Grieving to Grow

I haven't been myself in almost a year. I'm a version of myself. Newer, I suppose. Someone familiar yet unfamiliar. That's what happens when something grows. Well, tries to grow as is in my case.

You see, something life changing happened to me almost a year ago. I'm not able to talk about it just yet due to legal happenings and I don't think I'm in a place anyways to fully dive back into every detail of what happened. That's one of the works in progress.

What I am able to share is that it impacted me physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally. I believe that because of my faith in a good God, the love and devotion of my husband, friends, and family, I am able to continue my daily work in processing and recovering from this trauma.

Trauma. That's a funny word. You hear it used all the time in so many different contexts. Some deal with it well, others, not as well. It can cause a cascade of responses and behaviors both positive and negative. It can get locked away in the body and held tight leading to sickness, fatigue, defeat (p.s. a great book to read on that is The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Link at the end).

Have you ever experienced trauma?

Do you know someone that has?

How have you seen it affect a life?

It can be an intensely emotional rollercoaster walking through it and/or walking someone else through it. It's full of triggers, tears, screams and shouts, doubts, fears, questions, hope, and hopelessness.

We walk through a fire that molds us and shapes us into a new being by the time we reach the other side. Like a piece of delicate glass. This is the growth. Yet, we don't always agree with the final masterpiece.

I am still neck deep in the grief process of all the things taken from me because of someone else's choice. I can't physically do the same things I used to. I go to more therapies than I can count. I have fears and nightmares I never had before. My body has changed. My plans have changed.

I mourn what I was and what I thought I was to be. I'm holding on tightly to a version of myself that no longer exists. When I fail at something or fight with the version of myself I see in the mirror, I give power to an evil that is no match to the power of the work of my God. At the root of any version of who I am, I am a child of God first and foremost.

I may grieve what was and not accept what is. In that, I take the glory away from God who is doing a new thing in me. He told me in the middle of it all as it was happening, "I am here". If he was with me at the worst, he is walking next to me as I work to grow into the best. That same truth stands true for you.

Psalm 30:11-12- 11"You have turned my mourning into

dancing;

you have loosed my sackcloth

and clothed me with gladness,

12 that my glory may sing your praise and not

be silent.

Oh Lord my God, I will give thanks to

you forever!"

He is growing us into something new from the ashes of our pain.

Link for the book mentioned above.

https://a.co/d/1udp0wR