Not Mine

Recently I was blessed to hear Jim Woodford speak, author of “Heaven.” It was a moving experience for me, one that touched my spirit deeply.

That which impacted me the most was the description of the Angels. They of mighty stature and the purest violet eyes one can imagine, and then some.

He shared how they are with us always, from our first moment of formation til our last breath. The awe of this fact fills me even now.

With me always.

My Guardians of God, sent to protect, guide and comfort me.

Even then, in my can.

My can. This is how I think of my times tossed away into the trash, literally, by my Mother,for “allowing” my Father’s abuse.

My can.

Except now, God has used the vision of Heaven he gave to this author to comfort me in the now as the then is healed even more.

 

You see, I have often wondered at the fact that, though I remember the feeling of abandonment I felt those long nights, I have no memories of fear or loneliness.

I understand now… it was my Angels who sat with me. Who wrapped their wings around me, miraculously to fit within with me. They stood guard over me that no harm come to me, shielded me from the hot and the cold, loved me in my abandonment.

As God is waking me to this truth of those times, He is also showing me this…

It isn’t my can, it never was.

I was placed in the trash, discarded, tossed away, but it wasn’t my can.

I can release this time of abuse, for it was never mine.

I didn’t ask for it, as I was told.

I didn’t deserve it, as I was told.

I didn’t belong in the trash.

It wasn’t my can then…

And…

It isn’t my can now!

 

 

I DON’T WANT TO

I didn’t want to go to Mass today, not at all. I woke full of flashback invaded dreams, remembered. I so wanted to curl in upon myself, drown in going away. Away from remembering, away from life. Stay in bed and pity my past me. To go where the victory of Christ is partaken of? Nope.

I wanted to be done, this journey seems never-ending at times. I will have my footing, then, wham, bam, I am down again. Down of heart and weary of mind. The final count to feel welcome. 1…2…3 she’s out!

Yep, that’s just how this morning was.

I was so lost in the feelings, the overwhelming emotions my child me suffered that my adult me wanted to throw in the towel.

I dreamt of the using and taking, the abuse rained down on me… thing is that wasn’t what was tearing at me when I woke. In my dream I was sitting alone, after, so forlorn. I was crying, not because of what was done to me, rather, because I couldn’t seem to dress myself. My clothes were inside out, a jumble at my feet and it felt as though I simply couldn’t do it. I cried that no one was there after, that I was so alone not only in the abuse but further abused as those that could and should have, didn’t as well.

Rather turned a blind eye, a deaf ear and an indifferent heart.

So, I had me a good cry to the Lord and begged Him to help me care in the now. He did, I still didn’t feel it, but He reminded me that I needed to go. I imagine my Guardian Angels wings whooshing as they propelled me forth. I certainly didn’t go in my own power.

Mass. The remembering and celebrating of the greatest sacrificial gift, ever.                                                              Mass. Where my Christ endured for me the very thing that I feel this day, betrayal.                                                                                               Mass. He to suffer again and again what was then for me in the now, flashbacks.                                                                                                                                                                                   Mass.

One of the hardest yet most helpful things for me as I heal has been to revisit the abuse and see my God there. Find how He was with me, yield the whole truth of then to Him that He be with me now as He was then.

This is what I was really wanting to hide from today, I wanted to give up and not do my part of the work in my healing. Imagine if my Lord had given up? Had called forth all of Heaven to save Him from the cross? He could have, yet He yielded, “Not my will, but thine be done.” He uttered to His Father.

So, there I was at Mass. A quivering, emotional mess, kneeling and crying, oh, so tired.

Then the homily was shared. Father to talk of how much we have to be thankful for. The beauty of life and creation ours to see, hear, experience.

It hit me then, all along I was heard, I was seen, someone was far from indifferent.

God my Father, Mary my Mother and Christ my Brother and Savior not only were then with me but are now.

I am home, now is safe, I have oh, so much to be grateful for.

For I am no longer then.

 

 

 

I AM…

I am the rainbow these days                                                                                                                   The color and beauty of my emotions vibrating                                                                                   They spill upwards for all are fading                                                                                             Flashbacks of feelings separate from the happenings                                                                         No more do the dragon monsters of then wrestle caged within me                                         They have been slayed                                                                                                                 Replacing the darkness with the brilliant light of present                                                                 I live in the light                                                                                                                                           Breathe its sharpness in to cut out the then                                                                                           I exist from inside out spewing forth life                                                                                             I’m among the living now                                                                                                                       No battle scars as they burst out of me                                                                                                   They do not matter for they are not who I am                                                                                       They are not my reflection                                                                                                                         No.                                                                                                                                                                 My me is a rainbow of truth now                                                                                                               My me is light and love and now                                          My me is gloriously free                                                         I am me                                                                                     I am alive                                                                                   I am color and light and love                                                                                              I am a rainbow flowing free                                                                                                                                                     

 

IN THE TELLING

So little can seem like so much sometimes.

This morning does. A simple dream, puzzled together of past and present, like an awakening.

These times are like rising from a fog, limbs heavy with the emotions of the memories as I must choose.

There are forces within, battling, you see. Past and present swirling about, vying for me.

These are the hardest of hard times for me. How I simply want to go back to sleep, to hide in slumber.

Waking is never easy these days.

Grounding myself in the present is what is needed, the only way out.

Abba is always with me, I have all of my heavenly family watching me and drawing me out, I see them and love them, beckoning smiles and arms held open, inviting really. I always look to heaven first, my true home, my heart’s sanctuary. This is my present truth, that which floods me with emotions that are present to drown out past, the angels sing the glory of our Lord, and I can open my eyes.

Yet, humanity is still where I am, thought I would love to sit at Heavens gates all the day, life calls. I am reminded, as I turn to embrace the day that my Abba has purpose for me here, I am honored to fulfill it and serve Him.

How much I am loved and seen and heard.

Heard being the one He is waking me too now, In the telling.

Someone told me a few days ago that I, “Can tell them anything, that they want me to.” How I have sat with these words. Such a flood of emotions flows from my head to my toes as I savor the, I, Tammy, can tell.

In the telling shall be no more secrets…  no more hiding… no shame,  no matter the horror…

In the telling I can free the nightmares that haunt me, loose the bonds of then… find release

In the telling lies are shattered that the truth of them burst forth, shiny and bright, dispelling darkness.

I feel these words to such a depth, “I can tell.” It is as a vanguard before Satan that shouts, “I am telling! You have no power, for Jesus loves me and has given me someone to tell! Go away, I am washed clean in the blood of Christ, I am innocent. It wasn’t my sin and it won’t become it!”

In this someones listening I am safe, heard and free of blame. I am given understanding and love, seen as a person not an object. I find that I have a voice, my feelings matter, consequences are not the end of the world and won’t bring me harm.

In the telling I feel so shattered sometimes, the gentlest of touches to take me by surprise, voices to reach me in the fog, as I find it clearing.

In the telling the fog will lose…

For In the telling…

I am rising with the Son.

^“So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn’t hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing himself to the worst by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn’t gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God’s chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:

They kill us in cold blood because they hate you.
We’re sitting ducks; they pick us off one by one.

None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.”

 Romans 8:34-39 (MSG)

I AM BLESSED

I am weighted down

full of the abuse gone by,

the memories invade me

a stream of visits,

a turnstile of arriving,

never-ceasing

past remembering of that

which sank me lower to lower                            

my bed to carry my frame…

imprinted upon it.

for I was no form

rather a mold.

shaped to serve their sinful choices.

there was no me there,

only survival

I was strong for I had to be to survive…

I was indifferent in an attempt to convince myself that it didn’t matter.

I was anger and sorrow intertwined,

filled up of others sin

that I…

boiled over…

with wrath at the injustice.

I screamed out, in all the wrong ways.

for I was not heard, not seen, a no one to them.

an object to be forced down,

every part of me ground up.

I hated their faces full of leering and wanting and taking always

I went to my can…

with joy.

telling myself that if I curl up tight,

I can make-believe I am be within a womb

I can pretend tomorrow will be new’

that I am in the womb and will be reborn.

but, it never worked

I was still trash to her,                             

and his toy.

each day a horror I lived

so I became anger at night

indifference by day

i survived, I did

but now I am weighted with the memories

seeing me,

seeing them.

they are like lead drowning me in my slumber,

crashing into my dreams…

waking me.

that I must pull myself from this lostness…

this fog…

find me.

then I can be full of truth instead.

I resist the urge to go to where peace is,

to curl up outside, safe…

to be waken in love and gentleness,

to be found this time,

wanted and soothed.

I am going now, instead, to sit and be in Heaven awhile

Momma Mary is smiling at me,

she knows and is whispering, “Come.”

she will wrap herself around my nakedness

Abba will stand guard.

I can go home now…

to them

home.

it feels as somewhere I have never been,

that now I am.

and oh, how, precious beyond precious, it is.

I WILL BE OK

 

It is amazing to feel pretty… to think maybe someday God will bring a man into my life that will enjoy my company. I am astounded to realize I want to be free to be me, no more defined by others, I was always alright with that, thought I wasn’t worthy to have an opinion or free to choose. Now I know and feel I am, I am someone just like everyone else, it is an amazing discovery. It feels like I am saying this wrong, I just like being me and embracing the gift of being female, make up and pretty dresses, all that stuff.

I have known and felt the love of Christ in my life, the hand of Him through so many of those who have and are journeying with me on this journey of healing. Abuse leaves such scars, especially when it is heaped on one after the other, now I am waking up to finding my body without those scars. To seeing myself as God does, pure and beautiful, unworthy but still loved, I can give yet am worthy to receive. Joy is mine to claim, hope for what God created me for as a women, more than to be used, pushed and thrown out. I am someone not only as a human being but as a woman. I can feel attractive and it isn’t haughty, I can enjoy a man’s company simply for that. I can learn to dance, laugh out loud and share my thoughts, some day I may even have my first kiss and I like that feeling. Guess I am saying I feel alive. Confused some, but oh so alive.

TammyAnneofGod

 

THE OTHER SIDE OF MY HEARTBEAT

 

 

My heart, a mystery unto me all these years I have lived.

Even more so it seemed as my healing progressed.

In the beginning of this journey it seemed to be missing, just a hole where it belonged. When I would stumble upon it I to have no idea what to do with it. To hold it in my hands left me full of sorrow as I looked upon its bruised and bloody pulp. If I strived to lovingly return to self it would shock me into past. jolt me awake to all endured as a child sending me fleeing and hiding as those memories, now alive, overwhelmed me.

My hearts very aliveness to seem my greatest enemy.

To claim my heart was to find me.

How scary this was.

Little me, toddler me, child me… all rejected

Growing me, teen me unto woman me void of touch, lost of heart.

Oh it was there, within my frame for such is our created being.

Yet, in my mind’s eye, it was gone…     

Endurance having replaced it, survival the flow through my veins…

How deeply I hid my heart, to save me, to save it.

Handed off from one abuse to another as it was secreted away with each.

Lies to self the oxygen needed that a fake existence emerge.

A child to cope by going away from even self.

This is the side of my heartbeat I have been traversing.

Finding bits and pieces of then as God led, pulling my heart from hiding that I feel it’s true beat. Accept the truth of its being mine as it was placed back within me. Such a painful journey as each beat coursed through me, each throb tied to an abuse, each memory a horror unto its self.

Wanting my heart back was not desired, allowing God to do so, simply because Abba always knows best, was hard and ugly work. Focusing on Calvary and the truth that Jesus experienced the same was where I stayed.

Here also is where I was healed, here is where I found me, here is where the end began.

The wrong side of my heartbeat.

Death while living, dark in the day, cold and lonely always. Heartbeat slowed that I not exist to me.

Bit by bit I have been waking up to me, to the fact that I am now not then.

Bit by bit learning to sit still as I simply feel, beyond the memory to my being there, experiencing what was my truth of then as it woke my heart to the other side.

Now.

The right side of my heart.

Life. Living while enduring possible for Christ is with me, His light going before me lighting even the darkest of days. Hispresence the warmth when cold blasts find my heart, His arms enough to show me I am never alone. Heartbeat to race that it seemed it would explode, He to sit with me even in this that I learn it won’t. My heart need not be hidden, it is safe to carry it within me, for He guards this as well. He desires to teach me how to do so as our hearts beat as one.

I still hear my heartbeat knocking from time to time these days. Gentle taps of  my childhood hiding. Ones that are begging their turn to be seen and heard. At first this scared me to realize what I was “hearing.”  I can feel so spent with soothing myself of the pain and using, the discarded times.

But I am learning that feelings don’t hold the power, God does. He gifted me with the ability to feel just as He did all of His creation, thus He is also teaching me what that means. How to be human and give Him the control, to turn the fear for self into compassion for others who are facing theirs. I am learning to look on others emotions gone haywire beyond the impact they have on me and feel for them instead. How great their own wrong side of their heartbeat pain must be.

Having my heart back is changing me, having Christs heart wrapped around mine transforming me, as only His power can.

I no longer panic when these heartbeats come knocking.

Rather, I invite them home.

Allow each memory its visit held in the arms of God, soothed of my Mother Mary, Christ’s Momma lovingly shared with me.

Then we say goodbye. Some to stay the side of Heaven to heal in light and love, others to come home to me that they be used of God.

Papa, God, tells us, “As a (Woman) thinketh in her heart, so she is.” Prov. 23:7 (KJV)

I am thinking now, thus my heart is too.

I am thinking whole is good, thus God is making me whole.

Whole of heart, body, soul, spirit and mind.

Whole in Christ alone

 

The right side of my heart,

His side.

 

 

FINAL PHOTO CREDIT

https://pilgrimcenter.wordpress.com/category/prayer/pilgrimages/

The church’s crypt marked the site of the fourth station where Jesus met His Mother as He carried the Cross to Calvary.

REBIRTH

Ah, what an awakening, physically and spiritually.

I woke this morning deep in the arms of God, emotionally so within the presence of heaven and my family there. How I still feel the womb like holding and peace beyond understanding.

As I sat with Papa, He awoke within me this…            

I am within the womb of my earthly mother, for she is my mother, naught can change that. It is she who carried me physically within her womb while so full of anger that she was pregnant with me. A hatred for me that I existed directed at me not because I was me, rather because her life was as it was. Yet her emotions flowed to me just as did her essence of life, my me fed of her as I formed.

Thus I found my first me

Now Abba is showing me the truth of my beginning as it is held within his healing hands.

The vision is this…

I see myself within the womb but not within my mother’s body. I am held by the hands of God, for it is He that formed me and did so right emotionally just as he did physically. The very womb I floated in He holds out to Mary, who is there with Joseph, arm about her shoulder. They too reach out and place their hands upon this womb I am within.

I hear all of heaven rejoicing as Christ extends His hand. This touch of his redeeming to be gloriously red, as His shed blood pours forth to replace the flow of what was. A red of redemption clears the shadows of self from my forming eyes as a renewed vision is being crafted, saying all else needed.

I was created as all are, within a human womb, but blessed to be held in the very arms of heaven. For salvation transcends all that was to be, foils Satan’s attempt to claim me, one of God’s children

A curse to be transformed, a blessing to be birthed.

Me that blessing, as all babes are.

                                                                                           Today I begin anew.             

BEYOND THE NEON

I have noticed something about myself of late.

A subtle change that feels big, the kind that when put into words seems to beg the question, “And?” When in reality it is much like a flashing Neon Light. A sign that draws your attention simply because it is there. Blinking non-stop, bright, there even in the corner of your eye kind.

I feel like I have been this neon light. As if my me has been standing still while moving, pulsating with the colors of life, spilling forth in wonder, twirling about flashing, as I have found the rhythm of a childhood missed.

I have loved these colors, embraced them fully inside and out. My home is full of them visually as well as whimsically. Pinks and purples to greens and blues, they are all here representing the flowing  of my hearts depth of feeling,

A feeling of childhood.

Of happiness like  a smiley face sticker is how that happiness feels, almost that I am wearing one, which is making me smile even now. Remember I am visual writer, picturing just that now.

I feel as though I have been gifted with the glow of living, see myself pulsating as each beat of my heart feeds this through me, color flowing til it can’t help but b

Which brings me to my point, this is a child’s perspective in a way, one where life is lived in the cascading joy of simply being alive, the carefreeness of spinning round and round in a field, free to roll down the hill and embrace that moment in of itself while at the same time the flow of life moves you along.

Everything begging to be explored and embraced, full of why’s, when’s and where’s, that simply propel  you forward into more of life.

Neon, is how I would describe childhood as it is meant to be lived and embraced.

I have had my neon gifted to me as part of my healing. For quite awhile I am coming to realize. This gift has been one of time and patience, caring and kindness wrapped in an awareness of me. Memories created to replace those that never should have been that the brightness of them, their very existence to be what draws my heart forward.

Forward from Neon to Pastel.

I still love color but find the flashy and bright, isn’t always what catches my eye these days. I like the muted tones as well, the soft warmth they instill in me causing me to feel safe and settled.I now prefer to sit in that same field, to lie upon the field and find stillness as the clouds pass by slowly full of a caressing softness. The wind whispers to me if I but listen and the whole of living finds me.

I pause awhile even now, to find myself drawn to this field, within for now to be experienced sometime later. But, oh, how I am transported there even now.

Neon has passed as all childhood do.

Now, before me lies a field of wildflowers, begging crossing.

A slower journey this one will be, in the experiencing.

One of holding still a choice not instinct, where the stillness is a time of healing, as my me is awake.

Life to be embraced in the quiet moments, in the wisps of love sent my way.

I am growing up and I like it.

My soul set free upon the wind of my Father, God’s mighty healing gift of life.

As I am becoming Woman

“The spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.” Job 33:4 (KJV)

“And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”

Genesis 2:7 (KJV)

CORRIDORS

I have chosen to post this one unedited as given to me of God last night.

 

i find myself walking the halls of my past. i am not alone, my hand is held i feel it even as it seems that i cannot see by whom for when i look up it is as a flickering shadow, one that enlightens my heart to all who have had and are holding me not just of this earth for heavens grasp is here too i ponder this image I slowly smile both within and without as the meaning of this vision from my Abba is understood. some people have their family trees that are rooted here on earth, ties to generations that they claim with pride i don’t i am the tree uprooted, cast aside to wither and die cut up and burned that even the fragrance of my passing is gone upon the wind cut off from this tree. Still i smile still all is as it should be this is what my God is telling me with a whisper so soft it caresses my heart. “come little one, walk with Me.” I have a choice, I feel it, to stand still as i am or to move forward How i trust this awesome God of mine, memories of all the times He kept me in the dark despair of my childhood abuse, always He was there. i hold His hand tight, i whisper, “Yes.”

And… so it begins

Behind us are many doorways, those of past, of little me. They are darkened now, the lights turned off, as each reflects a soft glow of keeping. Within sleeps the many mes of my abuse. Each to have found love on this journey of healing Abba has me on. To look back leaves me contented, for i know that glow. Beside each sits my true Mother, Mary. as before each door stands my mes Angel. Stands tall and ready that no more harm come to this part of me, that the healed wounds stay just that, all attempts to harm this child shall fail.

So it goes door after door.

As I turn forward, nodding to Abba that I am ready, I can feel the safety behind. All is well with little me.

My smile widens, for the shadows are of all those who have been my family tree unto me, brave. strong souls that have done what was needed to enter those rooms, many that had been barred, sealed shut with lock upon lock upon lock set, no key to be found.

These are they who will travel forward with me, those of this earth and heavenly hosts as well. The flickering is not that they are leaving, it is rather. that each beat of my heart shows me another.

I am safe, loved, belong… grafted in of God.

Growing forward. awaiting, many doors still seen, but this time the way is lighted, brilliant with the glory of the Lords army that lines the way. Angels at guard before many of the doors, others within. fighting the battles already in a forward defense.

This time the journey will be different, oh it shall still have its battles, tears will flow and pain will need faced and claimed, but there will be no childish holding on, no clinging to what is old and worn, valueless.

No.

This time I shall go boldly forward, steps taken with purpose, fully planted as I keep my eyes open.

I am climbing the Everest of my God

Going where fear has kept me from going before

Walking the corridors of life

Rather than self

As I was meant to all along

~Tammy Anne of God ❤