Grief Is Not A Spectator Sport

 

I’ve been thinking of funerals, and of course I am, my mother has recently passed on. Death is a big thing in trauma/addiction recovery, truly any event that brings a lot of emotion forward is a big event, but death is definitely one of the biggest ones. And the death of an abusive/estranged parent is the biggest. Needless to say there are a lot of mixed emotions involved.

 

With the news of her impending death I found myself in constant prayer that she would seek repentance for the harm she put out in the world. I found myself waking early in the morning already engulfed in prayer that somewhere in my mother she realized the harm she had caused, and was honestly repenting. I have longed for her to show me remorse over the years, to acknowledge she hurt me worse than any other human being was capable, but the last week of her life I wasn’t interested in her remorse, I just wanted her to repent before she died. (Mathew 18:6) I don’t know if she did, and I suppose I won’t know until I pass on myself.

 

I am grateful I had almost two and a half years of mourning before she passed. I am grateful I had a chance to begin healing, to create a life where she wasn’t the chaotic center of it, to find some peace and belief in myself, and put myself in God’s hands and trust Him completely with my fate. I will always be grateful for the time. In the beginning I separated myself simply because I had no choice, my body had revolted. And I will be forever grateful the nightmares, flashbacks, fear and trembling, anxiety and panic attacks came before she died, because if they’d happened afterwards I don’t know if I would have survived it.

 

Therefore I’ve been thinking about funerals, and being the youngest on both sides of my family I’ve been to a lot of them in my years. Funerals tend to be highly emotionally charged events, and perhaps because death marks the end of an era, funerals tend to bring people to seek resolution of one long-held issue or another. Funerals are triggering, and I can’t think of a single funeral I’ve been to that didn’t bring an eruption of chaos during it, or quickly following it.

 

When my own father buried his mother he went to the funeral carrying his gun. The tension in that funeral home was like nothing before or since, the factions were aligned with their perceived righteousness and indignities of how my father had failed his mother, and although no shots were fired, or blows thrown, that event left an indelible memory. Then there was the funeral where a cousin went after an uncle and had to be physically restrained. And the one where one mourner worked diligently to turn everyone from another mourner with accusations of an earlier unwanted sexual encounter, or yet another funeral where there were divisions with claims of domestic abuse.

 

And of course there was my own child’s funeral where several people targeted me, trying to engage me into some kind of upset. One followed me through the funeral home mocking my words as I spoke to mourners, another tried to draw me into an argument because she felt she had been treated unfairly, and yet another sought out to resolve an issue from years earlier. All this occurred while I was attempting to say goodbye to my only child. Why did those people choose a funeral to address long-held upsets? I don’t know, but I do know that it’s not uncommon to use that ritual as a tool of harm.

 

Grief is not a spectator sport, nor should it be used to gather more fodder for the gossips. If the last two and a half years have shown me anything it has been that I can only rely and put my trust in God, not man, not family. I suppose I knew what would happen when I stepped back to mourn my own losses and begin to heal my own injuries, and the events happened in a textbook fashion, the lines were drawn and people chose their side. I didn’t ask anyone to choose, and although I may have desired understanding and compassion, I did not expect it, and I wasn’t surprised when I did not receive it. I was hurt, though, just one more hurt piled on top of the others, and I was gossiped about and condemned far and wide.

 

I have stated over and again that I abhor gossip and fully agree with the Bible in this point, it is destructive, it is sinful, and it is where small and evil minds gather. My mother told me many times in my life if I didn’t do as she requested then people would talk about me, ie., she’d get that ball rolling. Luckily for me after being warned, gossiped about, and experiencing the awkward hush that comes over a room when I stepped inside, I was prepared for what followed. What I won’t do is feed that gossip machine any further. 

 

My mother has died. There are so many losses to be mourned, so many. As her only surviving daughter I have the right to mourn as I see fit, I have the right to soothe my own pain in Jesus’ peace, and not be further fodder for the gossips.

 

All this is my way of saying I will not attend my mother’s funeral. Experience has shown me that funerals aren’t a safe place to let down my guard and open up my heart. Experience has shown me that the only benefit to be had by my attendance would be to deepen the coffers of the gossips, and to further a divide that may never be bridged. I know where my mother will be buried, I’ve spent a lot of time in that cemetery in my years, and I will go and visit the grave on my own, when I am ready.

 

Sometimes in this life you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t, and I am mightily tired of being damned by people who do not know my story, and mock, lie about, and dismiss what I have survived. She was my mother too, and above all else I pray that she repented for the incredible pain she caused in her life. 

 

 

 

Righteous Anger

I haven’t been posting a lot of blogs recently and the main reason is that I’m angry, and I didn’t really want to push that anger out into the world. I’ve written plenty, and when I see the anger sneaking in with no way to say what I feel without revealing it, I close it out. It’s righteous anger though; it’s the anger that comes when you finally find respect for yourself, your abilities, and your own existence.

 

I find I’m most angry over all the losses, the loss of a education, the loss of the love and affection a child needs to become a well-rounded human being, the loss of a central nervous system that works correctly and isn’t constantly on high alert waiting for the next threat. I’m angry that I never had a mother I could trust, one who would protect me. I’m angry that as an adult I never had a mother who was a friend, one who would hold my secrets and stand up for me. I’m angry that through all the suffering I’ve endured in my life, my mother only viewed my pain as fodder for gossip, as a means to draw attention to herself.

 

I’m angry that I have suffered real brain damages from the concussions, the beatings, the threats, and the continuous and constant stress through my formative years. I am angry that every confidence I trusted with my mother was shared far and wide, and not just shared, but subtly changed to suit her wants and needs for attention. I’m angry that in my childhood every little thing was a dramatic, never-ending crisis. I’m angry that my mother never tried to be a good mother, never taught me anything useful or valuable, it was all about her, her feelings, her needs, her wants, her desires to be the focus of everyone in her world.  

 

I am angry that the only affection I received as a child was in front of an audience, and had no real feeling behind it, it was just a show for others. I am angry that I am the daughter of such a cold, heartless, unfeeling, and cruel (mean-girl) woman, and that I was never allowed to be my own person, I was simply a possession that was expected to mirror her feelings. I am angry that I had to struggle so hard to find little pieces of myself, that being a whole, separate person was discouraged, while being a pathetic, helpless mess was encouraged.

 

The anger ebbs and flows, some days better than others, and I know with time it will lessen, and I also know that the anger is righteous and needed. What I find I am the angriest with is that I put up with it for so damned long, that I wasted the majority of my life seeking a thing that simply doesn’t exist. I am angry that I exposed my only child to the gaslighting and confusion, and now so many odd things that he said over his lifetime are suddenly making sense and I know from where those words emerged. I am angry with myself that I continued to trust my mother, and the countless times I was hurt, deceived, and gossiped about. I am very angry with the way I was used as gossip fodder over the years, my life, my pains, my suffering at the hands of a narcissistic parent were only used for talk, as a means of damned entertainment for people who would have never survived what I have endured.

 

So yes, the reason I haven’t posted much in the last year or so is that I am mad as hell! And following my well-established training, I’ve kept that anger to myself, not wanting to be or put a burden on anyone. I can’t say much will change by my stating these truths, but posting this blog will be a start.

 

 

Momma Said Write A Book About It

Perhaps this new book is my own confession, an attempt to rid myself of the deeply ingrained shame that I imagine most abused children experience. When you grow up under continual threat, in survival mode, and then step out into the world, it’s not easy to shift gears, and when you are trained in abuse, abuse begins to feel familiar and safe.

 

I’ve been on a long journey in my quest to feel comfort in my own body and mind, and at first I began changing the basics. At first I removed the harmful pharmaceuticals, harsh grooming products, and toxic cleaning supplies, I began eating more healthfully, we moved out into the country away from the city’s chaos, I moved my body more, I got sober, and grew stronger in my relationship with God. But what happens when you change everything possible outside of you, yet you still feel like crap? Then you must look inside, and at your own history, to understand those triggers that keep you in fight and flight mode. They say that unaddressed traumas stay in the body until you address them, and I have found that that is the truth.

 

As an example: I’ve always had a complicated relationship with sleep, it took me hours to drift off, and if I was awakened unexpectedly my entire day would be ruined. Such a simple thing, sleep, yet as a child I still recall the dread I felt at bedtime. Whatever my issue with sleep was, it was still affecting me in my 50s. For a lot of people sleep is safety and comfort, for me it was something to dread and avoid. Looking deeper I found the problem. As a child sleep was never safe and comforting to me as I could be yanked out of it at any minute, and being dragged from sleep usually meant being yelled at, accused, and hit and hurt. There was no comfort in slipping off to sleep, only fear of when I’d be attacked. In facing that fear and acknowledging it, my sleeping schedule has shifted, and for the first time in my life I now feel that comfort and safety, but I would have continued to suffer had I not gone down the rabbit hole of my own miserable upbringing.

 

In the new novel there is a scene where my lead character, Dani Donnelly, is talking to her young neighbor. The 11-year-old, Crystal, had just experienced a traumatic event, the first of her young life, and was having trouble sleeping. Dani suggested art as a way to remove the flashbacks from her mind, and I suppose this new novel is my art. Sometimes taking those images from your mind, by painting or by writing them out, lessens the power they have over you, and eases that ever-present shame and fear.

 

The title of the new novel was the obvious choice; there could be no other title, as when I was a child and would complain of the treatment I received I was told I could write a book about it when I grew up. I was told to write a book about it many times, usually with a smirk and a chuckle, as my grades in English/Lit were always terrible. So finally that is what I have done, I have written a book about it.

 

I weaved my own story into the story of a fictional character, Dani Donnelly, an author on the run from a stalker. Dani has signed a contract to write her memoirs, and with just a few fictional twists and turns to blend my story with Dani’s, most of her written memoirs are the truth of my upbringing and the early years of my adulthood. I faced incredible fear writing this one, as fear and secrecy (what happens in the family, stays in the family) was a mainstay of my upbringing. The description of the anxiety attacks the author suffers is not much different than what I endured breaking the trauma bonds that have held me captive and suffering for over fifty years.

 

So with all that said, the new novel is available on Amazon.

 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BVKV59Z9

 

 

 

Healing Loudly Part Three

I had a revelation this week, as it dawned on me that it isn’t the memories kids growing up in abuse repress, it’s the emotions connected to the memories that get stuffed down and buried. I have always remembered the abuse, tucked away and compartmentalized in the back closet of my mind, but what I had buried were all the emotions a kid feels when undergoing years of systematic and intentional abuse.

 

Growing up under a covert narcissist, one determined to break my spirit, and leave me ever dependent on them, a lot of emotion gets pushed aside and buried in the name of survival. The abuser controls everything, from comfort, food, and sleep, to whatever emotion is deemed appropriate to express, and in my upbringing only the abuser was allowed to express any emotions. My emotions were unimportant, ridiculous, the mark of an insane person, and completely unworthy of any attention or concern.

 

And it was those severely repressed emotional responses to systematic abuse that have been bubbling to the surface these last few years of sobriety. I was ill prepared to deal with them as I had been taught I had no right to them, no right to feel any way that my abuser didn’t approve. My abuser had a very limited range of emotions, and I was expected… No, it was demanded that I share only the emotions of my abuser, and disregard any of my own feelings.

 

Growing up like that, all my formative years spent trying to mold myself into my abuser’s screwed-up and limited emotional range left me unsure of my own emotions as an adult, and it sure explains a lot about my own life. A kid just wants to be loved and accepted, and that is something I never experienced as a child, which left a deep longing in me, and is the reason I put up with such insane abuse as an adult. I’d been groomed, beaten, and brainwashed by the continual abuse into not only yielding to the desires of the molesters who found me during my fourteenth through sixteenth years, but for accepting even more abuse as I grew up. My emotions had little meaning to me as I tried to fit myself into the emotional range of my abusers in adulthood, just as I learned to do as a child.

 

It occurred to me last night that I experienced at least a hundred abusive episodes at home between the ages of eight (when my sister died) and seventeen (when I left home pregnant and married). If it happened just once a week, then it’s literally hundreds of times, but I will settle with just the number one hundred for now. At least one hundred times of being hit, condemned, told how awful I was, and how much I was hated as my mother, my abuser, took out all her frustrations on me. It’s a miracle I have as much sanity as I do, it’s a miracle I’m not a hopeless and helpless mess, and although I am a bit of a mess, I managed, though the grace of God and God alone, to recover a spirit of optimism and hope.

 

So for those of you wondering, talking, scrutinizing, dismissing, and choosing sides, understand I’m not recovering forgotten memories, those have never changed, I am experiencing the emotions denied a severely abused and neglected child. Finally God has allowed me a space to feel and heal those deep, and unwarranted, wounds.

 

 

Healing Loudly Part Two

I should have known. It always happens. I should have known. The day after I posted my last blog my back tried seizing up several times, and I was left with what I will refer to as that pre-seize pain, afraid to move much in case it decided to fully debilitate me for days or longer. Thankfully, after some slow, long, stretches, and breathing exercises, it has calmed now, but it always happens or something similar, when I speak out.

 

More than a decade ago my articles were very popular on the Internet, and when I’d see how many views they were receiving and I’d get the emails that always came, I would have massive anxiety attacks, trembling all over. It was the fear of being seen, of being known, of getting in trouble by drawing attention to myself, a legacy of growing up under narcissist abuse.

 

And it seems I’m not alone, most children growing up as I did, both the scapegoats and the golden children tend to end up with medical issues. I know that I have certainly suffered vague, apparently impossible to diagnose sicknesses and physical ailments, and I’ve had a lot of surgery. The constant drama, the gas lighting and confusion, the fear of being caught, even when you’ve done no wrong, and the constant fight or flight stimulation leaves victims of abuse in poor physical states. We tend to suffer autoimmune disorders, constant rigid muscles, depression and mood swings, anxiety, digestive and heart problems, and a myriad of other stress related issues. 

 

There are biological reasons we survivors of childhood abuse suffer throughout our lives, and it has to do with the development of the brain, and the chemical reactions that occur when we are under threat. Our bodies and minds are poised to remove ourselves from the threats, but as children there is nowhere to go, no safe place to escape, we are trapped, and the body holds on to that and does not forget. Over and again we experience the trauma, and over and again it remains trapped in our bodies, and soon we find that we are constantly in pain.

 

The legacy of child abuse does not end when we become adults as our brains have literally been changed by the abuse, re-wired by the abuse, and in my case, I also have the damage done by many concussions.  The changes done by childhood abuse affects the cells in the anterior cingulate cortex, which plays an important role in the regulation of emotions and mood. Studies have shown significant changes in the white matter of the brain, which is made up of myelinated nerve fibers that, much like the electrical wires in our homes, conducts the brain’s electrical system. The myelin is the nerve fibers’ protection, and those who suffered childhood abuse have a stunted myelin system.

 

Childhood abuse also affects the development of the amygdala, our system to emotional regulation and to reward and satisfaction, as well as the hippocampus. The hippocampus helps with memory, cognition, and learning new things, and studies have shown that in childhood abuse survivors that part of the brain is shrunken and it has to do with the repeated and unexpressed fight or flight reaction that bathes the area in cortisol and retards its growth.

 

Although the abuse does cause physical changes in the brain, it is my belief that consciously healing also changes the brain, for the better. When I was younger, before I knew anything about Complex PTSD, before I realized that I was raised and abused by a covert narcissist, and when I still worked diligently to fit in with my family, pretending the abuse never happened, I was in poor physical and emotional shape. I suffered many physical ailments, had strange debilitating illnesses that defied diagnosis, and felt sure that I was crazy. I took handfuls of daily medications, and never found much improvement for my issues.

 

Healing doesn’t happen overnight, and it has been at least a decade of consciously working to be physically healthy, and the changes look vast from where I sit now, but it was a slow and steady, step by step, process of cleaning up my diet and lifestyle. Still, though, I felt ‘off’ until I confronted the abuse and began to acknowledge the damage done and the traumas that I experienced.

 

I know that there is hope on the other side of these realizations, and I know that although the abuse and concussions caused brain changes and damage, I can heal. When my son experienced brain damage from a fungal infection in his cranial fluids and central nervous system, I saw the improvements achieved through simple puzzles and exercises that reopened neuro-pathways, so I know it’s possible to heal. All it takes is intention, prayer, and hard work, and consciously moving forward.

 

We can’t heal what we don’t acknowledge, and acknowledging the abuse has been one of my more challenging experiences, but I am determined. Let us not give up hope, and know that there is light at the end of the dark and scary tunnel.

 

 

 

https://www.futurity.org/child-abuse-changes-brain-1554882/

 

https://psychcentral.com/blog/liberation/2017/10/long-term-narcissistic-abuse-can-cause-brain-damage#4

 

 

Healing Loudly From Narcissist Abuse

I never wanted or expected to be a spokesperson for healing from narcissist abuse, but here I am. I read a statement recently that we should heal loudly so that others can use our experience for their own healing, and it’s been stuck in my head and in my heart, that I have some responsibility to help others heal. It goes counter to my programming and training to speak out, to really speak out with the truth, and I have to admit it’s an incredibly hard and frightening thing to do.

 

These last six months have been difficult, the realizations and the full context memories have literally knocked me on my ass a time or two, and the anxiety has been nothing like I’ve ever experienced – the fear and trembling of working out my own salvation. I was asked not to write about my abuse as it may hurt my abuser’s feelings, and for the last six months I’ve held my tongue, once again isolated, and working against my own best interests. Working against my own best interests was how I was trained, and the lies and pretense is the wardrobe I was expected to wear for the rest of my life.

 

I knew speaking out would cause others to turn their backs on me because that is simply the way it is when you grow up in narcissist abuse. Growing up as I did you have this entire world of pretense and lies thrown over you, and you are expected to uphold those lies to the world, and as the abuse started so early with me, you carry those lies and pretense just because that’s simply the way it is. You carry the pretense even when everything inside is screaming that it’s a lie, you put on a smile and face the world and pray no one sees the truth.

 

I am done, I can no longer pretend, and the truth is I was one of the scapegoats in my family. The other scapegoat was my oldest brother, and when he grew into a man, dangerous and unpredictable in our abuser’s eye, the role fell onto me, as I was just a kid and a very easy target.

 

I have avoided looking into the topic of narcissism for years, both consciously and unconsciously, knowing that once I opened Pandora’s box there was no returning to the way things were before. And strangely, there was a bit of a mourning period of letting those old illusions go, realizing that things were never the way they were presented to the world, and acknowledging that I was never the person my abuser insisted I was.

 

There are many kinds of scapegoats in the narcissist dynamic, and I am beginning to understand that I am the truth teller. The other types of scapegoats are the rebel, the caretaker, the problem-solver, the protector, the perfectionist, and sometimes another covert narcissist is born under the selfish and incredibly damaging abuse. Being a scapegoat is a very hard and damaging road to follow, and it is the scapegoat who carries the burden of all the frustrations of the family, and the blame anytime anything goes wrong. The energy has to go somewhere, and the scapegoat is the receptacle where all that gets dumped. 

 

The dynamic is very clear, written about in books, shown in movies, and yet I avoided looking into it for years, the fear of facing the truth almost greater than the pain of being scapegoated my entire life. There are several types of narcissist, and narcissism is defined as a personality disorder in which the narcissist is selfish, lacks empathy for others, has a sense of entitlement, a need for admiration, and an inflated sense of self-importance. People growing up under that dynamic are very damaged, both the golden children (the chosen favorites) and the scapegoats are damaged. No one does well in a narcissist family, except for the narcissist themselves, as the children have long been divided and conquered, and have learned the hard way that keeping the narcissist happy is the only way to find what resembles peace, but that semblance of peace is always short-lived.

 

Some may ask, why now? Why talk about it now? It’s in the past, it’s over, why dredge up the old ghosts now? But the truth is it’s not over until the injured parties say it’s over, and it sure isn’t over for me as I now have to wade through the years of my life, the traumas I swallowed as something I deserved, and consciously begin healing my mind and my body. It’ll be over when I say it’s over, and not a second before.

 

I was asked to hold my words, to not write the truth of my own life on my own blog, and to keep silent until the narcissist died, and I had planned to do that, but something broke. Something inside could no longer hold the pretense, my body was giving out, my body was rebelling against the lies. It is completely unjust to expect another person to carry lies, and the simple act of asking me to do so is just another textbook example of being scapegoated. Once again the comfort and selfishness of the narcissist becomes more important than my health, my recovery, and my entire existence. Once again the narcissist’s feelings outweigh everything else, including my own health, but that is nothing new to me as my medical needs were neglected in childhood by the narcissist. I’m not going to continue down the path that says I am less than, my needs less important because others, outside of me, deem it so. 

 

The answer is no. I told that person that I would write what God inspired me to write, but the fear of speaking openly held me back, fear of retribution, slander, and rejection. God has been pressing on me to heal loudly, to help others in what I am an expert in, and I will no longer remain silent to protect the feelings of the person who went out of their way to hurt me and make me struggle. I will no longer protect the person who deliberately and with intent made my childhood a living hell, and I will no longer pretend simply to appease others who are invested in maintaining the lies.

 

If my words can help one person, then I must put myself out there, no matter how uncomfortable and afraid that makes me. So for a while this blog will be dedicated to overcoming and healing from narcissist abuse, there are more of us out there than I ever imagined.

 

 

 

 

Old Injuries and Healing

God is good all the time even when we don’t understand His mysterious ways. And I fully admit I don’t understand, but I trust God. In the world of faith we don’t always understand what is good or bad, often what we perceive as bad turns out to be good, or even great, for us in the long term.

 

I am in the process of learning this lesson again. A couple weeks ago our very large dog (80+ lbs) hit me from behind, running full speed, and at my age and size it could have easily killed me, or at least seriously injured me. Thank God I only suffered a severe ankle sprain, a bit of whiplash, and bruising. At first I thought it was really bad, but I am finding that it is good.

 

I have been asked NOT to write about my childhood experiences to spare feelings. I have been asked to wait for the death of the perpetrator before I speak of the abuse and neglect I suffered as a child, and honestly that had been my plan as well, but sometimes God’s timetable is different than our own.

 

As I have struggled to learn to maneuver on my first pair of crutches, battling a nerve damaged and atrophied uninjured foot and leg, I have been thrown back to a time in childhood where I felt more than helpless, ignored, and unloved. The truth of that time is ugly, it almost defies belief, and it is hard to write or even think about, but God has decided it is time for me to heal the emotional, mental, and physical wound.

 

I have experienced about every emotion there is in the last couple weeks as I’ve been stuck on the couch unable to do for myself. Beside the feelings of helplessness, sadness, and fear, there’s also been abandonment, rejection, and heartbreak, all the emotions I felt at twelve years old when medical care was withheld from me for months. I do not understand why an adult would choose to withhold medical care from a child, or maybe I do, and what I see is so dark that I cringe even thinking about it.

 

Looking back on that time through the eyes of an adult, and a mother, it is worse than I’ve let myself remember, the cruelty and lack of empathy toward me hurts both my heart and my soul. The short version (because the full version is still very difficult for me to face) is that I slipped, barefooted, on the deck, unearthing a very large splinter that essentially shot into the soft spot under my toes and disappeared inside. At first I don’t think anyone believed me, even though I was crying, limping, and in awful pain. This happened in the last days of sixth grade, to my club foot (a birth defect), and I was made to walk to school anyway, as everyone has had a splinter before and didn’t act like a whining baby.

 

Within a week a knot began forming on the bottom of my foot, between the ball and heel, in the arch, and it was quite painful. I was limping, and I’m sure complaining, and the knot was obvious, but it was ignored. Day after day, week after week, the knot grew painfully, and I soon learned to not talk about it, and not to be showing everyone my “boo boo”.

 

As I understand it scar tissue had begun to encase the 3 inch splinter to prevent it from moving deeper into my system, and for the entire summer, from the end of May to the end of August I limped, the knot growing larger, my foot swelling, and it was ignored. Finally, the week before school started again I had surgery to remove the splinter, and the huge knot of infected tissue. The neglected injury was bad, and the surgeon had to scrape down to the bone to remove the mass, and I was sent home with strict instructions not to put any weight on my foot, as there was an empty, fleshless, hole under the stitches that needed time to fill back in.

 

It was decided that instead of crutches I would use an ancient office chair with small metal wheels to move around over the deep shag carpet, and as that didn’t work, I ended up hopping or scooting around on my butt. I have no idea why I wasn’t given a pair of crutches, but I wasn’t, and I was not to complain.

 

Given almost no recovery time I started seventh grade in the three-story building where the stairs were an absolute nightmare. I never received any physical therapy, and although I had gone to doctors for my birth defect previous to this, I never went to another “foot doctor” until I was an adult and could pay for it myself. Before the injury I could balance on either foot with my opposite leg in the air, afterwards I became the brunt of the clumsy and klutzy jokes, and I have fallen down more stairs than I care to remember, as my foot was no longer trustworthy or dependable. Only my big toe could move freely, and the rest of my toes only moved as a unit, up and down just a bit, and I lost a lot of mobility in the whole foot.

 

I have been aware of the physical loss for years, my inability to balance on that foot and leg, but my right leg, my tree trunk, took up the slack until a dog, happily running full speed, knocked me ass over teakettle. I have thought many times over the years that I need to work on the balance issues and lack of mobility, but never took the time to focus on it. Now, it seems, God has put me into the position to heal my left foot, and the accompanying soul wound that comes when a child’s pain, needs, and health are ignored for months by those who are supposed to love them. 

 

At the beginning it’s a miracle I didn’t fall again trying to use crutches, and keep the weight off my right side, but I am slowly gaining some balance, and I’m feeling muscles in my left calf, ankle, and foot that I haven’t felt in decades. As I am beginning to heal the old injury, and the injury to my heart, mind, and soul, I am grateful that God has given me the opportunity to address them all. Healing can be messy, acknowledging the buried emotions from being neglected left me in tears for days, but things are looking up, thank God, and although I don’t understand his mysterious ways I trust Him implicitly.