Testimonies

Celebrating 20 Years With FaithWriters 2

by Janice S Ramkissoon 
03/05/25
Free to Share
Author requests article critique

  Message Writer
  Hire Writer

Tweet

Whilst on pause, my mind kept returning to the above quoted Scripture. It must have been the Holy Spirit warning me not to put my pen down, for in that season I could no longer focus on my writing. I was still writing but not much for public consumption. Then I had no time or energy to write.

I simply needed a break from house duties and work, but that I could not afford.

During that season, I would start a piece of writing and just could not progress to completion. The level of exhaustion was at its highest and I began complaining of being tired and needing rest.

Neither Vince, my husband, nor the people I was working alongside, in my voluntary roles within the church, took me seriously. That possibly could be because I was still operating to full capacity, in their eyes. So to them, I may not have looked like someone in need of support. Often there would be judgemental and condemning responses when I verbalise my feelings. So, I learned to live with the exhaustion and just kept pushing through, getting from one day to the next.

I kept being reminded of the quote from Habakukk 2 which says, ‘write the vision for a future time.’ So I would grab anything in sight to make notes as the thoughts flowed. Eventually, I began using my phone’s notes and I kept recording what I was receiving. But I still wasn’t able to sit down and write in a disciplined way. I was therefore not sharing anything publicly as none of the pieces were coming to conclusion.

Inability To Find Work-Life Balance

In the year 2018, the decision was made: it was time for me to return to full-time employment. We needed to start moving forward, financially, as a family. I wasn’t ready to go back into the travel industry, due to its inflexible nature and shift pattern. Our son was still in school and my desire was to be local and available when needed, particularly after school and during holidays. For just over two years, from that point, I published nothing.

On the first day of the job, I knew I was in the wrong place. Nevertheless, I quite liked the idea of giving people a second chance to prove themselves. It just takes a very long time for me to know how to exit, when I recognise I'm in an unhealthy relationship where the other party or parties are either unwilling or not seeing the need for change. So my second chances multiplied and my health began to decline.

It got from bad to worse.

A new level of stress was added to my already exhausted self. It began to affect other areas of life, such as home structure and rehearsals with the praise and worship team. The ineffective way that the department, I worked in, was being led meant that I would often be working late into the evenings and my husband would be waiting up to an hour sometimes for me to log off the computer system and leave the building.

During that period, dinner would often be prepared late into the evening, or we would grab a takeaway before Vince would drop me off for rehearsals. Rarely were we having evening meals around the table and our lives felt very disjointed. I’d be home later and having to wake up earlier in the morning, still feeling tired and the cycle repeats.

Eventually, I began questioning what was happening to me.

Unfortunately, I was still actively involved in the church during this slow decline. At the time, I didn’t see the need to reduce any of my involvement in the various ministries. Church was my family. In my immaturity, it didn’t make sense to reduce or stop any of those roles as they were monthly commitments. The exception was the weekly 'Worship leading' rehearsals which eventually became an issue with time-keeping. Now looking back, I can see why that became an issue. 

Towards the end of the year 2018, I got an email from two FaithWriters. Their reason for checking in was that they hadn’t seen any articles from me in recent months. Those emails came to encourage me during what was a chaotic season. I was touched by their concerns, particularly as I was asking God for direction about my writing. After those messages, I felt compelled to get back to writing, editing and posting articles again. My writing was just begging for me to get back to being focused on it.

However, work was so stressful that even though I felt convicted to start focusing on my writing again, there simply wasn’t enough hours in the day for it.  Focusing on my writing, alongside a full-time job (where I was also having to do mandatory online training at home in order to be on target) housework and several voluntary roles was plunging me into a place of exhaustion.

Burnout was knocking at my door.

God’s Grace And Mercy

God, in His goodness brought me to the mind of leaders in another church in our local community. I was asked to speak at a lady’s event. Seeking God on a topic, I kept coming up with ‘REST’. It was through my study and research for that talk I began to recognise what I was suffering from or rather that I was heading in that direction. At that point, I got another Bible verse, Luke 10:27:

He answered, ‘“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind”; and, “Love your neighbour as yourself.”"'

My focus now was that small word, 'as' acknowledging that I was commanded to love, not just my neighbour, but also  myself. Growing up, lacking understanding of what that verse  meant, not being encouraged to love myself meant that I was indirectly and incorrectly helping my neighbour at the cost of my own health. There was nothing Godly about what was happening. So I knew something had to change.

After that lady’s event, I began reducing some of the activities I was involved in at my church. That added conflict into the mix because 'No' was not seen as an acceptable response to the request for more volunteers. Not yet understanding the full impact on my mental and emotional wellbeing, as mentioned before, I actually went back into full-time employment; believing that now our son was approaching the end of high school, it was the ideal time to venture out into full-time employment again.

That turned out to be the worst thing for the health of my marriage and my wellbeing.

By November 2019, I knew that continuing as I was would find me in a terrible position. So I explored options available to me and requested less hours at work which was declined due to shortage of staff. There was a high turnover of staff so I could envisaged things getting worse. I prayed and hoped for change but nothing changed. After that, my family and I decided it was best that I resigned. So, I resigned from full-time employment, feeling I was still on a losing streak since I hadn't secured a part-time option elsewhere, before resigning.

Covid-19 Lockdown was just around the corner and home, my normal place of retreat, became the place where everything was happening. The phone was ringing off the hook and the calls were all based on doing more. The list of emails grew. What would normally wait until we’re in the church building or our son’s at school/college was now coming into home space with a vengeance. Monday to Friday was online school and college. No longer did I have a place of refuge.

Weekends used to be family time. It had become the time when calls and emails were responded to; the time to deal with ongoing issues; and soon we had conflict dealing with. We were having Zoom meetings throughout the week. There was no longer a difference or a break between work, church, school and home. Mondays through to Sundays were rolled into one. From online services; planning meetings; to overseas connections, we would sometimes stay up until early hours of the mornings.   

The Pause no longer felt like a pause.

Somehow, without getting the much needed rest my body craved, I was back into the full swing of things again. Motivated to revive my website and start working on my second title again. But that quickly came to a stop. After several restarts, I simply hadn’t the will to keep up with the many changes that were necessary to maintain the upkeep of a website, while working on other projects. Whilst in employment I hadn’t enough time or energy to distribute to all the areas needing my attention.

Eventually, I had to come to an understanding that the website may have served its purpose and it was time to say goodbye. It was at that point I questioned whether my writing was simply for a season and the time had come to close the curtains on that area of my life also.

Burnout was knocking at my door without an invitation. Never did I receive instruction on how to avoid its forceful entry into my life.

It was then God brought the owners of FaithWriters into my space. They extended kindness towards me during what was a very difficult season for me. That season was brought on by the experience/ impact of learning the identity of my birth father through the result of a paternity DNA test. God used their acts of kindness to remind me that He is my Provider and what He calls me to, He will sustain me through.

I needed that reminder to leave the door open as I waited on God to direct my path. God's amazing grace was expressed through their kindness and for that reason I am still here at FaithWriters, using my gift(s) of encouragement and teaching, through my writing. 

I would therefore like to close this part by saying, “Thank You!” to Bea and Michael Edwards. You’ve helped me to see the goodness of God through you and I pray that you will continue to be a blessing to others as God blesses you. Thank you for the work you continue to do here at FaithWriters. Thank you for the encouragement you gave during Covid when I almost quit writing. I heard God’s voice through your words of encouragement and I felt His love through your act of kindness.

“Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!” 

(2 Cor. 9:15).

End of part 2.

>>>Continue reading part 3 of 'Celebrating 20 Years With FaithWriters'

>>>Back to Part 1: 'Celebrating 20 Years With FaithWriters'