Grief Continued by Susan L.

An excerpt from God and the Black River. The Lord has had me return time and again to specific memories simply because of the profound impact they had on my understanding, not just in regard to how I saw myself but how I saw others as well. Trauma has a way of twisting how we view the world and ourselves. Most of all these key events impacted my impressions about who was supposed to be a loving God. He's forgiven me for my outbursts of rage at him. There was one key incident that most likely contributed to the formation of my Black River when I was a child. I had no idea how much I had been hurt because he hadn't hurt me physically. I thought since there were no bruises, there was no damage. The fundamental wrongness of this idea had to be grieved. It wasn't okay. I had to grieve that this idea had been scemented in everything I thought or did The grief poured out. This incident had a lifelong cost and cost me a life. That was the first step. The show opener. I thought I was done. Forgive and forget. Not. And I would sigh in resignation. Here we go again. The problem was the memories still had power over me. Freedom didn't happen in one year, one sitting or even ten. Some things took only minutes to let go of, some things. are still in the works. I lean heavily on my supports when the Lord takes me along this side creek. It is hard. Sometimes I even said, "No, I'mh not ready." I grieved my losses: the inability to trust "nice" people, the inability to accept kindness. I grieved the loss of innocence and the door that was opened...the list goes on. Recovery is possible because God taught me how to grieve: in my art, in my personal writing and with my voice.