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In a very spiritual and conversation, Adrienne Houghton spoke with Angelica Nwandu, founder of The Shade Room, to discuss holding to your faith in light of disappointment, particularly in waiting for God to give you the desires of your heart.
Angelica shared that she desired marriage so strongly, she placed it over her relationship with God. Nwandu said that her desire for marriage and God’s withholding of it, put her in a depressed state.
“Here I was. I came from having no money, facing eviction, living in Hawthorne. And then God brought me to a place of I don’t worry about money, I was able to buy a house. All these things were happening for me and I could not be grateful because the one thing. I used to tell God, ‘Yeah, that’s cool but you know what I really want. You know the desire. You know what I really asked for. Why give me the secondary things, give me the number one thing that I wanted.” And I started to think God was spiteful. For some reason in my head, I started thinking, ‘Ima be 60 and I’m never going to be married because God knows that’s the one thing that I want.’ Now I look back, if I had a husband, I would be in divorce court. I had a lot of things I had to work on. He was keeping me from ruining myself and a promise that he had for me.”
The host of the show, Stephanie Ike spoke about expectations not being met in relationships and Adrienne shared this.
“For me one of my lowest points was relationship things. Especially in my twenties. Oh my twenties sucked. They were awful. And a lot of it had to do with wanting to be loved. I was looking for this love and I love really hard and so I expected that in return. And when I wouldn’t receive that love in return it was incredibly hurtful. Even making the decision of breaking an engagement, not only was that depressing but it’s embarrassing. Moments like that can make you feel so low. There’s so many things you think of in that moment that literally make you feel like, ‘God, why do you feel so far from me.’
I know that I know that I know that I have a praying mom. And I know that I know that I know that God had spoken to me and told me that that was not the man for me. But I wanted that. I was on some, ‘I been through too much. I deserve it. I want it.’
For me, the sadness was that it was the end of an era. Something that I wanted so bad wasn’t for me.
…
I even went through a period where I would talk to my mom and I would have an angry moment with her. Like, ‘Why did you love me the way I did when I was child?’ I was told ‘You’re beautiful.’ I was told I was loved everyday and then when I went to seek that in relationships, I wasn’t receiving that. I even had a guy so much as tell me, ‘I don’t tell you you’re pretty because you know you’re pretty.’
Angelica: Does Israel tell you, you’re pretty.
Adrienne: Every single day. But it didn’t come in the package I thought it was. You know how much wrong was wrong with him? Had I gone off of logic, I would never be as happy as I am today. I went against everything that logically made sense. I’m not an idiot. I’m not stupid. I read everything you read. I genuinely felt led by the Holy Spirit. This is the one for you. For people who were perfect, who had no ex wives, no children, but I would feel repellant toward them. They were on paper and what the public would have thought would have been perfect for me, they were repellant to my spirit.
Israel was the worst look I ever could have gone with. I was the worst look for him. He was the worst look for me. But in the storm. What looked like circus to everyone else, we were at home like this— leans back in a chilled position.
