The year our oldest son dropped out of high school and became an addict was a very dark and difficult year for us. It was also a time of deeper exposure to life’s most important lessons. I didn’t fully realize it until much later, but it was during that anguished time that I gained a greater understanding of humility, honesty, courage, trust and grace. In this week’s post I want to share with … [Read more...] about What I Learned While Our Son Was Still Using Drugs: Part III

The year our oldest son dropped out of high school and became an addict was a very dark and difficult year for us. It was also a time of deeper exposure to life’s most important lessons. I didn’t fully realize it until much later, but it was during that anguished time that I gained a greater understanding of humility, honesty, courage, trust and grace. In this week’s post I want to continue … [Read more...] about What I Learned While Our Son Was Still Using Drugs: Part II

The year our oldest son dropped out of high school and became an addict was a very dark and difficult year for us. It was also a time of deeper exposure to life’s most important lessons. I didn’t fully realize it until much later, but it was during that anguished time that I gained a greater understanding of humility, honesty, courage, trust and grace. In this week’s post I want to share with … [Read more...] about What I Learned While Our Son Was Still Using Drugs: Part I

Early in my journey of recovery from childhood trauma I found myself asking angry, anguished questions of God. I protested. I lamented over my own suffering and the suffering of children everywhere. One of the things I share in this final video is that it is my belief that our anger matters, that our protest and lament are important, that our anguished questions need to be given voice. I believe … [Read more...] about No Matter What, You Are God’s Beloved Child

The fifth video in the series, Recovery from Childhood Trauma, looks at the process of integration. The process of integration involves bringing parts that have been separated together into a whole. Integration happens as our compassionate self embraces our wounded self, as our wounded self takes in love from God, from others and from ourselves, and as our judgmental self releases its defensive … [Read more...] about Integration

The fourth video in this series on Recovery from Childhood Trauma looks at the transformative and tumultuous processes of acknowledging and taking ownership of the internal conflict we are caught in. Taking ownership moves us beyond awareness to a growing acknowledgment that the wounded child self, the harsh and controlling judgmental self, and the observing, compassionate self are truly parts of … [Read more...] about Acknowledging and Taking Ownership

The third video in this series on Recovery from Childhood Trauma looks at the process of developing greater awareness of the long term aftermath many survivors of childhood trauma experience. When we embark on this healing journey, we often have little awareness of what is happening internally. We may be aware that we are anxious or depressed. We may be aware that we are exhausted from trying … [Read more...] about Increasing Awareness