Leaving on a jet plane
My brother and his little family are moving to Montana. It's the furthest from home any of my siblings have ever gone permanently. My parents are also moving...although only a short walk from the house they built when I was 16.Change is difficult for me. Especially if it involves my family. I was too frightened, as a child, to tell even my parents what had happened to me. All because my abuser threatened my family. Since that time I have been, understandably, very protective and almost over-attached to each member of my family - and, by extension, their families. Although I can rationally say it is fine for my brother to m...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 22, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: loneliness family change brother separation Source Type: blogs
Small portions of belonging
"You never belong until you believe you do. And it’s only when you believe you belong, that you believe you are beautiful." (Ann Voskamp, guest posting for Lisa-Jo Baker, "The Gypsy Mama")Sitting on the dugout bench at a baseball game, alone on the far edge, listening to the jokes the boys made of my hairy legs. Not having the bravery to join in my brothers' latest exploit, and that sense of dread mixed with shame like an angry sea roiling inside me. Playing with my dolls all alone, creating a fantasy land where I belonged and others belonged to me.But worst were the whispers of an abuser who told me I was "differen...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 19, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: trust finding your place belonging child abuse self-loathing 5 minute Friday loss of friendships Source Type: blogs
Blue like me
Children's laughter floating on the breeze in the evening; diamond droplets of water cascading from splashing feet; 10,000 gallons of therapy just sitting in the yard waiting for company. We spend long summer days floating and laughing. The children are brown and sleek and sleepy after a day in the water. It calms the soul, distracts the senses, sends memories scurrying like water bugs off the surface. Here I can breathe, even without gills.“They both listened silently to the water, which to them was not just water, but the voice of life, the voice of Being, the voice of perpetual Becoming.” ― Hermann Hesse (Source: Turquoise Gates)
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 18, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: distress tolerance beach summer opposite action therapy Source Type: blogs
Love is the only law left
Church camp when I was a kid was a place where everyone ran wild. "Safe" in the circlet of forest, our cabins mapped out in alphabetical groups, dirt paths between, our parents let all the kids run wild. They didn't know where we were or who we were with.The problem was, I wasn't free there. I was haunted there. One person made the grounds a maze of bad memories and new tragedies. Unlimited access in a place where no one heard a little girl saying no, no one heard a little girl crying silent and flying out of body into thin air to escape.Church camp for my kids will be different, so I say through gritted teeth and tension ...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 16, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: homosexuality Gods love church grace God's mercy the law Source Type: blogs
How to squeeze the most out of every day
I watch children because I am a mom. They do one thing at a time, whole-heartedly concentrating and finding bits of joy as they go along. Their inner monologues aren't well developed yet because they are in such a stage of discovery. They finger things carefully, inspect what makes it work, listen to the sounds it makes, feel the textures under their hands.Pausing to listen to an airplane in the sky, stooping to watch a ladybug on a plant, sitting on a rock to watch the waves crash over the quayside - children have their own agendas and timescales. As they find out more about their world and their place in it, they w...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 12, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: living in the moment being content 1000 gifts learning children mindfulness ordinary joys Source Type: blogs
An open letter to the school of hard knocks
I write because I don't know what I think until I read what I say. ~Flannery O'ConnorDear life,You have put ulcers in my belly but fire in my bones.You have torn friends away but shown me who my true friends are.You have made me doubt myself yet become myself.You have put bumps in the road that turned out to be wonderful surprises.You have beaten me up, so I'm stronger now.You have thrown me out but in the dark I discovered the stars.You have cast me down and on the ground I found rest.You have torn me apart but the scar tissue where I healed will never tear.You made me feel alone and I discovered I liked it.You threatened...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 11, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: a life well lived living like you're dying healing freedom in Christ victory choosing life Source Type: blogs
How I learned to surf
I surfed once, in California in my early 20s. I only managed to get on top of 4 waves, but I will never forget the incredible feeling of falling and flying simultaneously. Since then, I've only been on a bodyboard. A doctor, John Kabat-Zinn, uses surfing as an analogy for emotions: "You can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf them." A surfer named "Buzzy" characterized surfing in a way that relates to all of life: "Waves are not measured in feet and inches, they are measured in increments of fear."I am intimately acquainted with fear. It is the monster inside that roars at the slightest provocation, sometimes even ...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 9, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: emotions urge surfing therapy memory DBT flashbacks Source Type: blogs
On our wedding day
We take our place by the window in the evening light. Will it ever start? We've waited so long. Fidgety with excitement now, we will ourselves still as the last of the preparations are done.The chairs are set for the guests. Lined up pearlescent in rows, velvet and gold for the special occasion.Right now, it is an echoey empty hall. In a few minutes, there will be the bustle of the ushers seating family and the thrill of the bride walking down the aisle. We wait for her, anticipation thrilling our very bones.The tables upstairs are set for a feast. Place cards lined up in rows for every guest, from smallest to oldest. You ...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 5, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: weddings preparation celebration Christs bride beauty for ashes Source Type: blogs
I stopped wanting what I can't have
I step onto the sandy beach and there in front of me is a woman who used to be a best friend. It's strange to type those words "used to be a best friend". How does that happen? How do the most vibrant relationships in your life wilt in one night? Those who participated in our shunning in 2010-11 are spectres in my memory, danger signs, bright red flags painting our city. I've avoided all the old favorite haunts since 2010 because I didn't want to meet you anywhere. And now here we are, on the same beach for an afternoon. Acting like strangers. There is a gulf between us. An unbridgable gulf. A man-made expanse of uncharted...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 2, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: a life well lived worthiness church discipline broken relationships church pain faithfulness true love old friends Source Type: blogs
Progressing to exposure
I watch a ladybug lazily climbing towards the flowers. I don't know if this is her top pace or if the sun has made her drowsy. She inches along, bit by bit. This is me, I think. Inching along. Barely making progress. Feeling the "two steps forward, one step back" process is going too slowly.Reprocessing is the next step in my therapy journey. This technique holds onto the hope that, if you talk about it enough, a memory loses it's power over your present and future. Before I began this part of therapy, I was very nervous about it. I held it at arms length, even thinking about refusing to participate at all. I also noted th...
Source: Turquoise Gates - July 1, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: counseling progress therapy DBT EMDR Source Type: blogs
Weeee are the champions!
Katy's softball team completed their Cinderella season on Thursday by going all the way to the championship! The girls played hard in the semifinals and maintained a big lead. The other semifinal game went 9 innings in a tie, so the championship didn't start until 9:30 p.m.! There were some very tired girls trying to compete after dark! Luckily, the game only went 5 innings. The girls were behind the entire game, but rallied in their last at-bat to score 2 runs. They held the other team in the bottom of the inning and became very excited and very surprised champions! Here are some pictures from their last two games. I was ...
Source: Turquoise Gates - June 29, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: Katy sports celebration children Source Type: blogs
Oh little girl
{Warning: This post may contain triggers; please read only if you're ready.}Bare feet on beams. We go to cool off down by the stream. It is 2013, and the memory washes so far over me that I catch my breath, forgetting children laughing under the bridge. I'm no longer here, I'm gone again - into the trap of the secret sin. I am remembering the halcyon days before you ruined my favorite clearing in the woods. I remember the cool of the shade, the feel of the moss under foot, the whispering wind quaking through the aspens, the shafts of sun lighting the world yellow and green. I was at peace there, it's where I went to think....
Source: Turquoise Gates - June 27, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: childhood sorrow child abuse sexual abuse fear PTSD flashbacks shame beaten Source Type: blogs
Bouncing back
In the darkness of the soul, only the shadows of shame, grief, hopelessness are visible. Profiles of black against an unattainable light. The future appears as shrouded as the moment you are in now.Time and again, I've sighed, resigned myself, and stepped back into the light. The living light. Grace is holding me by the hand, and mercy the tug of life's current around my ankles. You are never alone, He whispers. Each day is sprinkled more and more heavily with happiness. Laughter with my therapist. Sharing a joke with my kids. Yelling and screaming at my daughter's softball game, totally abandoned to the moment. A card ful...
Source: Turquoise Gates - June 26, 2013 Category: Cancer Tags: moving mountains depression recovery hope DBT God's tenderness faith hopelessness Source Type: blogs
