I recently sat down with Annika O’Melia of Rock Island Line for a two hour conversation about trauma recovery, the congregation I am called to serve, St. John’s Lutheran church in Rock Island, Illinois, and our version of being firmly planted in our neighborhood. So take a listen.
Category: Healing
From Hurting to Healing
Life has a way of hurting. The unhealed pain of other people impacts our very existence. Nature, despite human taming and because it, will have its own way. No one lives then without wounds whether buried, forgotten, open, mending, or scars. Two truths:
Every human being hurts.
Every human being can heal.
If we all hurt, then why does the ongoing pain of others so often go unnoticed? And when we do notice why do we tend to stand, literally and metaphorically, an arm’s length away (if not more)? Distancing ourselves while also adding commentary as if their pain is an abstraction? Secretly relieved it is not us.
Because a distinct symptom of human unhealed pain from traumatic experiences of any size, duration, and intensity is disconnection. In disconnection, our relationship with ourselves, others, the world, and the Divine is disrupted. This chasm causes us to struggle with experiencing our own emotions, empathizing with and having compassion for others, and the Divine seems to vanish.
Disconnection, also called dissociation, is not a conscious choice. Often this separation from self and others is a lifesaving one. It is our wonderfully made bodies working to protect us from harm during an fear filled event. Yet if left unattended disconnection causes us and others further suffering.
Research tells us that the prevalence of unhealed pain from traumatic experiences in the United States is estimated to be 60 to 67% of the population.[1] In other words, more of us suffer from the unhealed pain of traumatic experiences than do not. The immensity and commonality of our suffering then demands that the act of ongoing healing be included in our thinking, meditations, prayers, and subsequent actions as a basic need for all humankind. That means you as well as me.
Let’s be clear: Healing takes courage, work, resources, healers, and time. The work of healing earns its worth however in the reconnection our minds to our bodies, hearts, and souls. Our true selves and our common humanity are uncovered and embraced so that we see once again or for the first time the pain of others. Reconnection then creates the space within us to accompany others–friend, family member, stranger–toward healing as our empathy grows and shifts into action. This action is called compassion.
Our healing then is the beginning. Our accompaniment of others, the mission we are called into as human beings on a spiritual journey with the Divine.
[1] https://www.cdc.gov/washington/testimony/2019/t20190711.htm
Trauma’s Dance
On vacation rereading Harriet Lerner’s The Dance of Anger. First found on a bookstore shelf during college years. Title speaking to me. Enough to buy a copy then and again now.
Reflect on how we lose ourselves in crisis, grief, and trauma’s afterlife. Seized by the past with future ceasing not in reality but in imagination. It’s a trauma induced de-selfing. Inflicted on our beings. Impacting our relationships.
Causing overfunction in flight or fight. Underfunction in freeze. Our relationships controlled by the remains of our battered selves. Spinning with trauma’s ongoing truths feeding past’s patterns even if thought eradicated. A rising fueling internal and external turbulence. Stepping toward us with sorrow, sadness. Leaving a wondering of how to stop the incorrigible dance pointing toward destruction within and around. Anger’s waltz keeping pain’s memory fed and alive. Each step minimizing compassion for me.
Lerner writes of shifting anger’s you to I. Blame belonging to you. Shame to I. Mine to heal with love leading to a knowing of where I begin and also end. You existing only outside the boundary of me.
So what if I said, “I want different music, a different dance?”
A new step. A beginning. The first in finding myself again.
Prayers for Pastors & Deacons
I wrote these prayers for pastors, deacons, and others who work for the Church. These petitions found communal life at the 2024 ELCA Northern Illinois Synod Assembly.
God of seed and soil, wind and rain, earth and all creatures,
We see ourselves in the seeds scattered on the path. Instead of birds, the work we do eats us up. Holy Wind blow us off this path and into soil that feeds us. God of good soil, hear our prayer.
We feel like we too fell on rocky ground. We quickly spring from task to task rooted only in our to-do lists with no protection from our own and others’ pain. Holy energy help us find deep soil to grow extensive roots in your being. God of good soil, hear our prayer.
We seek to be surrounded by support and rest. Instead, life prickles with thorns of complaint, gossip, and demands. We cannot catch our breath. We choke. Holy weeder, release us from these tangles. Help us to breathe well again. God of good soil, hear our prayer.
We know we are not alone in our laments and pain. Holy Gospel, open our mouths to tell the truth. Keep us working for justice for all people. God of good soil, hear our prayer.
We send these prayers out into your full creation O, God through your anointed one and with Holy Breath. Amen.
Image by onehundredseventyfive from Pixabay
Unsent Letter
You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased. Luke 3:22
A few years back I began repeating this biblical text to my sons. Words spilling out when I was at the very end of my patience or beyond tired. Often accompanied by placing my hand on their heads of tangled hair in an unofficial gesture of blessing.
These words calmed me. Diffused any situation. Whatever it was. Reminded me that no matter what I loved them with every connected molecule of my being. Later, I would laugh at my audacity. Knowing it would take some time for them to realize I was quoting scripture.
My eldest son asked me on the day of his dad’s one year memorial mass, “How can you be proud of me when I haven’t done anything with my life yet?”
Through tears, I babbled some sort of response. Praying it was enough for my hurting son on that raw and painful day. Later, I thought of what I could have said, still wanted to say. So, I wrote this letter and found it among my many drafts not so long ago, still unsent.
After the 13th of August, 2017
To my beloved sons,
Did you know the root of the word “believe” finds its way back to the word “beloved?” What a wild play on words! To say we believe in something or someone is to acknowledge our love for them.
After all that has happened, I still believe in us, in our family, and in our love for one another. We loved, Dad and I, by believing in one another and in you.
Right now you may not believe in anything. Yet you love. You have loved more in the past twelve months than ever before. Loved Dad in loss and grief. Loved me at my absolute worst. Loved one another in the midst of chaos. And most importantly loved your selves–your grieving, traumatized, messy, lost selves. You may not feel you are loving right now. But here’s what I believe (and therefore love): We cannot face adversity without courage. And true courage is born of love.
I am and remain proud of you both. Not just of who you are right now but of who you will become in life. Not that I know or can see or predict the you that you will be. But I believe in you both.
Love,
Mom
Jennifer Ohman-Rodriguez 