Early on at the “lord’s farm” everyone would go on trips together. It was before fun trips were deemed unholy. One time we went to Canaan Valley to ski. Now I had never skied before and I was and always will be terrified of heights. Not to mention that at this particular juncture in life, I had panic attacks regularly. I wasn’t allowed to have any type of medication to help at all. Their view was that if I was following God wholly then there is no reason for me to have anxiety. I guess they forgot to factor in that we are human. I remember when we all got there and the fresh fear gripping my heart at the thought of skiing down a huge hill. After I got my skis on I saw that there was a Bunny slope for beginners–yay!!! I made it through the Bunny slope with minimal incident. I felt so relieved; I thought “Ok, I did it.” I was ready to be done with my skiing career.

Everyone was sitting down to lunch in the lodge and it was there that Adrian said to me that I was going on a more difficult slope. I said that I did not want to do that and I was immediately cut off. It was decided for me that it would be just wrong if I didn’t go on a bigger slope. It wouldn’t be showing that I trusted God. Inside of me I began to freak out. I was praying silently, desperately that God would help me. I wanted to please Him with all of my being. I was so afraid I would fail Him.

One of the ladies named Ann was the one who would go on this bigger slope with me. We got on the ski lift and took off. I was so terrified that I would throw myself off of the ski lift that I wrapped my arm around the pole to keep myself there. I fell as I got off the lift and realized that it was all ice. Great…. just what I needed. I looked at this mountain I was on and the terror I previously felt was intensified astronomically. The panic gripping my heart caused it to beat erratically and super fast. I thought it might explode out of my chest. Ann cajoled me to begin and I fell again. This is how I mostly crawled down the mountain. It took me over two hours to make it down that slope. I was amess. I was sobbing and embarrassed. I wished I was invisible. In my mind I thought I had failed God. I obviously didn’t trust or love Him enough to be able to ski like everyone thought I should. I couldn’t understand why I was singled out. In my heart I genuinely felt alone and abandoned.