This process I’m trying to go through is called NLP, which stands for neuro-linguistic programming.
As a survivor of SRA, what they did to me left my brain in tangled knots. So it’s definitely going to be a process to untangle them.
I’ve gone through a few sessions. I know it has helped with at least one thing and that’s the trauma I went through most recently. It helped me get past a wall I kept hitting. But ask for the rest…
Everything feels kind of crazy right now regarding this process. It seems like it’s opening up things from the subconscious and letting them start popping up.
The latest issue I’ve been working on is still there. I think it’s because it’s really a whole combination of triggers resulting in one issue. It’s to the point where the woman I’m working with is going to consult the two guys I worked with to see what might be the best way to proceed since I’m really struggling. It’s like that saying of how things often get worse before it gets better.
So I have no idea how this is going to turn out. Maybe SRA is a bit too much for their protocols? Or, what I think to be true, is that it takes a whole lot more time and sessions than usual.
So the question is whether they will continue to keep trying. They seem to be determined to help really want to see me healed. As long as they’re willing to keep trying, I’m willing to keep trying. At this point, I really have nothing to lose.
I think my being partially amnesic is not helping. I can try to use the methods of my trauma therapist, but to be honest, I think the amnesia is going to be an issue with her also. Plus, I’m just not as confident in the different things that she knows to try. Which is kind of interesting because I’m usually pretty game to try most anything as long as I trust the person. And I haven’t even tried these things to even know. Prior to this I wasn’t really ready anyway. Anyway you look at it, I need to give this a full try first.
I’ve been going through these protocols to remove triggers. To separate intense and/or negative emotions from memories of events. Basically, it’s so I won’t keep getting tripped up in areas I should not be getting tripped up had I had a healthy childhood and life.
In some ways, it is helping. But it is also loosening up stuff that’s been buried in my subconscious. Perhaps, it gets worse before it gets better when it comes to SRA?
I know these protocols work for PTS/PTSD. But I am working on things I don’t even fully remember. I’m also working on things that are the result of multiple types of abuse multiplied out over many years. Will it really be able to help with that?
Today I embarked on a journey into a healing method for PTSD. You don’t have to talk about the trauma. In fact, apparently, it is better if you do not. I got the info today and had a first session. Tomorrow morning, I am supposed to think about the specific incident and see if any emotions come up for me.
He knows I am a SRA survivor and he also knows how that ties into what we see happening in the world as a whole. While some people can do it all in one session, he understands there is a lot to unpack and it will take several sessions.
The reason so few sessions is because they use a bookend kind of method where you start with a positive safe memory prior and also a safe place after and it deals with everything in between. It’s difficult to explain adequately in writing.
So, we started with a session and I think it worked. Tomorrow morning I will check. Because of the nature of my trauma, he is bringing his partner in so it will be the three of us because they each have strengths although both are thoroughly expert.
A big challenge for me is to get past my conscious analytical mind. But this method does just that.
It is free for vets and first responders and for their families. I am married to a vet and the daughter of a vet, so it is free for me, for which I am very grateful.
Decades ago, during my first marriage, I used to shut down every day after my husband would leave for work and my son for school. I slid down against the cabinets in the kitchen where they met. My back would be leaning into the corner and I would just shut down.
I used to try and push through and be productive, but I found I was pretty useless. I would feel emotionally and mentally drained and as if I was physically slowed down. I could not think or really do anything well until I gave up and shut down. Once I shut down and came out of it, I would be fine and able to be productive and full of energy.
What does a shutdown look and feel like? The first thing I experience is the need to shut my eyes. I can hear just fine, but I am blocking my vision. In my mind, I am pulling inside of myself, yet I am not really going anywhere. I am very present and aware of my surroundings. I am not in Haven. It is as if I am just “being”, but taking a break from the world. Iam not thinking about anything. Trying to pull out of it before I was ready was difficult and pointless, but if the phone rang, I could handle it.
I was always alone during these shutdowns and never allowed them to happen in front of anyone else. Until…I did it one time in front of a therapist. It just happened.She just waited it out and then asked me where I went. I told her I did not know because I remained aware of my surroudings the whole time. That was decades ago.
In the last few months, I have felt an increased need to shut down, but did not do it. Until…this week. I was in my therapist’s office and we were starting to explore what might be behind my over eating and I just shut down.
My therapist did not know what was going on and tried to talk to me. I ignored her. I hated to do that because I did not want her to be concerned, but it can be hard to pull out enough to speak. When she called my name sharply, I just shook my head briefly to let her know I heard her and to reassure her I was OK. She got the message and just waited.
I felt pressure to push myself out of it, especially since it was not how I wanted to spend my appointment time. I did push out earlier than I really wanted and it was challenging. I tried to explain what happened.
I started to feel some anger, but could not place the source or reason, although I am sure it is connected to the trauma being reflected in my eating. I certainly have reason enough to be angry.
So that is what a shutdown looks like…or at least, the best I can explain it.
Who are you and who am I?
You worked so hard to blur the lines
to splinter me into a thousand pieces
and, yet, become one with you.
You! Who are you?
Who the heck are you?
Do you even know
as you do your master's bidding?
I feel the pain inside me
wanting to come out,
but that is not all I see.
I also see the pain inside you,
the pain you try to hide
behind, "I don't remember doing that".
You triggered my programming
every chance you got.
You pushed me hard to make me break
in order to keep you safe.
You never could get that I did/do love you
in spite of all you have done.
I know you are broken.
Do you?
Are you as painfully aware of your brokenness
as I am of mine?
Or am I the first generation?
I have prayed for you to find freedom
as I have done,
for your bonds to be released
as mine have,
for your heart and spirit to heal
as have mine.
I am not there, yet,
and won't be until the end.
But I am not what I was.
I am no longer a puppet
to be used for their purposes,
for your purposes.
You cannot pull my strings anymore
for they have been cut,
severed,
burned,
gone!
I no longer respond to the cues,
to the unspoken (and spoken)
requests hiding behind your (and their) words and actions.
No more acts.
And though I'm still not fully healed
from the blood that was shed
or the acts committed
I will continue to grow.
I am strong in the Creator,
not the one you tried
to make Him out to be,
the real One.
All glory to the One True God!
I recently started reading again about PTSD and what I call “trauma brain”. The stress of some things in our living situation started to overwhelm me and I really needed to find more support and more information. So, I started searching again and found more information. Actually, there seems to be quite a bit more, but here are some things I am finding.
Apparently, they are now coming up with official labels for “trauma brain”…the brain that has developed in a biologically different way as a result of persistent abuse/trauma in early childhood. I am still learning about the labels and how they are separate and how they overlap with PTSD.
They now have something called Complex PTSD…or C-PTSD. I believe this is a new label because I don’t remember seeing it before. I also saw DTD…Developmental Trauma Disorder. There are several articles that I have not read, yet, but I am going to share them here because a quick perusal indicates that they have some very useful information.
A few years ago I read about the push to put DID under the PTSD category in the DSM. There was quite a debate about it. Clearly the two are connected, but not everyone agreed on putting one under the other. I wonder whatever happened with that. Perhaps, some of these articles hold the answer.
So, here they are, in no particular order…more articles on PTSD in its various forms. I chose the ones that went the most in depth (which is why I have not read all of them yet myself).
Gosh, November! Has it really been that long since I have blogged? I guess it has, obviously! There are so many things I could share, but it is challenging to know where to start. So, here, in no particular order, are some odds and ends of my life for the last three months.
I now have a working bathtub!!! I cannot say enough how therapeutic it is to be able to take a long soak. Cheap therapy. Even if I cannot do it in the moment…just knowing I can is HUGE! That happened very recently, about two weeks or so ago? In fact, it happened after we put the house up for sale.
Which leads to item number two (but who’s counting, anyway). One of our sons has offered to move us in with him and our wonderful daughter-in-love. This is because his dad is in a lot of pain and had to quit working. So, our unfinished house that we have been living in is for sale.
Next tidbit…I have sporadic contact with my father via email. He still does not know where we live (other than generally) and does not have my phone number. It is all good..meaning that I am taking care of myself.
I had a cult GF (who also does not know where I am) contact me via email. She has to sell her house (which I thought I saw sold a couple of years ago on the Internet) and wanted to know my address so she could ship me some boxes of books I “left” in her garage years ago. Neither Dave or I recall leaving books. I wrote to ask her what books they were and have not heard from her since. So, yes, I think the feelers still go out. Did I mention that she has met my parents and probably has their number and that her family cult is the same one as mine? Oh yeah, and I had to distance myself from her previously because she was setting off my programming…which is so NOT happening now!
It has been a challenge watching my husband hurt more and more. I believe this move is a good thing, even though it may be moving into the “lion’s den” in some aspects. But G-d goes with us and I believe this move is a “G-d” thing.
I will have to come back soon to this blog because it is time to walk out the door and there is so much more I could say. I want to share some things I am learning about PTSD and “trauma brain”.
is not easy. Nor is walking out my healing. There are many who would not understand my story. They would think it too fantastic…to unbelievable. They would not want to believe that such things even happen. Funny thing is…some of those same people will read the Old Testament in the bible and not question for a moment the child sacrifices and pagan practices mentioned there. (For those who are upset that I use the word “pagan”, get over it. That word is used in the bible, so if you don’t like it, take it up with G-d. I mean no offense.)
In addition to not being able to fully share my story, there is the fact that I still have to deal with what I dub “trauma” brain and PTSD. I kept thinking I was getting better and then things would happen that would seem to throw me backward. Now, the reality is that I AM better on so many levels. But my other reality, as I have been discovering over the past 6 – 8 years, is that abuse in childhood results in the brain developing differently than the brain of a child who is not abused. I have a whole page dedicated to articles on that topic. Abuse, Trauma & the Body/Brain Most of the articles are technical and deal with medical studies. There does not seem to be much in the way of practical information on how to heal from this or live with this. So, I do the best I can.
There are some things I have noticed. One thing is that the PTSD leaves me very vulnerable to “over”reacting to stress. In other words, I cannot handle the same stresses that a non-PTSD person can handle. What might be merely an annoyance or discomfort for someone else can result in my insides shaking like crazy. The intensity can be huge. I also have flashbacks that are sometimes so strong that I want to rock back and forth to deal with all that energy.
It can be very challenging for me to be out and about as I never know what will hit or when. I can be at the store or on the road when, all of a sudden, I just want to be home…NOW. It diminishes over time, that is, until I get hit with some other life event that knocks me for a loop. Then I feel as if I am thrown back to square one. For a long time, I thought I should be able to fix this…I just need enough therapy or counseling. But that won’t fix a biological problem. Even the PTSD has a biological tie-in and is connected to the trauma brain…seeing as how the same things caused both.
Between trauma brain (which affects how memories are stored and retrieved) and PTSD (which leaves me more vulnerable to life’s stresses ), day-to-day living can be very interesting…to say the least. Oh, and did I mention that I am also rather amnesic? Yep, I am missing all but a handful of memories of ten years of my younger sister living with our family and a whole host of other things in my growing up years and some of my adult life. Some of it may be missing due to improper storage or non-storage because of trauma brain. Some of it is repressed. Some of it may be hidden behind the cloud of dissociation.
At least I now know that there is precious little I can do about a lot of this other than to pray and just keep pushing forward, one day at a time. I used to think there was something I was neglecting.
Ever since my son was arrested, I have been struggling a lot more than usual…a lot. I am forgetting things…or as one doctor once told me…I am probably not forgetting them, I am simply not recording them. I find myself oftentimes leaving things unfinished as I get so easily distracted. I cannot focus as well. Food gets burned. I leave things out in recipes (not often, thankfully, as I have really been working on checking my recipes multiple times while cooking).
Even before his arrest, I was noticing flashbacks, but my ability to handle them is diminished. Too much added stress, I think. I see things and can feel the stress inside starting to skyrocket, so instead of going through that door or down that tunnel to see what is there…what memory is trying to surface…I find myself pushing it away.
Anyway, that is life for me right now. Or at least some of it. I feel overwhelmed. I cannot call people I want to call. I am just making it through each day and trying not to feel guilty for not being “better” than I am. Yeah, I know this is not my fault and largely out of my control, but the rest of the world does not understand and that is what makes it hard. I so want to look “normal” to others because I don’t want to have to tell my story to them. But the reality is that, sooner or later, I need to tell at least a part of it. Maybe…just maybe…they will understand.
To all my friends that I am not calling. I am sorry. It is just beyond me right now and has been for quite a while. I was hoping things would calm down by now…but they are not. In fact, the family situation just keeps getting worse and I am fighting against the effects of it.
I don’t have the energy to proofread this. I hope it turned out OK.
My earliest conscious memories regarding my name was of never being allowed to go by a nickname…even to the extent that I was threatened to be in trouble if my mother ever heard someone call me anything other than my full first name. Others did not understand this, nor did I. But it was my reality and the reason for it was more serious than I knew.
I remember coming home in the first grade from school and one of the neighbor girls was teasing me by calling me a shorter name. She wouldn’t stop even when I asked her to. I remember being worried (read that as “scared”) that my mother would hear her. My only consolation was that this girl lived a couple of houses or so before mine and ours was up in the back…behind the main house. Thankfully, my mother did not hear.
As an adult, when I asked my mother about that strict rule, she said something along the lines of wanting to hear my name because she had worked so hard on picking out a nice one. She chose that name and wanted me to be called that name…period. She came across as if she had not been that strict in laying down the rules, but I remember. There is a lot this partial amnesic does not remember, but I remember that. It was programmed into me to NEVER use a nickname. It was not until many years later that I began to understand the truth behind that demand.
I remember struggling as an adult…married with children even…to try to be me. It is like I woke up one day and realized that I did not really know who I was. I did not know what I liked or didn’t like. It was a perm gone awry that turned me onto that. I looked totally different. I got teased a bit for the drastic change, but that is when I looked at myself in the mirror and realized that I really did not know whether I liked it or not. It wasn’t what I wanted. It was drastically different. But did I actually not like it?
I tried to look at the woman in the mirror as if she was NOT me. Would I like that hair style on THAT woman? I decided I did, but I felt a bit of disconnect between that woman and me. That woman was not what those around me expected to see, which got me thinking. I decided that I wanted to become the woman God created me to be rather than the woman I was pressed into being. All my life I was always being what everyone else wanted, but what did “I” want? What did “I” like? And even more importantly, what did God create me to be? So, I set out on a journey of exploration. I wanted to find out who “I” really was/am. And what a journey it was!
Right there in the very beginning I was hit with a strong realization. I use the word “strong” because it was something that I knew for sure, although I could not have explained why or how I knew it. I just knew very strongly that I would never be able to be the me God created me to be if I went by my birth name. So, I decided I wanted to be called a nickname, which was really just a shortened version of my first name…half of it to be exact.
I knew my parents would not like it, so I started with my husband and those closest to me. I remember that some questioned what I was doing. New hair style, which I openly admitted was not my intention, but reassured them (especially since the hairdresser was a friend) that I did like it. New name. What was up? I just kept to myself what my realizations were and what my goal was.
Once I saw that those around me were willing to really try to remember to call me by my nickname, I asked my parents to do the same. Naturally, they did not like it. Thankfully, I did not see my parents nearly as often as I saw my husband and everyone else. And then I noticed it.
I had started to change internally, even if not all that much externally. I started to feel more freedom to gingerly explore, and my sense of who I was altered. I grew stronger, more confident and had a greater sense of my worth. And then my parents would come over and call me by my full name. Bam! It was like a switch was flipped and I found myself struggling to keep the ground I had gained. This happened over and over until I learned to turn it off.
Although I did not know anything about programming or my cult family heritage at that time, I did understand that there was a definite connection to my full name and being controlled and molded. It was one of the key events of my life as I moved toward freedom. I never went back to my full birth name and now have a completely different name.
So, what’s in a name? I think a lot! My birth names were given by my parents. They had really nice meanings and had programming attached to them. My current names have wonderful meanings and freedom attached to them. They were gifts from my Creator…my heavenly Abba/Father. I am no longer bound to programming or to the former names. When someone from way back calls me by that name, I don’t like it, but the effect is no longer there. It is more of just an annoyance.
I am amazed at how much more information there is out there on how abuse affects the brain than there was only about 10 years ago. Back then you could hardly find anything…or at least anything for the lay person. Now, I see all kinds of articles and studies. There is more understanding of how the brain works and how memory is affected…lots of good information. I hope it helps someone.
I have updated my Abuse, Trauma & the Body/Brain page once again. It looks like this will be an ongoing thing as more and more research is done. I hope that I will also see start seeing a lot of articles on successful healing and how the lives of survivors are made better.
Life goes on…even after curve balls get thrown at us. I am looking at a loved one in jail and the loss of relationship with other loved ones because of it.
None of this is my choice. It is not my fault one is in jail. It wasn’t my influence that put him there. I have always been against everything he got into and did. It is not my fault that his ex seems to be choosing to keep me away from not only herself, but their children. It isn’t right for her to do this, but it is what it is.
I think what is hardest is that, if she really does keep us apart, what will the children think? Will she lie to them and tell them I am not calling? That I don’t care? That I am related to the one who did bad things? Never mind that he had a brother I am also related to who is a good man!
Sometimes, forgiveness and love are all we have to offer. It is all we can do when things in the world are out of our hands and we are powerless to change them.
I found a really good video on forgiveness. This man defines it well and makes it easy to understand.
I really have to commend… again… a site called “Music for the Soul“. The people there, under the lead of Steve Siler do a wonderful job of using music to reach out to those who are hurting or struggling. I have had the privilege of interacting with Steve a number of times over the last few years and have found him to be a gracious man who truly cares about people and who loves God.
They have some blogs attached to the site, but the one I want to point to right now is called She’s Somebody’s Daughter. I don’t think I have ever met a Ritual Abuse survivor who was not thrown into the world of porn and/or prostitution and/or trafficking as part of the abuse. I really appreciate how Steve is trying to get the word out. I don’t know who actually writes the blogs attached to Music for the Soul, but I really appreciate the writers and what they are trying to do.
I encourage you to check out the blog and the site. They have several projects and one just might help you.
When I first started out on this last leg of my healing journey…the awareness of DID and the realization of some of what had happened to me (which was an “aha-now I understand” time)…I had an idea in mind of what healing looked like. For me, it meant that my hard work (with G-d’s help) was somehow going to reverse all that had been done to me and there would be a complete merging which I called “integration”. I looked at it like a broken bone or a sickness. I wanted to be restored to the condition prior to the break of illness…or to be made even better. After all, they say a broken bone that heals is stronger in the area of the break and will never break exactly there again. I wanted to be like pre-DID and trauma.
Looking back, I would have to say that I was pretty naive, but not in a bad way. I believed what I needed to believe in order to start the journey and do what needed to be done. There were things I did not yet understand about DID and how abuse affects the brain. There were also implications in my view of healing that I did not fully think through…implications that would later change my view of healing…and again…not in a bad way.
Initially, my goal was simply to work on whatever needed to be worked. If I needed to face a memory…so be it. If I needed to reach out to an insider…so be it. Whether it was writing, listening, sharing, art…I did it. I believed that if I just kept doing what I was doing that integration/merging would occur naturally. It would not have to be forced. And it pretty much did happen that way. As I focused on healing, integration and merging seemed to happen almost seamlessly and without any real effort. Some of it happened in huge chunks during several days I spent with a counselor at her home. I stayed with her twice and through days of prayer and working with insiders massive amounts of integration/merging happened.
Over time, I came to realize that not all of healing is as simple as that. Now, I believe that a huge part of healing is to simply live my life…enjoying it as best I can…and seeing the beauty around me in addition to seeing what is evil in the world. I walk in the Spirit of the Creator, trusting Him to show me whatever I need to see and to help me with whatever I need help with. He has always been my greatest Healer…my best therapist. And He has helped me see that my idea of what healing looks like was very faulty.
I know the Creator can do anything and I believe He could even make it like nothing had happened…but that is not real. Like so many others, I had to come to terms with a childhood I simply never had. It was not just a matter of putting the brain back to how it was originally created. All my childhood experiences shaped and affected my brain. Removing the effects of the negative experiences does not replace them with the positive effects of the good things that never happened!
I also realized that all those things that did happen a part of what make who I am today. And even with all my foibles and what I perceive as “weakness” and “brokenness”, I am a pretty awesome person. I am a walking miracle and I am doing pretty darn good considering all I have been through. So, part of healing is also accepting imperfect functionality.
So…maybe…healing is not about restoration (like a broken leg). Maybe it is more about learning to live as I am and celebrating the me I have become and the me I am becoming. Maybe it is more about giving myself the freedom to enjoy life now…without guilt and with less and less impact coming from the past. It is about accepting imperfect functionality. (What is “perfect”, anyway?) It is about learning not to compare myself to others…not my abilities, my weaknesses or my strengths. Every one of us has abilities of some kind; we just don’t all have the same ones. We all have weaknesses and we all have strengths, regardless of how healed or broken we are. It is about not comparing my healing journey to another’s. We all walk on different paths.
I know I still have more to learn, but I carry one thing with me on my learning/healing journey…one very important thing. I know the Creator of all things and I know who I am in my Creator. I know I can trust Him to continue to lead me. Whatever is ahead, He will help me to face it.
Trusting that the Creator has a plan and that it is for our ultimate good.
Trusting that there is something better for us than this life.
Trusting that the Messiah’s love will continue to carry me through every storm of life.
Trusting that the Creator’s teachings are true and good…no matter how hard they may be or how my “self” chafes against them.
Trusting that He is G-d and I am not.
Trusting that my understanding is not infinite…that I am NOT all-knowing.
Trusting that I do not have to understand everything.
Trusting that my human sense of righteousness is not necessarily my Creator’s…mine is imperfect, while His is perfect.
Trusting that, like a child, I can trust my heavenly Abba/Father/Daddy…even when I do not understand.
Trusting that my Creator’s provision truly is enough for me.
Trusting that, when my Abba says “no”, it is for good reasons…even though I may not see those reasons now.
As I look at the list above, I see that trust is really tied a lot into understanding…or lack of understanding. There have been many times in my life when I thought and lived as a child. I wanted to understand like G-d (my Abba/Daddy) and I wanted to understand NOW. Just like the impetuous child who does not want to obey unless she fully understands (and agrees with) the why of the parent, I wanted to act and live on my own understanding and beliefs about how I thought life should be lived.
It took time, but I eventually outgrew my childishness…mostly. I still have my days, but they are much fewer and farther between…thankfully. Now I am better able to trust when I am walking through the mist…when I cannot see tomorrow. I am no longer afraid when things seem dark and I cannot see my way.
I am better able to remain calm and serene in the face of what appears to be “impending doom” because I have learned that things are not what they seem to be with the human eye and heart. I know that Abba has a bigger plan and that the ‘powers that be’ are going to crumble. I know things are going to get tougher in the world and in our country, but I am not afraid, for I know He walks with me.
Healing can be hard when you also have to focus on living. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could all go someplace safe where our physical needs were met and there were safe knowledgeable people who could support us and walk with us as we face our pasts and work toward our futures? It sounds idyllic, doesn’t it? Oh, how nice that would be.
The reality, though, is that most of us do not have anything even close to that. We take snippets of time here and bits of space there and try to sort through what is happening to us…attempting to make sense of the experiences that are rocking our world. We have any combination of families and loved ones to take care of, jobs to tend to , classes to take, sick ones to nurse. And somehow, in the busyness of life, we try to heal.
There are so many things I had to learn about how to heal without taking a vacation from regular life. Recognizing and accepting my limitations goes a long way…instead of fighting them. When I feel overwhelmed or like I am pushing against a wall, I find it is better to take five to ten minutes and go hole up in the bedroom (or some other safe alone place) than to try to keep on slugging through it. Just taking those few minutes to breathe and refocus helps so much.
What about when I cannot leave or don’t have the option to be alone? I try to find an opportunity to close my eyes for a few seconds or minutes. Or, if that would be seen, perhaps I can sit somewhere just outside of the conversation zone and just sort of “tune out” for a minute or two. Letting my mind wander, or even just listen to other conversations without taking part in them can really help.
How do I extricate myself when I find I am engaged with someone? Go to the bathroom. Seriously, if I am at someone else’s house, I can quietly excuse myself and then take my time getting back…a reasonable amount of time, of course, as I don’t want to be rude. When I come back out, I do not have to go back to the same conversation, especially if there are scattered groups around the room or house. I can go get a breath of fresh air or even just sit in another room for a minute or two…just long enough to not be considered rude. If someone notices and asks, I can just say that I needed a moment to sort of clear my mind and/or just soak up the wonderful atmosphere of the event. Or I was just taking a moment to feel appreciation for all my friendships…or whatever other creative thing I can come up with. And, of course, because I always want to be as truthful as I can, I make sure that I actually do something suitable for the environment and the people and go with it.
Being able to take good care of myself when I am feeling stressed goes a long way toward my healing. It helps to keep me from slipping backward. And when I do get some precious alone time to work on my healing, I don’t have to spend it decompressing. I am ready to jump in because I have been dealing with the day-to-day stresses as I go along.
Sometimes, though, I do need that alone time to simply relax…or to simply not have to answer to, or be responsible for, another person. It might even be a good time to take the phone off the hook. Or take a nap. Or just do something I find difficult to do when others are around. I work on doing as much as I can when I am not alone so that I can be most productive for my healing and personal growth when I am alone.
I have not had the time to check out every single page on each site. However, what I have checked out seems to be pretty good. Always read with a discerning heart. Ask the One True God to show you what is from Him and what is not.
A Survivor's Thoughts on Life 