Can You Hear Me Part V

To My Valued Blog Readers,

It is my prayer that letters like this one can help speak some truth for you too. Not that I wish you have gone through the same pain, but if you have that I can help you express in words what our experience is like. If it is helpful I pray maybe you can share this with others as a letter from you so they can help you during painful holidays.

Blessings,

Susan

 

Dear friends, church members, people I know,

I know you mean well when you wish me Merry Christmas, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Easter, etc., but what you may not realize is when you do it makes a painful day much more so.

Holidays of all kinds are hard for me for several reasons. Growing up they were a time where my abusers had more access to sexually abuse and rape me so holidays bring these memories back, and I have not had time to work through them yet.

Having these things done to me during the holidays also confuses the meaning of them in my mind. To you the holiday may be celebrating Jesus’ birth or resurrection, but to me it is about surviving and trying to understand now as an adult what the real meaning is.

So I apologize if I am short with you when you wish me well during the holidays, or if I don’t respond at all. It has nothing to do with you at all and everything to do with me and my life experiences.

I am hoping writing this to you will help you understand that the things we experience shape us greatly and I am just now learning for the first time about God’s love, even though I have heard about it my whole life.

I hope you will understand too that the days are also painful for me because I am alone and have no one to be with, and because of my slow understanding of God right now, no church to embrace me either.

So, if you are inclined to invite me, or someone like me, to join you when you do something on one of these holidays it would please me to join you. I would not shy away just because of painful memories. I am anxious to make new ones.

Thank you for understanding and listening. I hope you have been able to hear what I have been trying to say.

Take care,

Susan

 

 

 

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