Who is Bertha Mason?
You don't know?
How about Edward Rochester?
Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre?
Do you know now?
Bertha Mason is the insane Mrs. Rochester, the one locked up in the attic.
My Bertha Mason, My Mrs. Rochester was unleashed from her coma within me this weekend. She rarely wakes up so when she does I'm always caught off guard.
What releases her (I hope you haven't been chased away by insanity)?
Negative emotional conflict and confrontation when I have neglected to take my crazy meds.
I love and hate my brain medications. Often I don't think I need them. I do fine without them for a few days. But by the third day I have become vulnerable without realizing it. And if a negative emotional confrontation occurs, Mrs. Rochester may very well show her face.
I fear this crazy side of me because I am sure beyond sure that she will chase everyone I love away.
My husband has had to deal with Bertha a few times in our marriage and he is still here. What a good man he is!
And I think of Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:9. God said to him, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness."
I also hate being human -- that's what this whole thing about myself reminds me -- that I am human. And how messy humans are!
But humans are who God died for.
Not robots.
Humans.
Messy, Sinful humans.
Like me.