The First Sunday of October

I'm in a new place, both figuratively and literally. It's going to take a lot of getting used to. Some of it is coming together pretty well, while other portions are pretty much a rollercoaster ride. 

I found my robe this morning, so that was nice. And yesterday I got my prayer bench set up. I'm dogsitting for a little Schnauzer (not my favorite breed, but Charlie's a good girl), and this morning I'm heading out to worship on my own in a new place to call home.

That's a lot to take in all at once.

I know some of the people at this church. My best friend and her family attend there, and I've met several people through her and know a few more on my own. It's still odd though to be heading out to a new place all on my own. If anyone had asked me what I'd be doing in my 54th year on earth, this wouldn't have been on my list.

But I'm trusting in God to lead me as He always has. I'm trusting His time and His knowledge to get me centered and integrated into this new way of living.

Life is not a constant, but rather a constantly shifting paradigm. Change is the norm. And if I can't learn to accept that I will find myself in turmoil all the time. 

Proverbs 3:5-6 (NRSV)

Trust in the Lord with all your heart,

    and do not rely on your own insight.

In all your ways acknowledge him,

and he will make straight your paths.

Trust and Healing [day 9]

Trust is a big word for survivors of child sexual abuse and trauma in general.

Somewhere along the way our trust was shattered and we have a difficult time figuring out how to regain it.

I left on Thursday to fly to a spa in Austin, Texas. I'm spending a week on my own getting some rest, relaxation, good food, pampering, and reassessing my approach to physical activity.

I can still remember the first time I travelled on my own after being diagnosed with PTSD. I was so proud of myself when I managed to take a train from Rye, NY into the city and visit a few sites in NYC. I also remember thinking how silly it was for me to be that proud of myself.

Yesterday a lot of those feelings came back as I travelled from Nashville to Austin, found the transportation to the spa, and handled all the tipping and checking in for myself. I realize that for some of you this won't sound like much, and for others it will seem remarkable. And therein lies the issue. For years, I just assumed that no one worried about things kinds of things but me. I believed there was something inherently wrong with me that I was afraid to trust myself to handle these kinds of situations. That I worried I'd make a fool of myself. That one of those strangers I'd have to deal with would take advantage of me.

So far this trip has been lovely, not completely trouble free, but still wonderful. Maybe one of the best things so far are the notes that are left on my bed at turn down time.

Good reminders that I may not be doing everything perfectly, but that's okay!



This is day 9 in Write 31 Days

Hide

I know how to do that. I did it for years. Hide from others. Hide from myself. Hide from God.

It's hard work, this hiding. Keeping all my real, true feelings inside. Trying to figure out what everyone else wanted me to be, think, feel.

What I didn't realize during all those years is I wasn't hiding anything from God. I was just hurting myself by cutting off the greatest support system in the world.

He already knew it all. He knew more about me than I did. He knew I'd been abused. He knew I was scared and why I was scared. He was just waiting for me to turn to Him because His arms were wide open all that time.

I try not to hide now. I try to tell the truth. I trust in Him to guide to the people to share with and keep me from the people that will harm me. I don't always succeed, and it can be really scary not hiding. But hiding is like holding your breath. You can only do it for so long. 

I am breathing easier now.

linking up with Five Minute Friday

What's Important

It's tough here in my world right now. Things are not flowing the way I want them to. I don't think they're flowing the way God intends either, but I am waiting for Him. I know He is present. I know He is in control.

I keep asking Him what He wants me to do. All I hear is "Wait". But waiting can be difficult and lonely. I am waiting in faith. Faith that He has this covered. That He won't abandon me. I have evidence to support His faithfulness. So I'm clinging to that.

I'm praying for myself, but I'm praying really hard for someone else. Someone who is struggling. He's depressed and dissatisfied and scared. Maybe he's feeling hopeless, I'm not sure. I want to fix it, but I can't. I've got some ideas on things that might help, but he's not receptive right now. 

So I'm waiting. It's not something I'm particularly good at, and it's not something our society encourages. We are the "get it now" society. "Just do it". "Have it your way." In America, especially, we are the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" kind of people. 

None of those are going to cut it in this situation.

So I keep praying, reading, confessing, and asking, with no end in sight. I know what I want, hope, believe to be the outcome -- I just don't know how it's going to happen. 

In which I find a new mantra . . .

I said it again yesterday. "He makes me feel . . . " And I was reminded that no one can make me feel anything without my permission. I give someone power over me by not recognizing and validating my own feelings and beliefs. 

It's been a very difficult lesson for me to learn. I'm still constantly working on it, and it's hard not to criticize myself for the continuing struggle. After I said it yesterday, I looked at my therapist and said, "I said something wrong, didn't I?" I could tell from the look on her face, but I had no idea what I'd done. She was quick to reframe it not as my having done something wrong, but rather as an opportunity to see things from a different perspective.

Needing someone else to validate my feelings and beliefs has been one of the toughest aspects of healing from childhood sexual abuse. Trust is broken and often lost as the result of abuse -- not surprisingly. But one of the things I'd never realized until I began to work through it myself, is that trust in self is one of the primary losses. It's obvious to me that victims/survivors would lose trust in the abuser, and maybe in people in general. That makes perfect sense. I couldn't trust people who had previously been trusted because now they had become abusers. It made me wary of other people. Strangers for sure, but even people I already knew, because I couldn't be certain they wouldn't turn on me as well.

Perhaps the greatest loss, though, is trust in myself. Abuse made me question everything I thought and felt, and a lot of what I believed. Retraining myself to trust me has been so difficult, especially when there were times that other people couldn't understand my feelings. Just because someone else doesn't "get it", doesn't invalidate my feelings. (A new mantra for me).

So I'm working on trusting myself more each day. Taking my feelings out for a test drive, as it were. Asking myself why I feel certain things without needing (as much) for someone else to validate those feelings.

It's a bit scary, but like everything else on this path, I'm trusting it's worth it.


linking up with Just Write

Reframing Honesty

What's the difference between dishonesty and full disclosure?

No, no. I'm really asking.

I had this conversation yesterday. It started out simply enough. I commented that I felt dishonest at times because I don't always share all my feelings. I keep certain things back, even from my husband. I present things carefully so as to keep from getting hurt. Or hurting the other person.

Is it dishonest not to share everything? Or is that just making a personal choice? 

I learned this lesson early on in my life. Limit what you share, because it can be used against you. For humiliation or for pain. So I am still reticent to share deepest thoughts and feelings. Trust takes a long time for me to establish, and is easily extinguished. I typically assume I am wrong -- the only one who feels this way or thinks these things. So it is best to keep these feelings and thoughts to myself.

Over time I have found I am not the only one. When I've found the strength to express things I haven't always been shut down. Sometimes there have been others who shared the same feelings and thoughts. Sometimes there have been others who appreciated my perspective as different from theirs yet still valid. 

By keeping so much to myself I allowed my perception to become skewed. I began to think of myself as dishonest in certain areas. I've joked for years about being pathologically honest. So how could I hold two such divergent views of myself simultaneously? I don't know, but I did.

So now I'm working (again) on reframing my view of myself. Honesty is a huge part of my moral make-up, but so is trust. For years I felt I had to choose between the two. Not so anymore, but it's still a hard lesson to embrace.

linking up with Just Write and Imperfect Prose

Quiet Day Thoughts

Patient Trust

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something
unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress
that it is made by passing through
some stages of instability—
and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you;
your ideas mature gradually—let them grow,
let them shape themselves, without undue haste.
Don’t try to force them on,
as though you could be today what time
(that is to say, grace and circumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give Our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.

—Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ

Tethering

Post traumatic stress leaves it's victims untethered. That's my opinion at this point. 


When I was a pre-teen and teenager I wondered why everyone around me seemed to be so grounded. They seemed so sure of their place in the world -- of who they were -- who they wanted to be -- and how to become that person. I was always untethered -- ungrounded -- disconnected -- uninformed. What I know now is that's one of the fundamental effects of childhood abuse. I lost my bearings. I was searching for connections, but terrified of them at the same time. When basic trust is broken, a child's world view shifts forever. Trust is our connection to others. Once it is broken, we are disconnected. It's not just a feeling; it's a reality.