Breaking Free | Blooming Lotus

Posts Tagged ‘Breaking Free’

Experiencing Joy!

Posted in Healing, tagged Believing God, Beth Moore, Breaking Free, God's healing power, joy after child abuse, life after child abuse on September 18, 2013| 15 Comments »

I don’t check up on this blog much anymore, but I felt led to do so and share where I currently am on my healing journey. The entire time I was writing the Blooming Lotus blog, I was active in Bible studies, particularly those written by Beth Moore, who is a Christian speaker and author who is also a child abuse survivor. Nobody who knows who she is thinks of her with the label of “child abuse survivor,” though, and that is what I am seeking in my own life – to discover who I am outside of the label of “child abuse survivor.”

Two of her Bible studies have greatly impacted where I am now: Breaking Free and Believing God. In March 2013, I was in another bad place and questioned whether I would ever be free of my past. Where was this peace and satisfaction that Beth Moore said were mine as God’s child? I set aside a full day for prayer, worship, and crying out to God, and my life has not been the same since.

For the first time in my life, I experience joy. Yes, JOY! I didn’t know that was possible for me, but it is and has been for months now. In May, I realized that the undercurrent of wanting to die was finally gone – GONE! I now know what it is like to live my life JOYFUL and without an underlying death wish. I never dreamed this was possible!

This wonderful period of joy has lasted for SIX MONTHS, even while various challenges slammed me in my day-to-day life. No matter what life threw at me, I was “standing on solid ground,” knowing that God is always – ALWAYS – in control and protecting me. Nothing that my abusers broke in me is too broken for God to heal. NOTHING!

Last month, God put heavily on my heart that it is time to heal my marriage. God had already been softening both my heart and hub’s for a number of months and even moved hub into a life decision to stop complaining and be content. I was not involved in this decision of his, and he has not complained in almost two months. This season has been challenging for me because part of healing my marriage involves healing my feelings about sex and undoing all of the lies woven into my head – that “pleasure” and pain are intertwined and that marital sex is trying to say “I love you” with the same physical action as rape.

For the last month, I have been integrating my most wounded parts, and that has been difficult. However, this time around, I know where my solid ground is, and I feel like I can reach out and touch God because He is so close to me as I heal my most wounded parts of myself. In the midst of healing the pain, I know in the very depths of my heart and soul that I am fully and completely loved. I don’t know what I will look like after this process is completed, but I am resting on the promise that God wants this part of me healed. Once this is healed, I will have fully reclaimed all of the parts of myself that my abusers took from me. I am living Isaiah 61. I have been restored!

I was always very careful not to weave too much “God talk” into this blog because I did not want to trigger anyone with religious triggers. However, I cannot blog any longer with God hiding in the background. GOD IS MY HEALER AND RESTORER!! Behold, He makes all things new! And He is making me new. After all of the trauma, pain, rage, and grief, I have been made new! If God can not only heal but RENEW me, He can do it for you, too! Don’t let ANYONE tell you that you are a lost cause. The Maker of Heaven and earth has the power to fully free you from your bondage if you will let Him.

Photo credit: Microsoft

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Deeper Awareness of Healing from Child Abuse

Posted in Healing, tagged Beth Moore, Breaking Free, progress in healing from child abuse on September 13, 2012| 6 Comments »

Today has been a really cool day! I started a new Bible Study written by Beth Moore that is entitled Breaking Free. If that sounds familiar, it’s because I did it a couple of years ago and shared some of the concepts that were helpful to me.

Here’s the cool part – During her orientation video, Beth Moore talks about healing for the “brokenhearted.” That is a term that always resonated deeply with me. If one word captures how I viewed myself for most of my life, it was brokenhearted. I had the realization that I am no longer brokenhearted. What a HUGE, HUGE realization!

Now, I am not arrogant enough to declare myself “healed” or “done” with healing. I think that healing takes place at deeper and deeper levels as we grow. I also believe that I am blessed to be in a season of emotional rest. If history is a good predictor of the future, that season is likely to end as Halloween approaches, but for now, I have been in a wonderful place of rest and appreciating the fruits of my labors. I just want to enjoy it while it lasts!

I also noticed another area of growth today. My sister called me from the road as she is driving up to take care of momster. She hasn’t been keeping me in the loop, but she wanted me to know that she needed to travel to tend to some medical issues that momster is dealing with, and this information was relevant because she and I are working together on a project professionally, and she needs to send an email to the group explaining why she cannot be as active for the next few days. She didn’t want the first time I heard about this to be in that email.

My first reaction to this news was feeling badly for my sister – not guilty for me not helping out but just sad that my sister, who is working and going to college while parenting two children as a single mother, is having to take care of yet one more person. My second reaction was that I take no pleasure in knowing that momster is in pain. I didn’t think that her pain was the result of karma or whatever. I felt badly for her that she is in pain while, at the same time, had no compulsion to get involved.

I am aware of the many ways that I have changed as I have healed, but I don’t often have days like today where I am really aware of how much growing I have done. It’s a great feeling!

Photo credit: Microsoft

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Not a Normal Childhood with Normal Girlish Dreams

Posted in Challenges, tagged Beth Moore, Breaking Free, grief, loss of childhood dreams after abuse, not feeling loved on July 26, 2010| 12 Comments »

I had another tough week with the Beth Moore Bible study I am working through entitled Breaking Free. Don’t worry – What I have to talk about today is not religion-based, so there are no religion triggers in it.

This week’s focus is on childhood dreams from girlhood and the ways that your faith can fulfill those dreams. I felt like a fish out of water, and recognizing my lack of these dreams hurt … I guess because it drives home just how different my childhood was and how this was another loss for me to grieve from childhood.

Beth Moore says that all young girls have the following four dreams and that this is one reason little girls love fairy tales:

To be a bride
To be beautiful
To be fruitful
To live happily ever after

We were supposed to put a check mark by each one that we remember dreaming about as a little girl. I could not check any of them.

I had no dreams of growing up to be beautiful because I “knew” I was not beautiful as a child. My mother forced me to keep my hair in a boyish cut and dressed me in boyish clothing. Until I hit puberty, people constantly thought I was a boy. On top of that, I saw myself as “ugly” because of the abuse.

Quite frankly, I have no desire to be “beautiful” today because I don’t want to attract anyone’s sexual attention (not even hub’s.). The more beautiful a woman is, the more men think about her sexually, which I see as dangerous. I had a well-meaning friend offer to give me a makeover, and I told her no quite firmly. I am not plucking my eyebrows into a sexy arch, wearing sexier makeup, dressing to flatter my figure, or wearing high heels because all of these things would attract sexual attention, and I don’t want any. I don’t want anyone to see or think about my body. I do believe this ties into why I struggle so much with trying to lose weight even though I work out an hour a day most days each week.

I did not dream of being a bride … I did not think that anyone would want me, and I was frankly shocked when hub did. I definitely had no dreams of being fruitful as a little girl because I saw that as more helpless children that I would have to protect, and my sister was enough. I used to have my Barbies abort their babies, and I hated dolls. You can forget living happily ever after – My dream was to grow big enough that my abusers could no longer hurt me.

And then here was the kicker that made me cry – The question: “Who is someone you are absolutely certain loves you?” and then list how you know. My answer was no one. I might have said my son a couple of years ago, but his mood swings sometimes make me question this. I know I have many people in my life who need me, but “needing” me is not the same thing as “loving” me. I sometimes question if I am in people’s lives because I am “useful” rather than because I am loved.

Do I know in my head that I have people in my life who love me? Yes. Is my heart certain of anyone’s love? No. I am certain that there is not one person in my life who is in it forever and that any of them could leave at any time. Yes, I know that my loved ones who have moved away still love me, but that doesn’t do me a lot of good when they are 8 hours away by car. I feel like I am easy to leave. I don’t begrudge people for following their dreams (or their husbands’ dreams), but it doesn’t change the fact that they leave. So, no – I am not absolutely certain about anyone’s love for me on this planet, and that hurts.

Photo credit: Amazon.com

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Making It Through the “Moments”

Posted in Dependence/Compulsions, tagged addictions, Beth Moore, Breaking Free on July 7, 2010| 6 Comments »

I am working through a Bible study right now written by Beth Moore called Breaking Free. I tried to do this study back in 2004 when I was in therapy and working through flashbacks. I dropped out after the fourth week – it was just too intense for me at the time in my life.

Now, I am doing this study again (the updated version), and it has me hopeful that I can “break free” from more of my issues and break more chains left by my abusers, such as my eating disorder, weight battles, insomnia, etc.

The Session Four video was particularly powerful. I watched it right before I went to sleep, and I dreamed about it all night long. The video talked about the dangers of “making peace with our bondage.” Some examples Beth Moore used were an aversion to sex, being overweight, and eating disorders. Ouch! She pointed out that one lie that so many of us buy into is that nobody has been able to beat this, so why should I believe that I will be delivered?

I must say that I do struggle with this mentality, as I believe that most people do. For example, remember when people believed that it was not possible to run a mile in under four minutes? That is, until somebody did it, and then lots of other people did it, too. The main barrier was the widespread belief that doing it was impossible. A part of myself believes that it is not possible for me to overcome my aversion to sex, beat my eating disorder, overcome my anxiety, etc. However, I know that some of you have overcome these obstacles, which tells me that it is, in fact, possible.

Beth Moore covered another topic that really spoke to me. She said that, to reach our milestones, we must first make it through our “moments.” It is my “moments” that continue to sabotage my progress. I will have soy milk and orange juice for breakfast and a Lean Cuisine for lunch. I will work in one or two light healthy snacks. I make to 5:00 p.m. feeling very good about myself and my body. Then, I have my “moment” where my ADHD son is driving me crazy, my husband is cranky, etc., and I turn to food, wine, or Xanax to get me through that “moment.” Most of my day is fine – it is those “moments” that undermine me every time.

I am going to keep working through the Bible study and see if I can finally find freedom from the “bondage” of an eating disorder, etc. I am sooo sick and tired of being enslaved to it.

Photo credit: Amazon.com

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