Re-entry stress, or reverse culture shock is the disorientated malaise in returning to a home you presume to be familiar, but which, in reality, is no more familiar than the me that called it home. Re-entry is said to be 'like wearing contact lenses in the wrong eyes. Everything looks almost right'. The longer you live overseas, the more you open yourself to 'them' and 'their world', the less you seem to fit. Anywhere.
I've been through this before. It was months of torture. Months of conflicted emotions. Wanting to be here, but also there. That is better - no this is. I prefer the me I used to be, and who am I now anyway? And so on and on it went. This time is different. There's a shelteredness here, a sense of Someone Planned This. It seems suspiciously smooth. Strangely quiet.
The tears came at the right times, and sometimes the wrong. They carried my grief, losses, unanswered questions. I barely have words for how conflicted I feel. Is this how it should be? Do I need to debrief? Receive prayer? I suspect I simply need time, Sheltered time. But whatever I need, my Shelter knows it. And He says I'm safe with Him.
If you don't know how this girl in the sculpture feels (unfortunately it isn't my creation!), if you don't know the Shelter of God's presence, His shielding from the tempest inside and out, let me share with you these words of promise:
Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most Highwill rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.”
Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare
and from the deadly pestilence.
He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
~ From Psalm 91
Speak to this Shelter until you live in Him. He is listening.
