The Journey to Love: Healing Birthday Trauma

Photo by Tore F on Unsplash

As I write this, it’s my birthday.

Like many trauma survivors, my birthday has never really been a day of celebration and joy. Rather, it’s been a collection of traumas big and small, a message layered year after year that I’m not worth celebrating.

Until this year. Because this year, with a lot of help, I processed the trauma around my birthday.

I see now how I was taking other people’s words and actions (or lack thereof) and making it about me. That’s easy to do, and a normal part of child development. And as happens with trauma, we can get stuck with unprocessed trauma, in the same stage of development we were in when it happened. So the child who blames themself for being unlovable, as children do when they are rejected, overlooked, ignored, punished unfairly, and so on, becomes the adult who blames themself for being unlovable. And every time those old wounds get triggered by current words or actions (or lack thereof), it’s taken as proof that the old wound’s message was right: I am unlovable.

When we process the trauma, we can separate ourselves from it, create a more empowering belief from it, and place it appropriately into the narrative of our lives that makes us who we are today.

But it must be processed. And to process it, we have to be honest about how we feel, be willing to feel the emotions, accept that the emotions are a natural and necessary part of who we are as human beings, express those emotions in a way that does not cause harm to ourselves or others, and love ourselves on the other side.

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The day before my birthday, I sobbed. I grieved for the child who so often was rejected or ignored. I grieved for the child who believed that a pleasant birthday experience had to be earned. I grieved for the child who never wanted to have another birthday because it was only a reminder of being unloved.

I had a call with my coach that day. Knowing she’s a safe person, and our calls are sacred space where I can freely be my full self, I sobbed in front of her. She saw my tears, witnessed my grief, and heard my pain. And when I had shared enough for her to understand why birthdays were so painful, she gently reminded me that what others say or do (or don’t say or do) does not diminish my worth one iota.

An image from my three years of EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing) trauma therapy came up. In the image, I was standing on a crowded beach, in pain. Everyone around me was wearing sunglasses, but as I looked more closely, I realized that some of these glasses didn’t just block the sun. They also blocked the ability to see others, or others’ pain, or only certain people.

It wasn’t that they didn’t care. It was that they couldn’t see me. It’s no one’s fault, including mine, and it also doesn’t change who I am. How others see me (if they do), has everything to do with their perspective (glasses) and nothing to do with who I am.

I am neither diminished nor elevated based on how others perceive me, including if they don’t perceive me at all.

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On the morning of my birthday, I woke with a physical feeling in my body that what others say or do is not about me. And making it about me is what I as a child did because that was developmentally appropriate for a child. I don’t need to do that anymore.

I felt a complete separation between what others say or do and who I am. I felt in touch with the truth of who I am as a spirit being of love. I felt joyous. I felt loved by the universe. I loved myself.

At 11:56 p.m. the night of my birthday, I saw the clock and that internal, critical voice noted, “Only four more minutes of my birthday, and then it’s over.”

“No,” I said aloud, shaking my head. Because every day is a day to celebrate the truth of who I am, to love myself, and feel loved by the universe. Every day can feel like my birthday, and I can celebrate everyone who comes into my life and invite them to celebrate love with me.

Every day is another opportunity to experience life from a place of love. Every day is an opportunity to truly know that we matter.

My (True) Scariest Story

I’ve told a lot of scary stories. Some are published; some aren’t. But there’s one scary story I’ve never told: mine.

It’s time.

It’s time because it’s been holding me back for thirty years. It keeps me at a distance from others, untrusting, wary, afraid.

It’s easier now for me to say publicly that I’ve been seeing and speaking with my spirit guides since I was little—running the risk that disbelievers will question my mental health while those on the religious right call me evil—than it is to tell this story of my past.

It is the last great block in my healing, the thick quicksand of shame that slows my progress, keeps me from moving forward, and takes a toll on my mental and physical health.

To those who know me, this may or may not come as a surprise. Any relatives who read this may find it difficult to accept, and that’s okay. None of us want to hear less than stellar things about those we love.

It really begins in my early childhood. 

I grew up in a chaotic, frequently violent home. My mom’s mood could change from jovial to angry at the drop of a hat, and she’d sometimes go into rages for no discernible reason. My dad liked getting reactions out of me, and intentionally used sexist, racist, homophobic language. He sent me pornographic photos (always exposed males) via email. He repeatedly talked about my body in a sexualized way, through my childhood and well into adulthood. He frequently touched me inappropriately, claiming each time it was an accident. He said he was a “dirty old man” like his father, and he took pride in that.

My mom blamed her moods on me. On what I had or hadn’t done. Nothing was ever good enough. I was never good enough. The gifts I gave her weren’t thoughtful enough, my housecleaning skills didn’t meet her standards, I talked too much, I didn’t call her enough, I was in her way, I’d distanced myself too much. And how dare I be happy when she was feeling sad. Anything she liked that I didn’t was a rejection of her.

And when I reacted the way one would expect a child to react, they told me I was wrong. I was too sensitive and needed to learn to take a joke. I was ungrateful for wanting or needing more than I had, or for desires that were different from theirs. I was a prude for not wanting to be touched or ogled. I was a slut for wanting to experiment with makeup at age sixteen. I was ungrateful for not setting my life aside to be there for them whenever they needed me.

My feelings of hurt or anger were labeled selfish and ungrateful. My mom said I ruined every family gathering and holiday, but I felt completely powerless. I attempted suicide more than once, and my parents ignored it. When Child Protective Services got involved, my parents got me into therapy, but then told me that they’d only pay for it if I told them what I told the therapist. 

I later found out the psychiatrist they hired to see me was someone for whom my dad had done work, someone who owed him. And that psychiatrist shared everything with my dad anyway. So much for confidentiality. After a handful of sessions during which the psychiatrist diagnosed me with depression and tried to convince me to take medication, they quit paying, saying they weren’t the problem. I was.

They brought up every time that I’d conflated two similar events (a known and normal trait of human memory) as evidence that my memory couldn’t be trusted. Every detail that I got wrong, every time I remembered events out of order (even when all the events were true), they told me I couldn’t trust what I remembered. I was prone to suggestion. I made things up.

But then, in the early 1990s, they admitted to me the things they’d done. They wouldn’t go so far as to call it “abuse” because to them, that meant broken bones and hospital visits. All I had were memories of welts, bruises, sickening touches, hurtful words, and a broken spirit. They said they did the best they could. They did say they could have done better. And then they shared some horrifying stories that they remembered, times when my mom “snapped” (her word) and went into a violent rage she couldn’t remember later. My dad recalled times when my mom called him at work, telling him to come home immediately, because she was going to kill us. And how my dad came home and wanted to know what my brother and I had done to cause this.

I didn’t feel vindicated. I just felt numb. I wish the story had ended there. 

But within a year or so of their confessions, they discovered the False Memory Syndrome Foundation—an organization founded by a guy who was accused of child sexual abuse by his adult daughter. (Those accusations against him were later corroborated by other family members.) It didn’t matter that I had never forgotten any of my memories, that none of them were repressed, or that the only therapy I’d had up to that point was the psychiatrist who’d shared with them everything I’d told him. My parents jumped on the bandwagon and claimed that everything I labeled “abuse” was actually a false memory, implanted by a therapist. They were innocent victims.

Granted, the psychiatrist I saw was unethical, but his only agenda in treating me was getting me medicated, which I consistently refused. 

They went one step further: they told all of our relatives and family friends that I was a victim of so-called “false memory syndrome,” that I was sick and not to be believed. They said they had no idea why I maintained this vendetta against them, but they were the victims. 

To this day, I don’t know what my relatives think about that. No one’s ever talked about it with me. But the family I knew growing up never talked about the unpleasant stuff. Everyone pretended it didn’t exist. And those who did dare speak about it were shamed. “We don’t air our dirty laundry in public.”

I found a letter that my parents had written to my husband, urging him to have me committed to a psychiatric hospital “for my own good,” and pleading with him to see their side, how much I was hurting them.

My husband witnessed some of the abuse. He read the threatening letters and email, he heard the sexual comments my father made about and to me. He remembers well pulling up to the house to pick me up for a date when I was 17, and hearing my mom screaming at me from inside the house because I had tried to fix a cheap necklace clasp and it broke. He heard similar screaming at me over the phone when my mom would call me.

I responded the way I honestly think a healthy adult would respond: I cut off contact with my parents. (This gave them more fodder for the “our daughter is sick” file.) A couple years later, my brother reached out to me via email. I was wary, but I wanted family so badly. I had my husband, a few friends, but no one else. I wrote back to him, but I was anxious about how much I told him. I tried to keep everything vague. I’d double- and triple-check my email before I sent it, because I couldn’t trust myself either. 

I didn’t trust doctors, therapists, anyone who offered something to me, because I was certain they’d want something in return, and whatever they wanted would be debilitatingly painful. I didn’t trust anyone enough to develop friendships, and the isolation fueled the recurring depression and anxiety I’d had since my early teens. I’d try to work, but I would wind up in the hospital with suicidal intentions. I thought everyone else would be better off if I was no longer on the planet—if they even noticed that I was gone. 

Throughout all of this, my guides were with me, but I didn’t always choose to listen to them. In the worst of my depression and self-hatred, I had a hard time connecting with them. And to be honest, I questioned if they were real, or if they were part of the delusions that my parents claimed I had. They were never wrong, and they always made me feel better, but maybe they were just the creations of a sick mind.

In 2003, I got into therapy. I’d kept copies of all the emails and letters I’d sent my parents while I was in touch with them, along with their letters to me. I gave them to the therapist. I avoided talking about memories and stuck to my current conversations with my parents, most of which revolved around their parenting advice about my two children, mostly warning me that I’d have spoiled children if I didn’t spank them. The therapist said the letters and emails were one of the most severe cases of gaslighting she’d ever seen. 

Eventually, I trusted her enough to tell her about my guides. She was skeptical at first, but asked a lot of questions. (My guides answered some of them.) She took my case to a board review, which included psychologists, psychiatrists, and clergy. They discussed it, considered other diagnoses, and unanimously declared me a “mystic.” They didn’t know how, but they were completely convinced that the entities I talked with were both divine and real.

My therapist heartily encouraged me to work more with my guides. I began to stop doubting their existence. And slowly, I began to trust them. 

For years, they talked about how I also needed to trust myself. Taking baby steps, I let go of my self-doubt too. When I posted in a very vague way on my blog about what it was like growing up, and the time CPS came to the house, my brother angrily commented that I was wrong, that none of this happened, that I was lying and hurting everyone. Fortunately for me, I had a witness to the CPS investigation—my best friend in high school, who also witnessed some of the things my parents did and said. But that experience left me too frightened to publicly state anything about what I’d experienced. Until now.

In 2009, my mom died. My dad had died a few years earlier. Going through my mom’s house, I found a file with my name on it. In it, she’d amassed every article she could find on false memories. She also had printed email correspondence with my brother. Back when he’d reached out to me by email, and I’d cautiously started talking with him, he was forwarding my responses to my parents. Between them, they’d discussed this, agreed it was best that I shouldn’t know what they were doing.

This time, instead of feeling like I was wrong or sick, I was angry.

My guides led me to a coach who was able to help me have experiences of trusting myself and trusting others in a safe space. Bit by bit, she helped me see that I could share myself with trusted people, safe people, and be supported. Even loved.

When I was later faced with another betrayal—this time from my (now former) faith community—I chose a different response. I walked away. 

I share all this with you now for several reasons. First and foremost, because I need to end the silence. In silence and secrecy about this, there has been shame, and I have nothing to be ashamed of. Instead, I want to walk forward in integrity and authenticity, and that requires honesty and speaking my truth. My guides are 100% behind me in this, and their support has given me the courage and strength to sit down and write this.

Second, I’m sharing this because every time I have wanted to post something about my experience, whether with my guides or about how I grew up, there has been an imposing What will people (especially relatives) think? hanging over my head. It keeps me in a wounded child position. I do not owe anyone my silence in exchange for maintaining their comfort.

Third, I’m sharing this for all of those who want to share their truth, who want to be free from the shame, but can’t yet. Maybe it’s not safe. Maybe they’re not ready. Maybe they still believe the gaslighting, the lies that it’s somehow our own fault, that we’re only speaking up to get attention, that we’re troublemakers or bitter, that we can’t let it go, we’re too sensitive and can’t take a joke, that it’s all in the past and we should forgive and forget.

No. I have forgiven my parents for myself, but to forget is to condone what was done, and what is still being done to others. To forget is to dishonor the past, to say it’s all okay now. It was not, and is not okay.

And as I see now parents and partners of people I know gaslighting them, verbally abusing them and then claiming they’re making it all up, that it’s their depression or anxiety talking, that what they remember are false memories (or fake news), that they’ve blown it all out of proportion, I can keep quiet no longer.

I am not sick or deranged or making it up or trying to get attention or wanting to file a lawsuit. I am claiming my truth and standing in it. I am no longer ashamed. I am free to be who I am, regardless of what others think or say.

And for all those who get me on a deep level, when you’re ready, I’ll be here and we can stand together.

PTSD: a poem

⁣​you hide

in shadows and behind 

darkened memories

looking for a weakness

a way in

a break in my flawed façade

just a crack

a whisper

the chance to turn

dream into nightmare

laughter to tears

hope into ruin 

love to loss 

you wait patiently

for me to fail

to forget to be

protective of this new life

the one I built

created with my own hands

a metamorphosis of self

reinvented 

a family to call my own

a home

a place to belong 

to be

you hide and wait

to destroy me

with nearly-forgotten pain

but I will not

will not let you

because this time

I have something

to live for

Copyright ©2017 

by Sheyna Galyan

sheynagalyan.com

On Family

Seven years ago today, I wrote about family, about finding it and losing it and recreating it. 
Seven years later, these words are still true.

*    *    * I've been resting and talking and reading and trying to work through the fallout that inevitably happens when you try to go home again. In one sense, what I did was so easy. I flew on a plane to my mom's house several months after she died, cleaned it up, packed much, donated more, and drove home.

In another sense, it couldn't have been harder. I flew to the house where my mom suffered and died, slept in the same room where nurses and aids and family and friends cared for her in her last weeks, sat in the same chair I'd sat in months earlier while stroking her still-warm body, only seconds after she'd left it behind on her journey. I relived every moment of our trip in December '08 and again in April/May '09, discovering priceless information about this very complex and very convoluted family that would throw me into a deep and sudden awe and compassion upon finding one treasure, anger and betrayal at the next discovery.

But that's what family is for, is it not? To leave future generations with enough burning questions and obsessions that neither genealogy researchers nor therapists will ever have to worry about job security.

In my family, in that house, with those memories, I'm still confused. Information I discovered that had never been shared with me before, information that made me see my parents with part-awe and part betrayal, not knowing in that moment if I loved them or hated them, but only knowing I couldn't walk away.

My brother and I, who could barely be trusted to be left alone when we were kids, lest one of us injure the other seriously enough to require medical attention, went through 65 years of collected possessions, including possessions my mom had inherited from her mom and dad and from her mother-in-law. We opened every box, unwrapped every piece cushioned by well-worn newspaper or paper towel. It was a life autopsy of possessions and we, the examiners, separated and examined and weighed and tested every piece.

Numerous times, most notably when I was eyeing the growing stack of boxes for me to take back home and then visualizing the interior of a minivan and trying to figure out how it would all fit, I would wonder why I had come to do this in the first place.

Why?

It seems instantly an easy enough answer. I wanted some remnants of my childhood, as did my brother. I wanted some mementos of my parents, ones that focused on the happy times. I didn't want my brother to have to do this all by himself. And I wanted to get the place cleaned out so it could be rented. Another family, new life, new dreams. I think Mom would have liked that.

But was that really it? Digging through boxes and papers and clothing and endless amounts of plastic utensils and wet wipes and matches, the detritus of a life lived and loved and suffered and lost, what did I really find?

I found that family is a need, not a noun. Family could have been brutal and unforgiving, it could have meant growing up battered in mind, body, and spirit, and it also could have been children's laughter on the swingset, a surprise trip to the zoo to put the blue elephant key in the box and hear the narrator tell you about what animal you're viewing. Family is the need to always display some photographs and never others, never quite explaining if the hidden ones are being sequestered away to be forgotten or in need of more precious protection than hanging openly on a wall.

Family is a beginning and often, an end. Family is where we came from, that lifeline to who we were and how we came to be this way. Family is our excuse, our answered prayer, our legacy, our mark on the world. We love it and hate it, run to it and rebel from it.

Spending one week immersed in this family, in these memories, in this house, I was nearly ready to walk away. But I didn't, and now I'm home in the midst of these memory-filled items, not sure whether to mourn or rejoice, whether to use these objects as jumping-off points for discussions about the great-great-grands and how their lives were similar or different, or whether to pack them away until I can look at them without feeling such a hollow sense of loss.

I sorted and cleaned my way through a person's life, learning as I went, and found a woman I hadn't completely gotten to know, and now never will. Then I spent a week trying to return to my family, my mind ever on the challenges of the road I was taking. And then when I got home, I buried myself in a collection of political thrillers, looking, as the characters are, for order within chaos, duty within impossible moral choices, fleeing a past that may never be gone, and in fact parts of which are sitting in my living room.

I went for family, I stayed for family. And yet I feel like I'm leaving with a different sense of family. Gone is the omnipotence; what remains behind is the shattered life that found comfort in collections. And after picking up the pieces, I moved toward a family that I want simply to be honest and decent and caring.

You can't go home again, but you can define home and family for yourself and build it, out of the tools you inherited from your family, or the creative adaptations you learned because the only tools left to you were so morally broken they weren't worth using.

I did it for family. Which one—then or now?  Neither, actually. I did it for what family means to my heart and soul, where family means the most.

Originally posted on Interstate Insanity
Reprinted with permission
Copyright ©2010 by Sheyna Galyan

Four Lighthouses (or Why You Matter)

Many thanks to Teresa Romain/Access Abundance for the inspiration.

Have you ever thought about what it's like to be a lighthouse? I have. Of course, I am a lighthouse, so I guess it's only natural. I'm nothing special. Wide and a little on the short side, I'm not even 100 feet tall, though I do sit on the bluffs overlooking a very large lake. The lake gets a lot of marine traffic, most of it well to my west. I'm on the eastern coast, where a few ships glide by and storms rarely hit. The main marine channel is along the west side of the lake, and that's where the bad weather tends to be the nastiest.

There are three lighthouses on that side of the lake. On the northernmost point is a famous lighthouse that people travel from all over the world to see. It's everything a lighthouse should be: tall (181 feet), strong, with a very bright light. It's survived every storm without appearing to age a day. In fact, on the rare occasions that tourists come to visit me, I hear things about this lighthouse. That it almost never needs repair. That it is one of the most picturesque lighthouses in the world, part of it painted in a sleek black paint that almost looks like leather. That if you had a lighthouse fetish, just looking at it would make you weak in the knees. It even has a foghorn, loud and low. If there was such as thing as a badass lighthouse, this one would be it.

The lighthouse just south of that is the tallest lighthouse on the lake, a whopping 204 feet tall. People love to visit it, and I hear that tourists can even climb the lighthouse, to see the view from so high up. It also is a picturesque lighthouse, a gorgeous tan color that never seems to fade or get dirty, topped with a brown cupola and gallery that make it look almost like it has long hair, which tourists say is adorable. But what I hear most about this lighthouse is that its light is so gentle and warm, nearly everyone who's ever seen it says it's like being smiled upon by the sun. This ginormous lighthouse has survived the strongest storms, including some straight-line winds that came through nearly ten years ago. The winds cracked part of the tower, but it never failed to light the way, and after only a little repair, it was even stronger than before.

To the south, the third lighthouse is an enigma. It's not especially tall, about 160 feet, but it attracts tourists from all over just because it's nearly everything one would never expect from a lighthouse. Instead of a bright white light shining over the lake, its light is a bright blue, almost glowing in its intensity. And it is painted the most bizarre of colors, multi-colored polka dots visible along one strip of its tower, contrasting zig-zags along another, some sort of random paint splotches on a third, and, from what people have said, another strip is always something different. No one ever sees anyone out there painting, yet whenever locals revisit the lighthouse, it's always new. Tourists love to take photos in front of this lighthouse, and often find themselves letting loose and having fun, taking goofy photos of themselves and each other, often making new friends in the process.

It's hard, quite honestly, to be a short, unremarkable lighthouse on the other side of the lake from these three other lighthouses. Most nights, I shine my unremarkable light onto water that is shipless. I wonder, more often than I'd like to admit, why I was even built here. It seems I'm never needed, while it's clear that the three lighthouses on the other side of the lake are both needed and wanted.

I begin to dream about what it would be like to be wanted and needed as they are. I'd have to be taller—much taller—and brighter, and somehow stronger or more beautiful or weirder. I'd have to be different, something that both ships and tourists alike would appreciate. This thought consumes me and sometimes my light sputters. But that's okay, because it's not like it's actually needed, anyway.

And so one night, I lose myself in a dream about having a lighthouse makeover. In the dream, I have moved to the western coast of the lake, grown nearly 100 feet, and am trying out different paint colors and patterns. I've tried changing my light color too, even experimenting with a rotating rainbow of colors. I'm so engrossed with exploring all the variations between stately and silly that I don't notice at first that the wind has picked up. It isn't until I hear the howling that I realize a storm has arrived, but that makes sense, because I'm on the west coast now. I wonder if it's possible to be beautiful and strong and courageous and fun.

I'm trying to figure out how to do that when a large branch hits my tower and I'm suddenly back in my place on the eastern coast, wind howling around me, trees bent almost to breaking. Hail arrives, making visibility almost nonexistent. I am so disappointed that I'm back to being unremarkable, not-beautiful, not-strong, not-courageous, and most definitely not-fun, and I let my light grow dim and hunker down to sit out the storm.

And then I sense it: a ship on the lake, very much in trouble. And it's headed my way. This is not good. The reason the western coast is the main marine channel is because the lake is deeper there. Where I am, it's much shallower. Ships know not to come this way. But this ship is being driven by the wind, unable to see through the hail and rain, and it will crash on the shoal if it's not warned away.

I put everything I have into my light, yelling as loud as I can through my rarely-used foghorn. I'm not used to the exertion and the effort tires me, but I know that I cannot allow this ship to sink. One of the bulbs in my light flickers and threatens to blow, but I can redirect some of the energy and keep it from overloading. I keep scanning the horizon, looking for some sign of the ship itself, but can barely see through the weather. I cannot tell if the ship is still coming closer or heading back toward the marine channel.

I keep my light shining and my horn blowing throughout the storm, unable to think beyond the next moment, keeping my focus solely on light/horn/light/horn/light/horn, until the storm finally abates near dawn. Finally I can rest, and I do, drained.

For weeks after that, there are no more storms on my side of the lake, and I am back to thinking about the three amazing lighthouses across the water from me. And then one day a bus pulls up and dozens of people get out, standing around me and taking photos. I am confused. Don't they know that the picturesque lighthouses are on the other side of the lake?

As I stand there, I catch pieces of their conversation.

"I thought for sure this lighthouse would be taller."

"Have you ever seen a light that bright come from a lighthouse?"

"I can't believe this little lighthouse out here all alone saved our lives."

And then I understand. This is the crew of that ship standing around. They are here and not dead or injured because of me.

The thought is stunning and I have a hard time believing it. I argue against it, listing again all the things I am not. How many lives have the other three lighthouses saved? It must be thousands, hundreds of thousands.

One of the ship's crew comes over to my tower and puts a hand against me. "You keep that light shining, you hear?" he says softly. "We've traveled this lake hundreds of times and never knew you were here. And then the one time we really needed you, you were there for us. I was able to make it home in time to be there when my wife gave birth. I may see those other three lighthouses more often, but you're the one I'm going to think about." With that, he pats his hand on the side of my tower and walks away, hands in his pockets.

And then, as I watch the bus pull away, I think that maybe, just maybe, it was kind of a badass thing that stormy night for me to keep going until dawn. Maybe, just maybe, I was stronger than I thought. There's no doubt in my mind now that knowing one of the crew got to be with his wife while she gave birth is a thing of beauty.

And maybe, just maybe I don't need to be an odd lighthouse. Maybe I just need to be me. Where I am. As I am.

Though a few new colors on my tower could be fun.

Shine on.

Lessons From High School—30 Years Later

I went to my 30th high school reunion last weekend.

Aww... Thanks for saying that I look like I couldn't be more than 18 years out of high school. That's sweet.

Anyway, I had a pretty good idea who I was in high school. Or at least, I knew what I cared about (ethics, humanity's search for the divine, playing your best game with a badly-dealt hand, kindness to others, global respect, resilience of the spirit, the priceless value of life) and what I didn't care about (fashion, dating, gossip, makeup, social status, school politics).

Which made me kind of a nerd. And a social outcast—a role I embraced wholeheartedly.

My first three years of high school were spent with one especially good friend who had similar interests, exploring exactly those things that mattered to me, and by the end of my junior year, I had a pretty good idea of why I was on the planet. But then my best friend graduated a year before me and I had rarely felt so alone and adrift. Always the questioner, I wondered if there was actually an average number of french fries served with hot lunch, and began counting my french fries at lunchtime, to see how much disparity there was from day to day. I ate alone, people-watching in the quad, and simultaneously felt a longing to be accepted and a desire to get away from it all.

High school graduation photo, 1986

From exploring the mysteries of the universe to counting my french fries seemed to be a pretty long fall to me, and I filed my senior year away as "pathetic loser." When I graduated and went off to college, I didn't look back.

I kept in touch with a very few close friends, including that one special friend, but high school held nothing other than pain for me. And so I largely ignored the reunion invitations as they came and went.

A few years ago, I became aware that it wasn't that I didn't care about my high school years. It was that I was still running away from them. And I'd done enough work on myself that I knew it was time to put those ghosts of high school to rest, once and for all.

I won't lie. I was scared shitless in the days before the reunion. That 17-year-old high school senior was afraid I'd be walking into the middle of the kind of cruel judgment that only teenagers can dish out. I was convinced they'd see me now as I was sure they'd seen me then: ugly, weird, worthless. I weighed barely 100 lbs. in my senior photo, recovering from several years of anorexia. Nearly thirty years later, after long years of doing battle with my childhood demons (there might be one or two still skulking around), I wore my scars in the form of distrust, social anxiety, depression, and weight gain. So now I was sure my classmates, many of whom were still trim and athletic and gorgeous (or appeared so on Facebook) could add "fat" to their assessment of me.

And then a weird thing happened. A shift, both subtle and profound, as I prepared myself to walk back into the haunted memories of high school. I stopped caring. Really, honestly, stopped caring what they might think. Because I know the truth: I have come a long way in my healing, my growth, my embrace of my spirit. My body will follow; I trust that now. By fully embracing myself, self-care becomes a desire rather than an unwanted obligation. Change always has to come from within.

When I graduated from high school, I was a mere eighteen months past seriously wanting to end my life. Now, thirty years later, though those intervening years were punctuated by death and unemployment and housing crises and medical challenges, I am living the life I've always wanted. I have a strong, solid marriage (25 years as of July, 30 years together), children (now teens) who still love to hang out with me, a 98-year-old house that I love being in, close friends who share those same values I've long held, a career I've dreamed of since third grade, and a clear, strong sense of who I really am.

I walked into the first of three social events at the reunion willing to be open to whatever showed up, be it criticism or acceptance, or anything in between. And I learned that while I was right about how I see myself, I was wrong about how my classmates see me. Wrong about how they'd always seen me.

I was, in fact, really, really wrong.

Many classmates shared their memories of me, and those things I was so sure they'd thought about me didn't come up at all. I started keeping track of the adjectives they used, and other than "quiet" (definitely then, and mostly out of fear, but not at all now), I was amazed at the words that came up most often:

Kind. Caring. Compassionate. Fiercely independent. Quick-witted (especially with puns). Champion of the underdog. Deep thinking (really, really deep). Poet/great writer. Badass.

Huh.

I'm humbled to say that they might have known me better than I knew myself thirty years ago. Because every one of those adjectives have been used to describe me lately, and I'd have to agree with them. ("Badass" took me a while to accept, but I'm down with it now.)

At the tree where I spent many hours
exploring the mysteries of the
universe. 2016.

I thought I'd changed so much since high school, that I barely resembled the girl I was. I think now it's less that I changed, and more that I grew into who I am, who I was meant to me. I was all those adjectives in high school, but you had to take the time to get to know me before you saw them. (The "quiet" part drowned the rest out unless you were willing to look deeper.) Now, they're big and obvious. "Quiet" is my default only when I'm under a lot of stress.

I went to my high school reunion, thinking that I'd show them—and myself—how much I'd changed for the better. And I did this weekend walk those familiar paths between classrooms with more confidence and contentment and clarity than I ever felt in that place. Already, I was no longer haunted by high school.

But the surprise for me was that my classmates showed me that they'd seen who I really was all along. And for that gift, I thank them.

Bitter Herbs

I haven't written a blog post in over six months for a very good reason: I couldn't. I couldn't find the right words and when I thought I might have a few of them, I couldn't stop grieving. Yet somehow, once again Pesach (Passover) has given me tools with which to describe my leaving the most recent narrow place.

It's interesting to note that when I write books, they're always in response to some Big Question. Destined to Choose was an answer I could live with to the question "Why is there evil in the world?" Strength to Stand was an answer to "How much intolerance must we tolerate? And if the answer is 'none,' aren't we also being intolerant?" But I've never been able to write my way through traumatic experiences. My third novel, No One to Fear, due out in 2017, is the first post-9/11 book in the Rabbi David Cohen series. It's the first time I've been able to write about 9/11. I haven't yet been able to write about my parents' deaths, and it's been twelve years and seven years, respectively. Last December brought another kind of trauma and I'm only now able to write about it without bursting into tears.

September 2015 was filled with joy and book events. To my utter amazement, I found myself on TV, radio, in several newspapers, and around the Internet. For an introverted author, this was both exciting and terrifying. I flew to North Carolina (back when anyone could still use the bathroom most appropriate for them) for Bouchercon, the world's largest mystery/suspense/thriller convention for authors and fans. I met wonderful booksellers and readers and fellow authors through November.

In early December I had another book event, one that I'd dreamed about for years: being the December spotlight author for the local JCC's Jewish Book Series. It was, in many ways, a dream come true. And it was sponsored by my home synagogue. The rabbi seemed excited, and at one point said, "We have an opportunity to celebrate one of our own." Except it didn't turn out that way. At all.

I'm not going to go into details, because that isn't the point of this post. I'm also not going to name names, because that also isn't the point. (I ask that any commenters please not name names in the comments either. If you know me in person and want more details than this post gives, please contact me by email or through Facebook.)

What that event did do, however, was open my eyes to a problem that I'd been avoiding and choosing not to see for years: the shul had let members of my family (and me) down repeatedly over 20+ years. I'm not talking about the occasional human oversight. I'm talking about an ongoing failure of communication, of actions not matching words. Of talking the talk but not walking the walk.

My kids (now both teens) had no ties to the shul. No friends, no future there. My husband, save for a couple of individual friends, felt no sense of community. I was convinced that the problem was with me: if I just tried harder, I would be valued.

But December's event made me realize that all this time that I thought I was eating a savory, substantial brisket, I was really eating bitter herbs, washed down with the salt water of my own tears.

In an email I sent to the rabbi the day after that December event, I wrote, "The fastest way to drive someone away from Judaism is to make them feel like they have no value." I stand by that comment. We as human beings are hard-wired to belong. We need community (even us introverts).

Since joining that congregation some 20+ years ago, I had often wondered—and worried—what if I really, really needed my Jewish community, and they weren't there for me? While they sometimes were there for me, there were far more times when they weren't, including (but not limited to) my father's unexpected death, an extremely difficult pregnancy, and a life-threatening crisis involving my youngest son. During all of these times, I reached out for support. I didn't hide or expect anyone to read my mind. I heard the words I needed to hear ("We care very much") but no action followed. No minyan after my father's death. No support while I was under doctor's orders to remain in bed during pregnancy. No support or even resources during my son's crisis. I couldn't rely on their support. I couldn't trust that I actually had a community.

Thank G-d I didn't feel the need to leave Judaism as a result of this. I can't even imagine doing that. But with my family's input, I did come to the conclusion that this was not a healthy environment for me or my family. We had to leave our spiritual home and find a new one.

Psychology teaches about behavior change through rewards. Nearly everyone has heard about Pavlov's dog. That's an example of classical conditioning. Anyone who uses clicker training with a dog or cat is also using classical conditioning. But another type of behavior modification is called variable ratio. Slot machines work on a variable ratio reward system. You keep inserting a nickel or quarter or dollar into the machine and while you lose most of the time, you win just often enough to keep inserting those coins, ever hopeful that the big win is just around the corner.

Synagogues (and churches and mosques and other faith communities) should not work on a variable ratio reward system. For many people, these communities are their primary support network. It is true that no single group can meet all the needs of their members, or even all the needs of one member. But if it's actually practicing what it preaches, so to speak, it can do much better than 50%.

Since January, I've been going through a grieving process. While my kids and husband have been able to move on to the new synagogue without regrets, I feel like I've been through a divorce — or what I imagine a divorce would feel like. Thoughts like "I thought you cared," and "I thought we had something" and "Was it all a lie?" continually flit through my mind.

I emailed a handful of people from the congregation with whom I felt close, to let them know we were leaving, but outside of a few of those people, no one — including clergy — has reached out to us. There was no contact when we ended our membership. No contact when I gave an exit interview to a committee chair a few weeks later — and the committee chair only knew because she was one of the recipients of my email. It feels like the 20+ years we put into that community meant nothing, has no value. It's as if our family never mattered.

But I refuse to be defined by others' indifference. I've learned and grown enough to know that what we experienced in this congregation is not a reflection of us but rather a reflection of them. I didn't see the signs before December but I do now. I recognize now that leaving was an act of health, of taking care of myself and my family.

I'm still navigating the grief. It's too soon for me to go back to visit. Aside from a simcha next fall, I'm not sure it's appropriate to go back at all. My family sees no need to visit. In fact, my youngest, who was about to call it quits on Judaism all together, based on his experiences with our old congregation and the local Jewish school, has blossomed and begun to thrive at the new synagogue.

It is hard to let go. It's hard to give up on a relationship of more than 20 years, even when that relationship caused pain. It's hard to give up on what could have been, and that's what I'm really grieving. But it's also what I have to look forward to with the new synagogue: what can be.

Here's to life, and second chances, and the journey toward a new and fulfilling relationship.

Triggers, Critics, and Rosh Hashanah

It is two days before my newest novel, Strength to Stand, is released to the public, and I would have expected myself to be ecstatic. The book and I have both overcome so many odds to get to this point that the very fact some interested reader can hold it in his or her hand is nothing short of a miracle. Emotions swirl around inside me: gratitude, pride, humility, joy.

Yet there are others there, uninvited guests who have taken up residence in the party room, scaring away the fun with their chilly presence: pain, despair, hopelessness, depression. I was certain I hadn't invited them, certain my focus was on the guests I wanted. I had every intention of getting autographs from hope, opportunity, and love. So why the downer?

Because pistol triggers aren't the only kind of triggers that can leave a gaping, bloody hole in one's life.

If you've spent some time on this blog, you know that I've come out about battling depression, among other things. I've also written a little about what life was like in my family, growing up. Over time, I finally learned that I have worth, that my opinion counts, and that the Torah actually commands us to love ourselves (though not in a narcissistic way). These are life lessons that we need to learn experientially, not intellectually. And for those of us who grew up with a lot of criticism or shame or violence, learning these life lessons may well be the thing that keeps us alive.

But what these lessons do not do, unfortunately, is erase the pain or the shame or the scars left on our bodies and souls. And when something similar to those original assaults comes along, it can rip off the scabs, tear open the scars, and leave us hurting and weakened, right back in the center of hell.

There's some interesting psychology around what are now called Adverse Childhood Events (ACEs). There are a total of ten (defined) ACEs, events occurring before a child turns 18, including but not limited to physical and sexual abuse, physical or emotional neglect, mental illness or addiction in the family, and divorce, violence, or death in the family. The ACE study has linked these adverse childhood events with later (decades later) physical and emotional health issues. The higher you score on the ACE Questionnaire, the greater the likelihood you'll have one or more of the health issues commonly associated with ACEs.

Is it causal or correlational? The brain science behind the study does seem to show that it's causal. Long-term stress caused by these ACEs has a physiological effect on the development of the brain, thus leaving individuals at greater risk for health problems and reduced longevity. But it's not a death sentence. Science also shows that there are things we can do to help heal our brains.

Nowhere on that list, though, is finding ourselves, willingly or not, in the middle of situations that resemble the original assaults we endured.

We call those situations triggers, though that seems like a relatively innocuous word to describe all that scab-ripping, soul-tearing pain. Avoiding triggers is good. Becoming strong enough in ourselves that the triggers lose their power is even better.

I'm not there yet. I will be. But not today.

I got triggered this past week, which is probably what sent out the party invitations to the chilly, downer guests. Here's what happened, in a nutshell.

• I received a mean-spirited, snarky review of Strength to Stand from a review journal infamous for mean-spirited, snarky reviews. They described my characters in caricatures, wrote in hyperbole, and then accused me of writing stereotypes.
• Everyone else said that this was one (anonymous) person's opinion, and meant nothing amidst the sea of overwhelmingly positive reviews. One supporter thought my book was "too Jewish" for this reviewer. Another wondered to what extent there might have been an undercurrent of antisemitism. My favorite comment, by far, was from one reader who asked, "Who peed in [their] Wheaties this morning?"
• My brain didn't—couldn't—go there, as much as I tried. I tried doing the whole I-have-worth, I-am-loved, I-am-not-defined-by-one-review thing and no matter how much I practiced measured breathing and positive thoughts, they could not break through the Door of Shame that locked me inside with all my trigger emotions.
• Locked behind that door, I was a child again, harshly and undeservedly tongue-lashed by an adult who held my physical and emotional safety, indeed my entire survival, in their hands.
• My brain processed this criticism as "Not only did you do something bad, but by creating this and putting it out into the world, you have irreparably harmed the universe."
• My brain, honed by forty years of well-placed, well-timed barbs meant to cut, maim, and destroy, followed this train of thought: I did bad = I am bad = I am not worthy of living.

The negative critic in my head has been busy too. "If you're going to be an author, you're going to need thicker skin than that. Maybe you're not cut out to do this author thing." No judgment there.

Intellectually, I get it. All authors get bad reviews. No author's books are for everyone, and clearly, the snarky reviewer is not the intended demographic for my book. The greatest authors of all time get bad reviews. The book I'm reading right now and love has received bad reviews. It's one person's opinion and nothing more. I get it. I really do.

Emotionally, the child-me has associated that review with a parent's authority, tossed it onto the mountain of evidence that I don't measure up, and tried to convince me to find another career. Or at least stop writing Jewishly-themed books.

In related news, I've finally gotten around to watching the last half of Glee Season 5. The episode in which Rachel reads every negative review ever written about her performance in Funny Girl, of course, hit home. It begged the question, "Am I going to let the bullies, the haters, the trolls keep me from my passion?" Am I really going to give them power over me? Over my life?

Clearly, critics and bullies and haters (or those who comprise all three) are in abundance these days, especially on the Internet. Responses to them have made their way into popular songs, as well as television shows, evidenced by lyrics like, "Done looking for the critics 'cause they're everywhere / They don't like my jeans, they don't get my hair" (P!nk, "Perfect," 2010). 

Taylor Swift, in an interview about the song-you-either-love-or-hate, "Shake It Off," said, "The message [in 'Shake It Off'] is a problem we all deal with on a daily basis. [. . .] We live in a takedown culture. People will find anything about you and twist it to where it’s weird or wrong or annoying or strange or bad. You have to not only live your life in spite of people who don’t understand you — you have to have more fun than they do."

So as we head into the Jewish New year, as I ponder the year ahead and what I want it to look like, what G-d may want it to look like for me, words from the Unetanah Tokef—a thousand-year-old religious poem—come to mind: "Who will be safe and who will be torn? Who will be calm and who will be tormented?"

It is said, during Rosh Hashanah in general and during this poem specifically, that teshuvah (return [also translated as "repentance"]), tefilah (prayer), and tzedakah (justice [also meaning to act in a just or charitable manner]) can "avert the severity of the decree." While some interpret this to mean they must confess their sins, pray more (or go to shul more), and donate more money to charity, here's my interpretation:

Teshuvah (return): I return from what others think of me to knowing who I really am. I am Sheyna. I am created b'tselem Elokim, in the image of G-d. Through G-d, I am loved and accepted completely and unconditionally. Without need of caveat or disclaimer, I am enough, just as I am.

Tefilah (prayer): I internalize my intention to return, and I ask for G-d's love and support in my process and at all times. I seek out time for prayer and meditation, time to Connect. I seek out people who are loving and supportive, and situations in which I feel safe and supported.

Tzedakah (justice): My actions toward myself and others come from a place of justice. I treat my body, mind, and soul with care, compassion, and love, for I and others are created in the image of G-d, and how I treat myself and others is how I treat G-d. I do not expect perfection, but I do expect myself to show up and do all I can.

I know that this is not an all-done!-check-it-off sort of deal. We do have Rosh Hashanah every year, after all. We have every day to make a change. Every morning when I wake, up I can choose whether I want to keep my power or give it to the critics. In every moment, I can choose whether to see myself as I fear others may see me, or I can be who I am.

I may not be able to avoid the triggers, nor the wounds they leave. Yet. But I may have found the key to get out of that locked room of shame, and the exit door to show to my chilly guests.

Because damn it, I worked really freaking hard to get this book out into the world, and it's time to party!