Only for Those who Need Courage To Heal and Change

I write of my own experiences as I seek continued healing so that I might encourage you to do the same. God never gives up on us because God is the force of evolution both in the universe and within the human heart and soul. I want to be the very best priest I can be for the People of God. I have not addressed these issues/events of my life in a therapeutic setting prior to now. I have spent a lifetime of prayer asking God's healing and forgiveness for what I have done as St. Paul wrote "because of this thorn in my side."

Our journeys are unique yet each of us is wounded by life in some way. How to seek healing, how to find the courage to look deep into our own wounds? What is unconscious controls our behavior toward ourselves and others. We can look at our shadow side and we can be healed of wounds and be in control of how we live in relationship with others. By doing the inner work we cultivate our soul's earth for the seed of compassion to grow. Through growing in compassion we become mature daughters and sons of God our Mother and Father. God provides healing for us through our interactions with other human beings; for deep wounds it is best to enter this work with an experienced professional.

Today I wanted to experience healing around the trauma of being in relationship with my ex-husband for over 30 years. It was not a healthy relationship for myself, for him or our daughter and son. I know that healing of myself includes compassion for my ex husband. Today Dr. S used a different technique for "diving deep" into the feelings connected with our relationship.

In our relationship, there is no one instance that stands out, it is a repetitive pattern of emotional abuse even if the other would deny ever doing it. How Dr. S began really set me back. "What you are describing is a form of sadism" I was shocked. I think of the term connected with whips and chains, physical stuff.

Dr S explained, I will try to do the best I can in repeating what he said, "The one who commits such emotional violence is trying to love you, believes he is loving you. First your self esteem must be destroyed so he is in control. This way he can love you and not be vulnerable in his own feelings; he is safe in loving you." This relationship was created and continued unconsciously on his part and my part.

My ex-spouse teased, put down, discounted, ignored completely any expression of feelings and needs expressed by me. By the 5th year of my marriage I was literally neurotic, depressed, anxious and most of all fearful. I was paralyzed emotionally. As they say in AlAnon "it was insanity." I no longer existed, I was an extension of my ex's personality. I was to meet his needs and did so denying my very soul and every value I had lived until I married him. I was truly trapped in the emotional and spiritual Hell of my own and my ex's making.

I want to disconnect myself emotionally and to heal the wounds of this relationship so I might be compassion for myself and others. The process is like Velcro Dr. S explained. Right now there is an emotional hook which fits into a loop. The healing takes place when the loop is opened and there is no longer a loop for the hook. These are the emotions within the dynamic of the relationship.

Throughout today's exercise I am "to be my ex" not myself; that is feel, talk as if I am him. The process took an hour and I cannot relate it all, I will give examples from it.

The process looks like this.
Two fingers to the center of chest.
two fingers on side of nose touching brow,
fingers to side of eye,
fingers to bone under eye.

Looking for a memory to start.
then a feeling
feeling with new image if it comes
experience new image
a feeling

Or a repeat if the feeling/image does not change.
Many exhortations by Dr S to "dive deeper" into the feeling; to feel it in the now as completely as I could as my ex.
Two fingers on my chest to repeat as my ex spouse "I am feeling____, I love myself unconditionally in body, mind and spirit."

We started out with my being my ex on the first floor of our home in Va. He had taken over the first floor as his office. It had a fireplace, handmade furniture by my brother especially for him. A really, really nice office. Feelings of satisfaction, contentment, pride and happiness were in this room for my ex. Dr. S led me through the hand movements more than once to the point that the room and feelings began to fade into a fog.

Then Dr. S asked me to move to another room in the home. I went upstairs as it was dinner time. What came next is hard to remember accurately. My ex was enjoying the meal Katy had prepared. I kept giving thoughts and descriptions, Dr S kept saying "feeling, feeling" I imagined my ex eating a mouthful of chicken. I imagined the taste, smell, texture.

My ex enjoyed the meal so much because he had been very poor as a child and had gone hungry (I know my ex's dad went hunting and they butchered on the kitchen table). I was to enter into his feelings of poverty, hunger, being deprived.

The image given me was a starving child of Africa poster. My ex was taken a back. The child came out of the poster toward him. He was panicky, turning away. At this point I began to cry, I said, "I can't continue" for Katy would never turn away from a starving child. Dr. S began to tap the outside of the each knee. (I am assuming a meridian pressure point.) He led me back into the image and overwhelming feelings of conflict.

The image became my ex stuck to the tar baby as in Brer Rabbit tales. The rest of time was spent with both halves of the image. The feelings of panic (my ex) the feelings of frustration (me) because I can't get free. I kept trying to "solve the problem" but Dr. S kept insisting on feelings. The session had to end, I was left holding both parts "the tar baby-me, my ex stuck to the tar baby" neither of us able to be freed from the connection.

Dr. S said, "You did well, you continued even when you said, "I can't" I can sit with the images on my own till we meet again. I told him the feelings at the end of the session were the same as when I had the dream at Walter Reed (Jan. 2006) the dream is:

A man/creature is in a loft about 3/4ths of the image. The man/creature is in a spider web shaped like a tunnel. I know he is there and ready to pounce. The loft is hung with black and weapons, the lower floor is also the same. I am standing on the floor below and looking up into the scene. I know I have fought and won (this morning’s session with Dr. M where I spoke my feelings honestly) I was to fight again. A child is with me. I decide ‘No, I do not need to fight.” I turn and walk away. I turn to my right and step out into the sunshine and blue sky.

I had never had a lucid dream before or since. That is a dream where I made a decision that would change my life in the waking world of day. I must do the same with this tar baby situation I think. I am not sure so the healing process will continue when I return from my journeys over the next month. I hope to dream and maybe experience some further insight into my life, healing toward compassion, and its meaning.