Sunday, April 8, 2012

He is Risen....

Easter morning I am filled with peace.  NewCounselor presented an interesting idea.  The resurrected Christ is perfect and He kept the scars in His hands. 


Christ chose to keep the evidence of his sacrifice.  Another place I read was that when Christ was crucified we were on His mind.  He took time to make sure His mother would be cared for.  His life showed the way to share love and joy with those around us.  He did not doubt who he was or what he was sent here to do.

I thought of the scars I carry.  The scars on my body from cancer and other injuries. The scars on my spirit from abuse.  In counseling, I work hard at healing the broken places of my heart.  I still feel scarred.  Perhaps it is not the imperfection that I thought it was. 

Earlier in this blog I shared the story of The potato, the egg, and the hot chocolate.  http://weareone-ruth.blogspot.com/2010/09/potato-egg-coffee.html  I believe that we can not control what happens to us, we can only control what we do with the experiences.  I split to survive.  I was taught how to take control of my life and my thinking.  Fear still kicks in.  I learned how to work with that.  Anger is still there.  I learned how to use anger as an indicator that my boundaries are being pushed.  I still feel shame.  I am learning to sort out what belongs to me and what was projected to me from my abuser.  I feel peace more and more often.  I feel love for my children and grand children that far accedes anything I believed possible.  I believe Christ did exactly what He said He did.  He is risen.  For me, that has made all the difference.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Bunny Hop

At the grand age of 4 1/2 years old I was enrolled in kindergarten class at school.  I remember my mother filling out the form and she asked me if I wanted a nickname.  Mind you the adult is asking a little girl that has never gone to school.  At the moment in time, my favorite animal was a bunny rabbit.  Since I thought a nickname was a requirement to get into school.  Fortunately, bunny won over monkey which was another favorite.  By second grade, I hated the name 'bunny' and used my metal lunch box to silence those that persisted in using that name.  Fast forward 50 years.  Yesterday, at the preschool I got to be bunny, The Easter Bunny.  Head to toe pink fur with a full head mask.  The teachers planted me outside and let the children that wanted to come up to me.  One little girl flew across the school yard for a hug from the Easter Bunny.  I hopped, talked in a squeaky voice, fended off a future hoodlum trying to poke me in the eye, and thoroughly enjoyed myself.  I was very impressed with one of our students in the learning about early childhood education he's a 16 year old that knows he is a cool man on campus.  One of the small students wouldn't come near me unless he hugged me first.  I was so impressed that he gingerly hugged me then encouraged the 4 year old to do the same.  The atmosphere was gentle and any child that wanted to stay away could.  There were no tears and delightful fun.  I am a great believer in the Easter bunny, colored eggs, hunting for eggs and lots of candy.  I loved living in Washington, we could hide candy filled eggs all over the yard, even in the snow.  In the snow the colored eggs actually made the snow glow lovely colors to match the eggs.  The kids would re-hide the plastic eggs over and over.  I love coloring Easter eggs and checking out all the things that can be done with peeps.  I'll add a few links to a few of my favorites.

Peeps Diorama
https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&hl=en&source=hp&biw=1977&bih=1190&q=peeps+diorama&gbv=2&oq=peeps+&aq=2&aqi=g-z1g9&aql=1&gs_l=img.1.2.0i3j0l9.4409l8940l0l12474l6l6l0l0l0l0l114l620l1j5l6l0.cgsbsh.1.

Easter Jokes
My Butt hurts
http://insidecorner.dmagazine.com/2009/04/12/lets-hop-to-it-easter-homer-pool/

Do you know why the Easter Bunny hides the eggs?
He doesn't want anyone to know he is dating a chicken.

Easter Eggs
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/323228/20120403/easter-eggs-holy-week-lent.htm#page11

Found it!  Bunny hop
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgLL_q5FMCU


A little more serious
The Empty Egg (I need a tissue for this one.)
http://www.fathershands.com/emptyegg/

Friday, April 6, 2012

Amazing Friday...

For those that do not want to read about my belief in Christ enjoy clicking on this link to awesome Peeps pictures.  I love what people think to do with Peeps. 

https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&hl=en&source=hp&biw=1837&bih=1182&q=peeps&gbv=2&oq=Peep&aq=0&aqi=g2g-z1g7&aql=1&gs_l=img.1.0.0l2j0i3j0l7.3299l4974l0l7988l6l6l1l0l0l0l99l474l5l5l0.cgsbsh.1.




Each year on Good Friday I spend much of my day thinking and considering my faith in Christ and how do I feel about my relationship with Him.  Last week I was given an assignment to create a picture of myself before all the abuse happened.  I tend to go overboard on such assignments.  I decided to download the song "Music Box Dancer."  Then using iMovie I put together a 3 minute video of my own pictures featuring baby animals, ducks, lizards, flowers and other things that to me portrayed the innocence that existed before.  After I completed the piece and reviewed it several times I noted that the only reference to Christ was Christmas decoration pictures.  I pondered on how my intense connection to Christ being my Savior did not come during the light, exuberant, innocent days of my life.  Christ became my connection to life during the dark fear filled nights of my abuse.  In high school, my friends that knew me for years decided to 'save' me from my unChristian religion.  I listened to what they had to say.  I attended church with them.  I heard them out as they bashed my religion.  Then they told me that because of the church I belonged to I wasn't a Christian.  I do believe this quote, "The line between the righteous and the unrighteous is always drawn by the self righteous."  I changed my friends.  KavinCoach was surprised by such a drastic decision at 16 years old.   I will agree with anyone that at age 16 I was already a mess.  I didn't know how big of a mess but I knew that something was very wrong with me.  It was in this time of deep despair that I learned that if you have but a mustard seed of faith you can build a relationship with Christ.  By that early age, I connected with Christ as my Savior.  Because I did not want to stand before Him and tell Him that my life was too hard by committing suicide in my teens; I lived to show Him I could.  Here my friends were mocking and making fun of my life line.  I asked one of them why they were doing this.  "Well, you get so serious."  I ended the conversation with, "It is the only thing I am serious about."  When you have just one precious thing in your life, going overboard to protect it is not a surprising outcome.  I was accused of following blindly.  Not so.  By that time, like every teenager in the world, I doubted everything I was told by my parents.  (I later understood that I should have doubted them more.)  A teacher from church encouraged me to study and learn for myself.  I did.  This wasn't some light undertaking for me.  When I became a young mother and struggled like every young mother does trying to raise her precious babies the 'right' way, my connection to Jesus strengthened as I stumbled and failed by my own brutally high standards.  By the time I was 32 years old, I was almost completely bed ridden.  I could barely take care of myself let alone the precious children in my home.  I was devastated.  I pleaded with God to be released from my nightmare called life.  At this time laying in a darkened room I felt in my heart that God said no.  He wanted me to live.  Christ became my constant companion as I struggled to get out of that hell hole.  Medical doctors had no answers for me so I started to study and pray for my own answers.  I learned for myself the power of the Holy Spirit teaching the truth of all things.  I learned through having cancer that there are professionals that can help when the problem is bigger than I know how to handle.  I was led to a therapist that had the expertise to recognize my problem and teach me what I needed to know.  Through all this, the poem "Footsteps in the Sand" stayed on my refrigerator.  I know by my own experience the depth of meaning when I think of the times when Christ carried me.  Artist portrayed through the centuries Christ carrying a lamb on his shoulders.  Always the lamb is a pristine white and Christ is neat and tidy.  Not my image.  Imagine Christ with his arms and legs scratched and dirty, clothes tattered and ripped with a bedraggled lamb limply hanging in his arms.  His triumphant smile as He recognizes the precious life still existing in the damaged lamb.  He tenderly washes and anoints the lamb's wounds and binds up the broken places.  He nurses the lamb back to health.  I am that lamb and Christ is my Savior.    

Thursday, April 5, 2012

To Dream...

Pearl S. Buck
There are many ways of breaking a heart. Stories were full of hearts broken by love, but what really broke a heart was taking away its dream - whatever that dream might be.

I was all psyched up to discuss some more painful things from my past.  However, needed some closure to last weeks discussion.  Thanked NewCounselor for listening.  I appreciated him giving me the opportunity to clear out the file called, "Old Garbage to be taken out."  I felt awesome knowing that there is nothing left there to haunt or make afraid.  I still feel sad...I grieve my lost childhood but that doesn't send me into a blinding tail spin.  I thought tonight I would be dissecting another unfinished part of my past.  Instead, we discussed how I was before pain entered my life,  how I felt during the time it happened, and how I felt as a survivor.  I felt frustrated a couple of times trying to explain that I didn't have a master controller personality.  I had three that worked as a tag team each with their specialized set of skills, one for school, one for friends, and one for home.  The conversation did not have quite the results he was looking for.  On the other hand, he broke down some of my impressions of how I felt during those different times.  He showed that from each of these challenges I developed different strengths.  He then talked about creating an image that combined all the different strengths.  The project sounded more and more interesting.  Then he dropped a bomb shell...


"You can dream...."

Squealing of brakes as my mind crashes into that one phrase.  Full panic in 3 words.  Grabbed the stress toys that I have and started rotating them in my hands.  Back and forth, round and round, the action of the toys matched the whirling in my mind.  For me, dreams = NIGHTMARES.  Not what NewCounselor meant at all.  He soothingly talked about what kind of person do I dream of becoming.  First off, I had never thought I would live this long in the first place.  Secondly, I can have dreams?  Really?  Me?  I am trying desperately to listen.  Keep my mind focused on what he is trying to say to me.  Instead, I feel a ripple in the underwater a crocodile entering a swamp or some mysterious creature waiting to destroy.  The image his words create in my mind is an image of open meadow with receding clouds on the horizon, morning sunlight touching the dew drops glistening on petals of marigolds and roses.  Not one bit of swamp land in sight.  His words created a new image...can that image really be mine?  

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Shame and Abuse

http://theprojectbyjudy.wordpress.com/2012/04/03/sharing-roots-to-blossoms-post/


http://roots2blossom.wordpress.com/2012/04/02/stopping-the-cycle-of-child-abuse-by-talking-about-it/


So unfair.  On top of all the trauma and hurt there is a layer of shame felt by a victim of abuse.  Questions like: why did I let it happen?  I should have said no?  Am I to blame? The perpetrators of abuse set the victim up for the fall if anyone finds out.   Judy and roots2blossom both share their combined views.  I am studying the affects of abuse and how to over come the feelings of worthlessness and shame.  Victims are 'groomed' by their perpetrators to accept what happens to them. Sometimes taking months before taking the abuse to the next level.  The victim is the one feeling shame.  The perpetrator feels none.  Either complete denial or blaming the victim are the mantras of the abuser.  I learned 7 years ago that my past was not all that I wished it could be.  I still struggle with feelings of shame.  I must consciously remind myself that it all started when I was 5 years old.  I look at my little granddaughter and remember that I was younger than her when my childhood ended.  Sometimes I regret remembering.  But the feeling of shame without any memories of why I felt that way were just so overwhelming sometimes.  I needed to remember to gain perspective of my own behavior. 

Here is a list of emotions commonly felt by adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse: (she is used in the text but sexual abuse happens to boys also.) Sorry, I don't have the name of the original author.

Confused about identity
Angry at self and others
Guilty about everything she has ever done, about everything that has been to them, or thought about.
Difficulty separating what she's done from what's been done to her
Afraid of men; doesn't trust women
Frustrated and uncertain about life and goals
Depressed, but doesn't know why
Doesn't trust her own judgement
Believes the world would be better off without her
Hurts all the time; exhausted
Can't keep up with everyone else
Feels everyone is looking at her and can see right through her 

I felt 12 out of 12.  No small wonder that KavinCoach immediately recognized me as a sexual abuse victim.  I am a walking cliche.  As I go through the healing process I am feeling more and more relief from these emotions and feelings.  Then I have a little incident and all this rips through me like I have done any work at all.  Kind of like a tornado coming back around for another pass.  Sometimes how I feel just sucks... then I have time with my kids and grandkids.  I cuddled up to one of my granddaughters and rocked us both to sleep.  Cuddled together with this precious little person restores my soul.  Winston Churchill said it right, "Never, never, never, never give up."