Hormones and Harried Emotions
“I can’t help how I respond when my hormones are out of whack. (It’s understandable to act like a shrew at certain times.)
If we accept the lie that we can’t control our emotions, we will also believe we can’t control how we act when we are feeling emotionally vulnerable or out of control. Not only are we to quick to believe our feelings, we are also far too quick to obey them.
So if we feel a sudden craving for a big bowl of chocolate ice cream at ten o’clock at night, we head for the freezer and pull out the ice cream. If we feel like staying up and watching a late-night movie, we do so. If we don’t feel like getting out of bed the next morning, we pull the covers up over our head and call in sick to work. If we don’t feel like cooking a meal that night, we call for pizza delivery. If we don’t feel like cleaning our house, we let it go until that mess is so great we are really depressed.
The problem is, if we cater to our emotions and let them control our actions
in these kinds of daily routines, we will be more vulnerable to be controlled by our emotions in the major transitions and difficult seasons of life.
In recent decades, there had been a lot of research, writing, and discussions regarding the seasons of a women’s life. Some of this focus has increased our understanding of the way that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” However, it has also caused many women to become obsessed with themselves and provided them with an excuse for inexcusable attitudes and behavior. Some women I know habitually attribute their negative moods and reactions to where they are in their monthly cycle (as I am frequently tempted to do myself). This way of thinking almost cost “Marie” her marriage:
I am fifty years old, and I can see how this lie had my heart completely deceived. My husband tried to confront me and help me see the Truth, but I was so deceived and reinforced by the PMS proponents that there was no way I would listen. I had to face the possibility of my husband leaving before my eyes were open.
For some women, a difficult pregnancy “explains” erratic mood swings and volatile behavior. I have met other women who seem to be planning ahead to have a breakdown when they hit menopause.
Certainly what happens in our bodies does affect us emotionally, mentally, and even spiritually. We cannot isolate these various dimensions of who we are – they are inseparably intertwined. But we fall into the trap of the Enemy when we justify fleshly, sinful attitudes and responses based on our physical conditions or hormonal changes.
My recollection of the year I was twelve is that I cried the whole year – for no apparent reason. As I look back on it, I understand better now than I did then some of the changes that were taking place in my body as I was becoming a woman. But I also understand better now that I did than that want was happening in my body was no excuse for the moodiness and mouthiness that were part of my pattern during that year.
I remember an occasion years ago when I was physically and emotionally wrung out from an intense speaking schedule. My attitude and my tongue were on a roll; I was being negative and generally hard to live with. Subconsciously I was justifying myself because of how I was feeling. A friend who happened to be within the radius of my cantankerous spirit look at me and said simply, “Don’t let tiredness be and excuse for carnality.” I confess that at the moment, I didn’t particularly appreciate the rebuke, but it was exactly what I needed to hear – a painful, but necessary, reminder of the Truth.
As with other aspects of nature, God has designed our bodies to function in seasons and cycles. Certainly each season of life has its challenges. One of the consequences of the Fall was that childbearing would be accompanied by sorrow and pain. Childbirth is not the only time these consequences are felt. For example, the difficulties some women experience associated with their menstrual cycle are practical reminders of our fallen condition.
But every monthly cycle is also a reminder that God made us women, and that with our womanhood comes the capacity for being a bearer and nurturer of life. Even as a single woman, I find this to be a gracious and valuable reminder of who I am, why God created me, and how I can best glorify him here on earth.
Didn’t God make our bodies? Doesn’t He understand how they work? Do you think things like our menstrual cycles, hormones, pregnancy, and menopause catch Him off guard?
The psalmist praises God for His watchful care and His sovereign plan as it relates to the creation of our physical bodies:
You created my inmost being;
You knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully
and wonderfully made….
When I was woven together in the depth of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be (Psalm 139:13-16).
What an incredible thought! Long before you were born, every molecule of your body and every day of your life, from conception to the grave, was carefully thought through and planned by God. He ordained the day you would start menstruation, when and how many times you would conceive, ad exactly when you would stop ovulating. He understands exactly what is taking place in your body through every season and change.
Is it conceivable that this wise, loving Creator would be unaware of our hormone levels at any stage of maturity or would have failed to make provisions for every season of life? He does not offer an easy or trouble-free process of growth. But He had promised to meet all our needs and to give us grace to respond to the challenges and difficulties associated with every stage of life.
Long before anyone had ever written a book on the subject of menopause or estrogen, Francis de Sales (1567-1622) wrote words of wise counsel for women of every generation:
Do not look forward to the changes and chances of this life in fear; rather look to them with full hope that, as they arise, God, whose you are, will deliver you out of them. He has kept you hitherto, – do you but hold fast to His dear hand, and He will lead you safely through all things, and when you cannot stand, He will bear you in his arms.
… The same everlasting Father who cares for you today, will take care of you tomorrow, and every day. Either He will shield you from suffering, or He will give you unfailing strength to bear it. Be at peace then, and put aside all anxious thought and imaginations.
Paul’s prayer at the end of Thessalonians is not just of the first-century believers. And it is not just for the men. I believe it is a prayer that can be clamed by women in ever season of their lives. It is a prayer we can expect God to answer, as we exercise faith and allow Him to do so:
May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul [including those emotions!] and body be kept blameless at the coming of out Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it (I Thessalonians 5:23-24).
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