I am so afraid of disappointing the people I love I often forget that I am someone I love too. And I need kindness just as much as I believe the people I love do. ~Nikita Gil
There was a time in my life that I thought I could not hear the birds sing again and wondered even why they were singing. I had to depend on others to hear and to feel for me and I trusted that even though it looked and felt heavy and dark it would not last forever.
This may not be a typical blog from me but given the current state that so many are in right now, I think it is wise and also healthy to acknowledge that many of your loved ones, brothers and sisters and friends are in a state of trauma. They may not wear it on the outside but it can be silently crippling them on the inside. This is different from sadness, it is terrifying for them when they are in it. And I am afraid the waving of the faith wand and reciting scripture will not cure what ails them. It will help and it is a salve but some of our family and friends need an extra dose of grace right now and sometimes therapy and medical intervention.
As I said earlier, when I got divorced from my starter husband so many moons ago it was one of the darkest and saddest times of my life. I got by with a little help from my friends, I had dug my well before I got thirsty and had long been a person who was able to rise up, but I did not rise up quickly nor did I do it alone.
I want to share another story that shaped my life and I thought about it on my last quarantine birthday. So here goes and I hope at the end of this revealing tale you hear my heart of beseeching us all to have an extra measure of understanding and empathy for each and every one of us.
When I was a little girl, my mom and Grandmother who I called mom made a huge production of my birthday with a frilly dress from the Criterion, orchestrated a huge party with a multilayered homemade cake and with all kinds of gifts, friends, neighbors. It was quite the affair and I was a more than delighted and enthusiastic child.
But brewing in my family each year as I got older was the disease of alcoholism and birthday parties became a time of dread and embarrassment. Each year even though I knew and I begged my Father to please not drink on this day, “ please Daddy, just this one day, don’t get drunk.” I somehow thought each year it would be different. It was not. He was falling down, humiliating drunk.
Each year my sweet dependable and kind mother would say,” Perhaps we shouldn’t try again, honey.” But my hopeful optimism has already been forming and one more time each year I thought it would be different and it never was. So thus was born the trauma and the dread around this day until I learned a new way of being and much healing through 12 step programs, prayer and the belief that God had big plans for me!!! I learned to change the patterns of my life and to learn to let Go and let God. I learned that the behaviours of others did not have to be the measure for my peace or my happiness.
None of these revelations were formed without pain, and seeking and searching. Hugh, my wonderful husband, was one of the most amazing parts of my healing and growing into a purpose driven life not built on the sanity or sobriety of others but the very strength and the hope in myself.
Why in the world do I share this seemingly disjointed story with you today? My sweet precious friends who know me as the invincible Molly Brown, I am that but I also did not get here overnight and without spot or wrinkle.
I believe that right now we have so many of our fellow family members who are struggling with addiction, depression, loneliness, fear, anxiety. You name it. Yes, there is so much hope and I know that dark days pass and some of the most beautiful parts of my life were on the other side of darkness. But now, especially now I pray that if any of you who are hurting and you are scared or you don’t know where to turn, please know that there is no shame in asking for help. In asking for help you not only help yourself but you help your family and others know that it is okay to hurt. Just don’t hurt alone.
I know that I spend much of my time raising a hallelujah and I still do that but I would be remiss if I did not take a moment to acknowledge that there are precious children of God that are hurting and they are in need of whatever grace, whatever hope we can offer them. I have learned not to waste my darkness because it just may lead someone out of theirs and into the light.
Oh, how I love you. Oh, how God loves you. So many love you. We are marching through this time together. Grateful to share all of me with all of you!!
Karen
Well…..that hit home for me! Instead, I was like your mother dealing with a alcoholic husband. 30 yrs of a roller coaster marriage, had its toll on me. Depression not only hit me but a couple of my children as well! Like your father, my husband Tim died at a early age of 50. My children were embarrassed many times by their father, he wasn’t always the nicest drunk. The strangest thing happened after he passed, I felt a weight was lifted off my shoulders but….. Unfortunately 2 of my 5 children inherited his addicted behavior, alcohol was Rachelle’s problem and Meth/drugs got the best of my only son Stefan. Alcohol lead to Rachelle’s demise with a bad choice she made that night, that sent her to Heaven in the early morning. Her death broke me, sent me spiraling into another depression, sometimes blaming myself for staying in a very dysfunctional marriage, you know all the what if’s. Now, Stefan is clean but not without being punished for taking his sister Rachelle’s truck for a 3 day joy ride, tough love landed him with a 5 yr prison sentence and now considered a felon, his sentence was ridiculous, Rachelle didn’t press charges, but the state took over and made a example out of him. He deserved to be punished and he is regretful for his crime. He didn’t even get to say good bye to his sister Rachelle because he was in prison, that hit him hard. When I went to see him, I just held him close, he was in disbelief. I thank God for putting Pete in my life after Tim died, he definitely has stood behind me and held me up through it all. Life has definitely changed for me but I’m still pushing forward. Stefan will be home by Thanksgiving this year and I’m thrilled. The thing that also means a lot to me is Jocelyn and Jett, they are what I have left of Rachelle and all the time I get with them is most precious to me. Karen, there are so many people like us, they just need to see what we see, God is with us all the time, the good and the bad.
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