My word picture of redemption

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Bugs Bunny was one of my favorite cartoons when I was a little girl. And one cartoon in particular always fascinated me. It is the episode with Ralph E Wolf and Sam Sheepdog. The long and short of this cartoon is this: Wolf's job is to capture the sheep, Sam's job is to protect them. Over the course of 8-10 minutes these two creatively battle back and forth. But the part that always sticks with me is close to the end, where in a cave, each of them begin revealing that they are indeed in disguise. Back and forth they go, unzipping their cloaks from the tops of their heads to their toes, stepping out as the other character.

Beyond just being funny to the typical 8 year old, I have always found this scene to be both disturbing and inspiring; a comical albeit fantastical example of a wolf in sheep(dog)'s clothing. On one hand, the viewer is simply confused, not sure which is who and what is which. Eventually that decloaking becomes ridiculous as new characters appear, adding to the surprise felt by the viewer. And while the average 8 year old giggles at the thought of a wolf and dog trading costumes, I understood the deeper implication. I knew how it felt to be deceived by the sheepdog.

On the other hand, I was inspired by the same picture painted in a different arena. My parents didn't go to church when I was young. But when we moved to the country, a church became my next door neighbor. I was curious, I heard kids at school talk about church, I asked a lot of questions. Shortly after starting first grade my parents agreed to take me. That church became a refuge for me.

I have several favorite hymns. But there is one that takes me back to my 8 year-old self every time I hear it; Sweet Hour of Prayer. There are many lines that spoke to me: and oft escaped the tempter's snare, thy wings shall my petition bear, may I thy consolation share...But there is one line in the last verse, close to the end, sort of the climax of the entire poem, that says:

This robe of flesh I'll drop, and rise to seize the everlasting prize.        

Every time we sang that hymn, I'd picture it. Me, standing on Mt. Pisgah, which looked amazingly like the meadow in the cartoon, only to unzip my skin, leave it on the ground, and float in spirit upward to Heaven. And with that skin? I would leave far more than my own body. I would leave the pain of being abused. I would leave my parents' fighting. I would leave feelings of disappointment and failure. 

I am a long way from that 8 year old girl in the front pew of the Christian Church. I have made a lot of mistakes. I have hurt a lot of people, myself included. This leads me to Colossians 2:13-14.

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.

I can picture it. Jesus, on the cross, with my sins. At his feet are the bottles of booze and pills I emptied over the years. The lies I told. The money I stole. The friends I hurt.  The stench of my promiscuity wreaking from his body. He holds in each hand a soul I so selfishly took from this earth. All of it, all of the things I do not want to face about myself he willingly takes on Himself. He relieves me of these...these...sins; these acts I chose in an attempt to numb the pain. Acts that in the end only served to increase my self-loathing and increase the distance between me and God.

And then it hits me. This robe of flesh is not what I am to God. When I drop my robe of flesh, I become something beautiful, something indescribable. I become what God sees in me.

I told you I'm no theologian. I don't have it all figured out. But I heard once that even a beggar can tell another beggar where to get food. And I'm not going to tell you that giving Jesus your sin will mean that all your struggles go away. Far from it. But I will tell you this; if you will look at that cross and see yourself the way he sees you, with love and compassion, so willing to take your baggage from you, it will change you. You are more than the baggage you carry, than the robe of flesh you wear. Unzip yourself and step out of your flesh so you can see it too.

Merry Christmas, I have a present for you

As I've read the biblical account of the first Christmas over and over, I've often wondered; what the heck was Mary thinking when she was given the gifts by the Magi? Gold, frankincense, and myrrh. It's like showing up at a baby shower with a load of cash, a smelly candle, and LSD. As strange as those gifts were they had a purpose.

Strange gifts. They are inevitable. Every one of us has been the receiver of an "uh, what is this for?" gift. I don't have any ugly sweaters, a chia pet, or a clapper for you. And you may not be able to use these gifts today, but I pray that, in time, you will find their usefulness and value.

Gift one: I give you a baby's smile.

Why a baby's smile? Because it is unconditional. A baby smiles at you out of purity. She has no ulterior motives. His grin is not attempting to woo you into something that will hurt you. A baby's eyes are gentle, and kind, and sweet. When a baby sees you, and smiles at you, it is out of the purest of joy in her heart. It is because you, in all your brokenness, bring her happiness.

Gift two: I give you a closet.    

When I was a child, before I disclosed about being raped, I ran away from home. It was a well-planned escape, as well planned as any nine year old can be. After my parents went to sleep, I would sneak out the back door and walk the mile and half to my BFF's house. She would make sure the door was unlocked and I could come in the back.

I had ridden my bike but never walked to her house before. It took longer than I expected. It was dark. The sound of the crickets and frogs in the night was frightening to me. But I was also excited to start my new life. Twice as a car came down the country road I hid in the ravine, like a criminal on the run. By the time I got to her house my heart was pounding out of my chest.

When I arrived the door was indeed unlocked, but her parents were still awake, watching TV in the front room. Somehow, this clutz managed to tiptoe across the kitchen, up the stairs, and into my BFF's room. She had the closet ready for me; a blanket, a pillow, white bread, and chocolate chips. It was amazing. It was exciting. 

I lasted about 20 minutes in the closet before I got scared. I started crying, and soon my BFF and her little brother were crying too. We told her parents, who were not mad, and soon my dad was on his way to get me.

Thirty years later, after receiving some particularly frustrating news on the litigation of the rapist, I shared an update on Facebook, and it was quite obvious I was raw with emotion. The next morning, my BFF's mother posted this on my wall:

Trish, when it's all over, I have a closet for you.

Those words, simple but cryptic to the average listener, are still such a comfort to me. She knows. She understands. She isn't trying to fix it, or me. She is willing to be what I never had; a safe place to hide. We all need that. So accept my gift when you need it; a closet to hide in.

                                        

Gift three: I give you words.

When I was first abused, I lacked the words to be able to tell anyone what had happened. And as I grew my vocabulary became perverted as words of love and friendship became intertwined with words of pain and hurt. I want to give you a few words, some of my favorites. I offer them to you as a starting point, and ask you to continue building your own list as you heal.

Belief- I believe you. I believe what you tell me. I believe that you are in pain. I believe you deserve justice.

Empathy- I hurt with you. No, I don't know what you are going through. We share some common pains, but your pain is unique to you. I will sit quietly and listen to you. I'm sorry you are hurting. You did nothing to deserve the pain you feel.

Grieving- All of us had a dream, a wish, we hoped to come true. You and I, well, our dreams got taken from us. I give you permission to grieve that dream. As with any loss, you need the time and space to grieve your loss. It's ok to express your emotions. If you don't know how, we can explore together.

Hope- While it is incredibly hard to see right now, you have a future. All of the events that led you to this point, that beat you down and made you feel defeated, they belong to your past. Your future is yours. All of the pain you feel, the anger you hold, it can be made into something new, something beautiful, in your future. That is hope.

Going back to the manger and Mary's  reaction to the gifts of the Magi, well, we just really don't know. The bible doesn't tell us why Jesus was given gold and spices, but in the end we know he needed them. It is assumed by many scholars that the gold helped him escape, and the spices were prophetic in nature, to symbolize his death. If you look closely at the life of Jesus, you will find that these words I give you are important to Him too.

This Christmas, may you find what you need to continue healing. I wish I could say you just wake up one day and it's all better, but truthfully that's not how it happens. But if you need a smile, or a closet, or the right word; look me up. I'd like to try to help.

Trish

       

     

                                                                                                    

              

Response to Robin William's death

I copied this from my facebook post dated  August 13, 2014

Unless you have attempted suicide and survived, as I have twice, don't tell me you understand. Suicide is not a permanent solution to a temporary problem, it is a permanent solution to a permanent problem. I do not remember NOT fighting these demons. I will never know if the root cause is rape trauma or simply on my DNA (as I have a long family history of addiction and depression). It was an astute 17 year old who saved my life in 1987. I wish I could say the ideations go away, but they don't. I've just learned to fight harder.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/katie-hurley/theres-nothing-selfish-about-suicide_b_5672519.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000063

(December 23, 2014)
It's true that I do not remember fighting these demons. I was talking to my dad about the Heath High School shooting, and admitted to him (I was then an adult) that I had had the same thoughts. I had thought, fantasized, about taking out all my anger first on those who hurt me, and then on myself. It was a final revenge. My dad got angry at me, yelling at me "no you didn't! You couldn't have," as if by having the thought alone I had wronged him.

It's also true that the ideations haven't really gone away. It hasn't been that many years ago, when I felt like my marriage was over, I saw my life as hopeless and considered driving my car into a tree as I sped down the interstate. I have battled the urge to take one or two more pills, one or two more drinks, just to end it.

I have learned to fight harder than the demons who tell me to harm myself. More, much more, on this topic later.

I worked as a critical care nurse for years. We all knew what patients would be admitted on Christmas eve, the suicide attempts. I urge you to reach out. I urge you to talk, to me, to anyone.

The ugly details that haunted me most

If you have never been a victim of sexual assault, you are likely to believe that there are degrees to rape; that one type of rape is worse than another. This is a fallacy. I have been raped on two different occasions  by two different men. While one rape could perhaps be classified as violent, forcible rape, and the second date-rape, the trauma I endured was the same. I am going to share with you a bit about both rapes. While the circumstances surrounding the rapes are not at all similar,  the details that haunt me are almost identical.

I was six years old. We moved from a subdivision in the city to a farm in the country. I had not yet started school. Unlike my subdivisionin the city, there were no kids around me on the farm. It was summer, and it was a lonely time.

My neighbors had a teenage boy, the same age as my sister, also between his sophomore and junior year. He was short for a teen boy, probably around 5ft, but like my sister who beat me up on a regular basis,  he was a lot bigger than me. He would come over to my house when his mom visited my mom. He played in the backyard with me. He made sound effects for my toys. He made me laugh with his silliness. He had new ideas for new games....like house, where he took me to the barn loft and raped me on a camping trailer mattress.

There are details from the rape that I remember that may seem odd to you, but it is a common phenomenon. My brain was rushing endorphins through my body like mad, and I became astutely aware of all of my senses at once. I can remember the differing textures of the mattress and torn fabric on my back. I can remember the smell of rotting timber, the moldy styrofoam, the dusty fabric on the mattress. I remember the taste of his mouth, the feel of his hot breath on my neck. I remember how when he made me touch his genitals I was confused by the contrast of coarse hair and soft skin. I remember the shadows cast by the sun through the holes in  the barn walls and across the things stored in the loft. I remember his weight against my body, the feeling of being powerless as he held my head, and being unable to escape. I remember the pain between my legs, a fire burning, like being stung by hundreds of bees at once.

But what do I remember the most? His eyes. His green eyes were piercing. They glowed, they hungered, they preyed.

And I was crying.

Fast forward eight years and I go through these same sensations, only this time I knew what was happening.

I was 14 and a freshman in high school. I had a huge crush on a basketball player, and made no secret of that crush. I will cut to the chase here, but trust me, the events leading up to this rape are going to be addressed in a blog post all it's own.

He was 6'7". He was a smooth talker. He told me he was going to take me places. He slow danced with me in the living room. But when he took me to the floor I was in an all too familiar place.

I remember the feel of the carpet on my bare back. I can smell his cologne, the taste of Coca-Cola still in his mouth. I can feel his huge, strong hands on my skin. I remember turning my head and watching the dust particles dance through the single stripe of light shining through the drapes in the front window. I remember the weight of his body on mine and struggling to breathe. I remember not being strong enough to push him off or pull myself away. I remember the pain, the burning, tearing, ripping pain, between my legs.

I remember his eyes. And I was crying.

When I told people I had been raped, I left out those details. I frankly didn't expect anyone to understand how sitting on a foam mattress, or watching dust particles, or the taste of a soft drink could take me back to some of the darkest times in my life. This is the type of baggage a rape victim carries around. It is irrational, but it is very real.

This is what my husband, John, walked into when he married me. He had to deal with this baggage (and more). The ugly truth is that he said and did things at times that caused me to feel like a 6 year old all over again. He had no idea how the small details of the rapes had imprinted my brain and altered my senses. The good news is that we talked about it early on, and he loved me through it. I did not know that telling him these things  made him angry until I started prosecuting the first rape 20 years later. Only then did my husband admit that Mr. X affected his life. My husband admitted to me that he feels he has had to fix what Mr.X broke.

I am thankful for a loving husband who chose to fight with me. But it took being honest and open about the details. It took my willingness to be vulnerable and his willingness to be broken to allow healing to take place.

All of the pain you feel, all of the details that haunt you, they can be redeemed. But it is going to require that you stop hiding them and telling yourself they don't matter. You have to bring them up, and out. By giving them away, you will be given a gift of much higher value. Redemption.