Contraction

Throughout our lives, we experience both expansions and contractions. Expansions are characterized by growth, new experiences, and relationships. Starting a new job, getting married, or having a child are all examples of life’s expansion. Then there are the contractions. Contractions are most notably characterized by loss like the experience of losing a job, a friend, or a loved one.

Your 20s and 30s are a natural time of expansion. You are finding your way in a career and possibly building a family. You are meeting new people through your neighborhood, school, and church. It feels like life is bordering on overwhelm as more and more is added.

I experienced my first contraction of life in my mid-30s. I had a good job as a software developer and was on a beach vacation with my family when I got the call that the office would be locked when I got back and I no longer had a job. The company had relocated operations from Greenville, SC to Houston, TX.

It felt like a gut punch. Thankfully, I had been doing some side work and had multiple inquiries. I thought I’d be ok and maybe even thrive as I had a nice severance package. Within two weeks I had gone through all of my leads and had no work to show for it. I was unemployed for nearly 6 months.

I remember waking up with nothing to do and no place to go. My anxiety was through the roof. I decided to keep pushing with my consulting and, just before my severance pay ended, I got my first paying client.

As hard as that was, there were other areas of life that were expanding while my work life was contracting. I started a men’s group in that season from which I have found some life-long brothers. My family and church involvement helped balance the equation. It was only when I was alone that the anxiety would creep back in. How are you going to provide? What if this consulting route doesn’t work? Will you be a failure? Again?

In my early 20s, I struggled financially. We were below the poverty line for years. Even though I had earned a Master’s degree, I could barely make ends meet. I thought I had left that season for good. Will I have to return to it?

Thankfully, the answer was no. Though it took some time, God opened some amazing doors. My consulting business grew and I eventually cofounded a software company with a former client turned business partner.

After a few more years of hustle, I was entering into a new season of expansion. What I didn’t know was that simultaneously, as the business was growing, I would be pulled into another concurrent season of contraction. My oldest daughter, then in middle school, got sick.

She was originally diagnosed with Mono but never got better. As time went on her condition worsened and the traditional medical community had no answers. They effectively said she was fine and was making it up though she lost nearly half her body weight, dealt with constant fatigue, headaches, and chronic pain. Her circadian rhythm changed and she eventually became nocturnal. This lasted through all of high school. She was home-bound, doing school online in the middle of the night. We would see her only as she would wake in the evening before we went to bed. She would work in the night and fall asleep in the morning as we were waking.

Over the next 4 years, as I’m building the business, we are spending obscene amounts of money on alternative health practitioners. Nothing was covered by our very expensive health insurance premiums so it was all out-of-pocket.

I can’t fully explain the pressure I felt in that season. To come through for my partner and employees in building a successful business. To watch my daughter fade away in pain to the point she no longer wanted to live. And to spend so much money on treatments that didn’t even seem to be working. I was failing to care for my wife and our other 2 kids. I was a shell of a person becoming so angry about what my life had become.

There is far more to this story but God, in His boundless grace, healed my daughter with the cooperation of a handful of unusual suspects. I’m very thankful for the alternative practitioners who helped save her life. She graduated from high school (online) with a 4.0 and healed to the point of being able to go to college. It was truly a miracle.

Over the next few years, we begin experiencing a slow expansion again. The business grows and our family recovers. There were normal issues that life throws at you but nothing compared to previous season. It was a time to catch our breath and recover some much needed sanity. Then, without much warning, another season of contraction snuck up on me when I wasn’t looking.

During my daughter’s health challenges, my dad was dealing with alcoholism. He passed away in 2014 from liver failure. Then my mom was diagnosed with early onset dementia in 2017. While she’s still alive today, she can no longer communicate with or recognize family. Effectively losing both of my parents in their late 60s promoted me, unready as I was, to become the patriarch of the family.

The joy I found when at work also started fading. In the previous season, I thrived on leading the technical vision and project management of our small team at work. One of my greatest joys was to come into the office, grab a cup of Methodical coffee, and dig into how to optimally build a feature with such an amazing team of people.

Then, one by one, each of the development team left for other opportunities. I was very happy for them as they were growing in their career but was sad that I would no longer be able to work with them or see them daily.

Eventually, I was the only technical resource remaining. We also decided to give up our office as we just didn’t need it anymore. So my days changed from working with a team and having camaraderie to working alone in my home office.

As my work life was shrinking, my family and friends moved away.

My sister and her family, who had moved to be closer to us, decided to move to another state so we rarely get to see them.

The last of my 3 children left for college in the Fall of 2022. Empty nesting is great in so many ways but it was another loss of daily connection when all your kids are gone.

My best friend of 20 years moved away and the group of guys I had been meeting with weekly for the past decade started losing steam and disintegrating.

As my external world was shrinking, my wife found a renewed purpose in becoming involved in local politics and is very active outside the home with various organizations.

In 2024, my business partner and I decided to stop deploying new features for a season. So even my identity as a software developer, and what I have spent my days for the past 20 years doing, was no longer.

As I was coming to terms with all of this loss and trying to find a new daily routine, my home was hit by Hurricane Helene. On September 27, 2024, a 70-year-old oak tree fell through our roof allowing rain to pour into the house. A few minutes later our neighbor’s chimney crashed through the side of our house sending bricks into our living room.

My wife, Kelly, was home with the dog when this happened. I was in Toronto at a conference on the phone with her when all this was happening helpless to do anything about it but pray. Our house sustained major damage. Estimates are that we’ll be out of it for a year or so to complete the repairs.

Dealing with displacement from our home, an insurance company – unhelpful at best and negligent at worst, my wife’s PTSD, logistics for disaster relief, and a host of other losses has been difficult. However, it pales compared to those in North Carolina who lost everything and had no insurance. Comparison just doesn’t compute.

I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I’ve experienced loneliness,  sadness, and, at times, even depression. Thankfully grief comes in cycles. It hurts so badly for a time that you don’t think you’ll make it through. But you do.

I certainly didn’t expect I would be where I am now. I expected the contractions to be balanced out with more expansions. That may be what happens. In a few years, we could be grandparents and we would enter a new season of expansion.

But for now, I’m in a season of multiple compounding relational contractions. Where this goes, only God knows.

What am I learning in this season?

I came to realize that I saw my value through what I create or produce. I often asked myself, “What did you accomplish today?” Now that I’m not needed by really anyone on a daily basis, I wonder why I’m still here. What’s my purpose?

Could it be that I’m simply here to glorify God and enjoy Him forever? Maybe my production isn’t the most valuable thing I can offer.

By stripping away the things that got most of my focus daily, I’ve become more and more grateful for how richly blessed I am. Being grateful doesn’t dismiss loss. The loss shines a light on the very things that God gave me for a time that I neither deserved nor could  have imagined for myself.

I may not be done producing but I don’t want that production to define me or to equate to my value. I’m hoping that I can walk with God through the rebuild of the house, and the upcoming years, with an expectancy for the lavish gifts so undeserved that He, in his goodness, provides.

And he said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” (Job 1:21)

Acknowledge and feel your losses. They will lead you somewhere. I’m sure there will be more contraction in my life before it’s over. I accept that and will offer that pain to God. I’m also hopeful if I’m fortunate enough, to see more expansion in this life. But regardless, I look forward to the ultimate expansion as Jesus makes all things new.