And at last, she knew what the agony had been for.
To me, a great capacity for delight outweighs the burden of also feeling life’s pains quite strongly.
A big part of my story the last so many years has been severe, crippling anxiety. The trick of anxiety is, the more you make concessions to accommodate the bottomless hunger of fear, the more the walls close in on you; until you’re swallowed whole and gone. Shortly after having Holly, I was completely gone to myself. In some sort of haze I recognized I was sitting knees pressed to chest, without room to stand, in a trap created of my own mind. I felt the weight of immense shame and loss, and it hurt even to breathe. Clocks went backwards and light became a distant memory. I didn’t have strength to lift my eyes. Days passed where I spoke no words out loud, and sadness for my baby tore what was left of me from inside out.
Postpartum brought me to a grim rock bottom that in hindsight, I was always heading towards. I have never known Hell so personally. My husband almost died a few months after we got married, but there in those sleepless nights, never couldn’t I detect the presence of God. In fact I felt Him closer than ever. But to this day when I remember the period I now think of as a slumber induced by trickery, a simple prick of a finger; I feel suffocated with grief. I’ve known no greater Hell than to walk my days asleep. But where there is darkness, and seemingly nothingness, the tiniest of embers shine brighter. Where there is silence, one can hear what is truly meaningful clear as a bell. Rock bottom, as it would turn out, was where I’d find mercy.
When I was 5, I watched from my second story window as my dad mowed the tall grasses below on a summer evening. He’d mow a single path to a single tree in an expanse of seemingly endless field and sky. The grass was taller than me then; so when I’d run to him, I couldn’t see anything but their fluffy brown-golden tops waving in the gentle breeze. I remember noticing how the warm light danced on my blonde hair as it trailed me. I remember looking back at it, and hearing music in my head. Laughing. Backlit ladybugs dancing. I remember the tire swing swaying, and the beaming smile of my dad looking down at me. What a lovely, lovely poem I was in. Before I had the tools of a photographer, or even a cinematographer, I would write. I had some poetry published as a young girl. A short story written in 5th grade entitled “Synchronicity” expressed how God reveals Himself through synchronicities, for I recognized you can understand a lot about the story of our world - past present and future - through awareness of them. “I’m not sure where you came from sometimes” my dad would say. The cover art was a scene drawn in thirds as children often do; at the top the sky with a sun, then open air a bridge to the ground, then finally green grass, with a single four leaf clover peeking out of it.
Maybe six years later, I discovered running. It was my favorite thing to do, but not running for running’s sake. There was something about it that allowed me to do my actual favorite thing in the world, completely immersively; listen to music either real or imagined, watch the clouds pass overhead and tree branches swaying kindly, see the light dancing. When I ran, in my mind, I could be a composer of what God created for us; just appreciating, imagining, constructing stories and in doing so, processing my world. It felt like praying. And in fact, never a run went by where I didn’t actually pray. I loved it so, so much. It was a salve and reprieve for a little girl who would hyper-fixate on street signs during car rides, because she thought they were ugly and added no meaning. (Little did she know they certainly did add meaning, she maybe just didn’t speak that language.)
In the bottomless darkness of postpartum depression, when I wept to my husband that I must be done for, that I was beyond saving and it was all my fault - I knew better than to bargain to the beast that transforms and never stops demanding more - he assured me he could still see me, even if I couldn’t feel me. And when it hurt to breathe and my senses were blacked out, I found myself lacing up sneakers once more.
Life breathed back into my spirit as I ran under the open sky. Watching sunsets, smelling grasses, hearing birds. One summer evening it rained; and all at once, I was immersed in a bowl of pink sky, and a vibrant double rainbow stretched overhead. With wet hair and flushed cheeks I sat alone cross legged in the middle of it all, looking up. Could this show be for me? This would not mark the end of my journey; rather a beginning of sorts. But it was certainly a gift, a direction, and validation. I knew to climb out of the belly of the whale, I would need to have more faith than I ever had - and more patience too, going one step at a time. I grieved the time lost, and gave thanks for the life regained.
In the background of all this, I recognized that I had long ago forgone my purpose, under the guise of promised safety. Surely denying the gifts God gave me was better than trying and failing. I told myself I was more of an introvert than I ever really was, I receded into the shadows, and stopped doing what I loved; slowly enough to not notice the death of me. I made a covenant that spring that I would no longer make decisions based on fear. Even if I felt the fear, I would do it anyway - and I had faith that over time, I would be able to blot out the fear, and relearn how I was meant to exist. I needed Holly to know her mother as she was created to be. There is no motivation like the love of a child. I wanted to give her the best example of a fulfilled, balanced, giving woman that I possibly could. So on my birthday last year, when asked by my husband what I wanted, I asked that the day would be the start of a series of Sundays, where I would clean-up and rebuild the toxic, uninhabitable grounds of my heart and world. That is when ashleynicolephotographer.com was born.
Two months later I would fall on that glorious track, while glancing behind me at the sunset. I shattered my foot as my soul had only recently been. With dirt in my mouth, and searing pain, I pushed myself up off the grass. My eyes focused on a four leaf clover in the ground. I tried to crawl but ultimately I had to be carried off the track that night. Faith was hard. I was incredibly fragile. I was home alone all week from sun up to sun down with a baby learning to walk, when I couldn’t myself. Eighteen weeks of healing, waking up in pain, all the while trying to care for a highly sensitive little girl. But still, onward was the mission and onward we went. There was more mercy.
I am so grateful for this period of suffering. In a hollow, suffocating darkness where not even an echo could be heard, I was able to become reacquainted with myself - which was all I really needed. Just a girl who God made to have her finger on the pulse of beauty, and hopefully show people what He made in a way that glorified it. A girl who he made to feel everything to the fullest extent of it, and this time to be open and honest about her own journey.
So, in the words of Taylor Swift;
And the years passed
Like scenes of a show
The Professor said to write what you know
Lookin' backwards
Might be the only way to move forward
Then the actors
Were hitting their marks
And the slow dance
Was alight with the sparks
And the tears fell
In synchronicity with the score
And at last
She knew what the agony had been for
The only thing that's left is the manuscript
One last souvenir from my trip to your shores
Now and then I reread the manuscript
But the story isn't mine anymore
In a last-ditch effort to have me, I heard whispers; whispers telling me because I was so wise beyond my years, everything had been above board. One day he was telling me this like always, but I heard the music change in my head; and for the first time, I wasn’t sure.
And then the tortured girl was free.
For whatever you’re going through, so much care and love,
Ashley