What do I feel?
Hungry.
A tinge of tired, but mostly hungry.
Hungry for what’s next. Hungry for what’s ahead. Hungry for dinner.
And here’s what’s wrong with that…
Hungry is a double-edged sword.
GOOD HUNGRY
Here’s the good hungry:
When you’re hungry and you know a meal is coming.
It’s Thanksgiving morning, and you know that meal is coming at noon or maybe even 1 or 2pm in the afternoon. But you’re willing to wait until 2pm because you know it’s only a matter of time.
You and the family are spending all morning prepping the food. You have this side finished, this side cooking, the turkey is in the oven, the rolls are rising and will be added shortly. Desserts are sitting in the fridge.
You are HUNGRY!
You can feel it.
You know the big meal is coming. You can see it. You can almost taste it.
And yet, you haven’t tasted anything…
YET.
BAD HUNGRY
Hungry is a double-edged sword.
Here’s the bad hungry:
You don’t know where your next meal is coming from.
You’re financially poor. You’re down and out. You just paid rent and you just paid for gas, but the electric bill is due, and you still have to get groceries. You’re debating whether it’s easier to live without lights or whether it’s easier to skip a couple meals, because you’re afraid one of those is going to give you the “Transaction failed” or “Insufficient funds.” As they used to say, you’re afraid the check is going to bounce.
But damn, you’re hungry. You’ve been living on cans of spaghetti-o-s, bologna sandwiches, or peanut butter and jelly. For weeks, you’ve been buying tuna and mac-n-cheese. For breakfast, it is cheapo cereal, an off-brand poptart, or a single piece of toast. You’re barely making ends meet.
Have you been that hungry?
I have. As an adult. When we first got married.
We made it. But it wasn’t pretty and it wasn’t easy. And when we first had kids, we had WIC-support.
Am I ashamed to say it? Yes.
But does it make it any less true? No.
It’s part of our story.
And what about this kind of hungry, maybe it’s more true to your experience today?
PAYCHECK-TO-PAYCHECK HUNGRY
What about when you have to cut the grocery budget because you can’t afford the full, normal amount? You keep choosing the off-brand or the cheapest option, instead of the one you actually enjoy?
Or when you have to tell your kids they can only choose one sport or activity because you don’t have enough money for a second?
Or when you have to buy the clothes second-hand because there’s no way you could actually buy the full-price ones?
Now if you like bargain shopping, and that’s your thing, that’s fair. But when you can’t afford the thing you want and you settle for the thing that is lesser, or different, that’s the pain, right?
What about when your rent or mortgage, your credit card, and that medical bill payment are due on the 4th, but you don’t get paid until the 5th or 6th?
What about when your school fees, your car payment, your other credit card, and utility bill all hit in the last couple days of the month and you don’t get paid until the 1st of the month?
Maybe you’re already paycheck to paycheck, but then you have to put that car repair or urgent medical care expense on credit cards? “Buy now, pay later,” not because it’s a good deal, but because you’re actually behind a paycheck?
What about those times?
- Will we be in the black or in the red?
- Will our last wee bit of savings be depleted and we’ll be paycheck to paycheck again?
- Will the bills and expenses come due before the paycheck rolls in?
What about those times of paycheck-to-paycheck financial hunger?
THE DEEPER RELATIONAL HUNGRY
Let’s go one step further, shall we?
What about when you’ve been wanting to sit on the couch next to someone for months, but they have no interest because your behaviors hurt them so badly for so long and they need space?
Or you’ve had to ask whether you can go into your own room to grab some things because you’ve been kicked out?
Or you’ve had to ask whether the person will accept a small side hug in a vulnerable moment because you’re trying to honor the boundaries they’ve set for themselves so that they can heal?
Or you’ve had to ask if they’ll go for a walk because you need to talk to them about something very important, and both of you have to give yourself a pep talk just to be able to do it?
Or you’ve gone down the spiral of circular arguments for the 8th time in two weeks and you’re both so fed up you can’t stand being around each other any more?
Or when you realize you’re the one who has more to deal with before a relationship could ever work again?
Or when one of you wants to pray together, but the other one doesn’t because they’re so hurt?
That kind of hunger, that kind of pain, that only a separated spouse knows. Where you cry yourself to sleep in this season, knowing that your spouse cried themselves to sleep in another season.
These matters are tough to discuss. There is so much pain in a relationship on the rocks, in a marriage that hasn’t been well tended to.
But if you find yourself in this situation, you have to ask… how did you get here? What happened? And now that you’re here, what are you hungry for? A “married” status, instead of a “single” or “separated” or “divorced” status? Are you hungry for sex and physical intimacy? Are you hungry for dates or doing activities together? Are you hungry for being included in daily conversations?
What are you hungry for? Are you hungry for proximity? Are you hungry for a hug, a hand on a shoulder, any basic touch?
Are you hungry for bonding, for connection? Are you hungry for friendship and companionship?
Are you hungry for peace, for joy, for understanding?
Are you hungry for the deepest love you can experience on earth?
What were you in the relationship for? What were you in the marriage for?
What was your spouse in it for?
Is there a remedy to all this hunger?
THE REMEDY
If you’re living paycheck to paycheck, you simply have to find a way to make more money. Pick up a side hustle. Take an extra shift. Cut all extra spending for a time and figure out how to live on less. Those solutions are fairly simple.
Will you have to humble yourself? Yeah. Will you have to part with some things you enjoy? Sure. But if you need the money bad enough, you can find it. Hell, I’m driving Uber Eats some nights just to make a few extra bucks each week, trying to make a couple hundred each month. Covers the dental / orthodontic work our kids need.
But the remedy is much more complex for that deeper, relational hunger. You have to be willing to admit your mistakes and ask forgiveness, first and foremost. You have to be willing to change behavior and do things differently, because if you say sorry but nothing changes, then were you really sorry?
More than that, you might need professional help. Counseling? A health and wellness regime? A relationship coach, or trauma healing coach?
You might need to demonstrate real heart change and behavior change over a long period of time. You might need to break cycles that have been going on for decades. You might need to heal from generational wounds.
You might need a prayer.
Or hundreds of prayers, from dozens of people.
You might need a prayer that goes like this:
God, today, I claim and believe that You are Good. I haven’t always felt it. I haven’t always believed it. I haven’t always known it. But as I’m here right now, in this space and in this place, I feel it.
I hurt. I have so much pain. I have so much angst. I have so much inside me that needs healed and restored and cleaned and treated.
God, I have ignored my heart, I have ignored my soul, I have ignored my pain, and worst of all, because I ignored all that, I ignored my family’s too.
Their hearts, their souls, their pains, their struggles, I ignored. I didn’t pay attention. I missed. I fumbled.
I can’t fix it all on my own. I could certainly destroy it all on my own. But I can’t rebuild it from the ground up on my own.
I believed that stupid lie that if I just went faster, if I just did more, if I just stayed one step ahead of the pain, I’d be ok. We’d be ok. And it’s not ok.
You can only ignore cracks in the foundation and the walls bowing for so long. You can only ignore the tread getting so low before the tire blows. You can only ignore the pain for so long before it eventually reaches unbearable. You can only ignore the cancer for so long before it becomes radical treatment or it kills you.
I hope, and I long for, every day, to be forgiven. To be reconciled. To You. To my family. To be experiencing that good hunger and not the bad hunger. To be experiencing that Thanksgiving dinner type of hunger and not that deeper relational hunger. God, You know where this is headed.
I surrender this moment, this situation, and whatever the outcome may be. And I trust You are Good.
