When Life Literally Beats You Up

Do you ever feel isolated, picked on, beat up? Do you feel like you’re the only one enduring this pain while everyone else around looks on? Well yesterday I literally knew how you feel. If you live in the Midwest/Southern region of the US, you know some crazy weather is in store for us over the next few days. Wild temperature swings, sudden rain, tornado like conditions.

Yesterday the pain (literally) decided to visit my house. Late afternoon the sky went from clear to ferocious in a matter of minutes. The breeze turned to hurricane force gusts and the rain turned to golf ball sized hail. My focus was on my car that could be dented sitting in the driveway, that is until I saw my backyard trampoline lift off the ground. I’ve lost a trampoline to high winds before (think oversized kite), so I did what any semi-sane person would do: I ran out in the middle of a ferocious hail storm to tie down my trampoline.

And I paid for it. (Spoiler alert: I tied down the trampoline and it’s still with us) But it hurt. Golf-ball sized hail being hurled at 50-60 mph hurts. I was hit everywhere, relentlessly. It seemed like the longest two minutes of my life. I know pastors aren’t supposed to cuss (and I didn’t), but I was sure close. Have I already said that it hurt?

Afterwards, triumphantly wanting to share my pain with the world, I did what anyone would do: I shared it on Facebook:

As expected I got several likes and comments, but the comments surprised me. No one else got that hail. Not those living 10 minutes away, not those living 5 minutes away. It’s as if the world singled my backyard out for a few minutes of hail fury.

My question to you is: have you ever felt like that? Have you ever felt like circumstances, the world, or even God was singling you out to experience a hardship that no one else seemed to be going through?  If so, how have you dealt with it (positively and negatively). Would love to hear your thoughts!