I'm Rachel.
I’m so glad you’re here.
All tagged trauma recovery
Parents love and nurture their children, provide and lead to the best of their abilities. Then all of a sudden the clock strikes some magical tune between the ages of 5-7 and a child is launched out into the real world. Alone, children without the full ability to navigate the prefrontal cortex, emotions, or fight and flight instincts are asked to trust and follow a complete stranger.
Every single day, I ask God for wisdom and strength to get me through the hard days of temper tantrums, sensory meltdowns, sibling rivalry, harsh words, dirty bathrooms, discipline, and foolish behavior (there's and mine).
As Easter draws nearer and my days continue to contain mile-long to-do lists, I focus on what matters most. The party and presents don’t matter. The time spent with my children that I’ll never get back matter more. The perfect way the cake looks or whether I remember the party favors won’t be remembered but the ways in which I encourage my boys, bring them up in righteousness and lead in gratitude will resonate with them for the rest of their lives.
Some fears are founded with validity and deserve cautious proceedings and wisdom to navigate. Other fears are purely irrational, nothing threatening exists where you wander but you cannot help but remain paralyzed there.
Grief and joy are never far removed from one another. One emotion can easily access the other. Neither emotion is every far from your embrace. Yet, grief is a tightness in your chest. Grief is a crashing wave. Grief is lingering and heavy. Grief is the emotion we don’t want to experience, we are ready to be rid of it as soon as it sweeps over us and yet this unwelcome visitor persists. Unfortunately, and this is what the work of Christ teaches us, without grief we would not cherish joy.
God placed Sean in my life at a time when I was suicidal and looking for any way to have to stop covering up my heartache with jokes and a goofy personality. I was so ashamed by the sexual abuse. I was ashamed of my family and home. I didn’t want people to know how broken I was in fear of the lies that I’d been told, “No one would ever love me.”
This threw a wrench in my writing as I planned to be getting published right now, not to expound and revamp. But my plans do not often work out perfectly.
For EIGHT years my uncle abused me in literally every way a person can be abused. And EIGHT years ago, He was sentenced to ten years in prison with another five added the following year.
Easter is my favorite holiday, but this year it’ll look different for everyone. If you don’t get to celebrate with your family or friends this year, it won’t take away from what Christ did for you on the Cross. The egg hunts and gatherings won’t look the same but that doesn’t mean those things cannot occur at all. An egg hunt or big family brunch is not exclusive to Easter. Celebrate that regardless of your job status, health status, or shelter-in-place status that Jesus chose YOU to die for.
So, here’s what I try to do when I am feeling overwhelmingly anxious. (I say try, because I’m human and fail at about every single thing I do.) In times when the weather dampens my mood, politics feels like a loss, or the world seems to be falling apart altogether, I take the Lord’s advice and I become still. Here’s what that looks like:
While at an appointment for his brother, James read “appendix” on the chart of the digestive system and proceeded to ask what the organ did. I did not have an answer and was a little busy trying to wrangle a new toddler and undress his big brother to research an answer.
This did not stop him from asking the doctor when she arrived in the room. Her response was “We don’t really know what the appendix is for.” James’ little shocked face was amusing.
