisted for another week that I wasn’t going, but by the time my brother confirmed he could take the dog, I had accepted the fact. Once I finally committed, I felt a lot of peace and joy come into my mind, but there was still something lurking around the corner. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what it was lingering around; it wasn’t spiritual warfare, it was some sort of unhealed wound inside me.  About a month later, I got sick, just a common head cold, but I had to “call out” for serving in children’s ministry, then my mental health took a nose dive due to some other things going on. I ended up having to leave work early on that day that week. I don’t remember much about that morning, but I do remember crying to my boss that if I left, I would be letting everyone down, and everyone would have more work, and I was a burden. I went home, took care of myself, and dealt with the other bigger and harder things going on, but when I was finally rested and regulated again, I saw it, there  it was, that unhealed wound that was being twisted. When I got sick, I was unable  to do the work I had been called to, unable to do the work people had donated to send me to do. I was a burden, required extra work as people had to keep driving me to the hospital, and I wasn’t useful or valuable to the team. When I was sick at the mission, I do remember having a conversation with a friend about how I felt like I was letting everyone down by not being able to serve and do what we came to do. She had assured me that no one was thinking that or saying that; her teen daughter had even told me to go back to bed, asking what tasks I had been given and promising to do them for me. No one had told me any of this; this was all in my head. I served for several days before getting sick. I have always had anxiety around being sick. I actually get relieved when I have a fever because then it’s believable that I am sick and I have to go to bed. Anytime I get sick, I gaslight myself, ignore my needs, and try to press on. Which is exactly what I did in Mexico, the night before I got actually sick, I had felt bad all evening, I was so tired, I remember hiding on the bus for just a few minutes of quiet and crying because I was tired, but I ignored it, I didn’t tell anyone, and convinced myself that it was just from the long day.

When I get sick, I tell myself that.

I am faking it

I am making it seem worse than it is for attention.

I am weak; everyone else manages to keep going.

I am causing an extra burden and have become an inconvenience.

I am dramatizing my symptoms.

And many other things that are between Jesus, my therapist, and me, but those are some of the big things. The part I hadn’t dealt with was getting sick publicly. When others started bouncing back sooner than I did, it made me want to push through and ignore my own body’s needs. I even talked to a friend about this while at the mission, sick, and she told me none of that was true.  The second trip to the hospital, where they kept me overnight, I sobbed uncontrollably, from fear, from exhaustion, from pain, from feeling helpless. Then I was crying because I was being comforted, I cried from the overwhelm of not being alone, cried from the guilt of feeling needy, and from distracting the other women from those they had come to take care of. When I saw my pastors and the friend I asked for, I cried again, cried because I felt guilty that they had to drive up to the hospital. My whole life, I have trained myself to be helpful,  not  to need much attention (even though I was starving for it), my worth came from service, from being a light burden. I would repeat the cycle of ignoring my needs, my desires, and even some basic self care for weeks, then snap and fall apart when I broke, then apologize not only for how I handled my feelings but for having needs and feelings to begin with. Signing up for Puerto Rico brought up a buried, unhealed wound that had started to surface in Mexico but that I hadn’t really dealt with yet. This wound started showing up in other areas too, like when trauma anniversary dates still affect me, I gaslight myself and shame myself for not being “over it” yet. I don’t see myself as strong and a survivor in those times, I don’t look at the amount of mental and emotional torture I endured and feel free or like a warrior. At those times, I feel weak and powerless. Once I could name the fear and found that unhealed wound, I was able to pray about it, talk to my therapist, and lastly write about it.

  Now I get to actually be excited about the trip, yes, there are some nerves because it will be new, and I don’t know what to expect. One of my best friends told me in the midst of all this that Puerto Penasco was for me to heal me and answer questions, and that this trip is for me to now go serve and help others. I think she might be right (she often is, but don’t tell her I said that). Getting to focus on fundraising, preparing, and the fun parts. I am curious to see how I will feel being on a plane again. On the last trip, I was so overwhelmed and felt so far out of my element (which is good for us all to do ) that I still can’t tell you whether I enjoy flying. Everything was so new, so many first experiences, and so much internal work was going on that I often didn’t have words to describe what was going on. My mind was doing its best to keep up. It took weeks of being back before I could fully write and talk about most of what went on. I am glad that I went to Puerto Penasco, and I love, will always be grateful for all the external and internal work done there, but this time I am hoping I get to savor and settle more into the present moments. We will be going on the trip in august to help Dream Center Esperanza bring hope and meet the needs of the community.

Please be praying for my team as we preapre to do this mission work!