Marriage.

I never thought anyone would want to marry me for the longest time, that I was just destined to end up alone. It seemed like there was such a wide selection of prettier, thinner, funnier, more charming, NORMAL girls out there. I walked around with quite the inferiority complex. Even though I never came out and said it, people could sense I felt less than them. People can smell fear, and when they sense you are afraid of them or feel they are better, they immediately grow distant toward you, and do not see you as their equal.

Over the past couple of years, and I can’t place my finger on it, but I outgrew this inferiority complex with people. I think it happened when I finally stopped seeking reward with them, and essentially wrote them off as a source of contentment and happiness. It was when I finally stopped relying on people to make me happy. Nothing and no one but Allah can make us happy. This was when I noticed the subtle changes in how certain people who before seemed like the “cool, untouchable” cliche suddenly became friendly and approachable. I can’t say this lesson was due to any nobility of spirit on my part. It was a hard won lesson because in the depths of my despair, not a single tearful phone conversation, not a single hug or embrace from a close sister, nothing could make me feel better except turning back to Allah. I remember driving to school one day and crying and crying, begging Allah not to leave me, to help me, please, I have no one left. I could barely see the road, I was that beside myself. When I finally arrived at school, I felt hollowed, emptied out. In a good way.

This illness, this condition, this test…it is a way for Allah to test my mettle and see what I’m made of. I can either pass or fail, and each time I am afflicted with a low episode it is simply a test from Allah to see how I will react. If I will forebear with patience or suffer myself to pity. I feel like I have been failing this test each time, because I don’t react with patience, I just fall into despair and abandon my prayers and can do nothing but lie in bed. I don’t want to be this person. Please Allah, don’t let me be this person.

I still struggle with the fear that I am never going to get married, but I try to console myself with the fact that whoever we are meant or not meant to be with, it is already written. If I don’t ever get married, then it is the will of Allah and I just need to stay chaste and be a good Muslim. When I have a low episode I feel like if only someone would touch me or hug me or hold me close, I would feel better, and insha Allah if I do get married I can have all that, but it’s not going to solve or cure this, although it will help. I used to think that once I got married, I would be fine, but of course this is not true. Marriage is simply marriage, it is not a magical pill.

I have been seeking spiritual counseling, and alhamdulillah I have been benefiting a lot from this counseling. My counselor reassured me that insha Allah I will find the person who will not see my condition as a detraction, but rather as a way to gain blessings from Allah. The days when I can’t get out of bed, he can bring me water to make wudhu with if needed. He will encourage me and help me and support me in the low times, not see it as a negative. Insha Allah I hope I find that person, even though I have mentally prepared myself not to. Maybe I shouldn’t prepare myself not to ever get married, maybe this is really just holding me back?