TELLING MY UNTOLD STORY

I'm writing for  Five Minute Friday, and today's prompt word is STORY.    This prompt is in honour of Kate's new book, Share Your Story.   

An untold story never heals.    I read this today on the Facebook page of Letitia Shelton, who is a powerful advocate for women in abusive situations, including within church structures and families.  She is the CEO of City Women in Toowoomba, Australia, working with others to make Toowoomba a safer place for women and children.  She also works in Pacific island nations to encourage women to speak up and tell their stories, and others to listen and take accountability.  

It's been said that everyone has a story.  Everyone does.   If everyone has a story, then everyone needs a safe place to tell their story.   Maybe it's one of abuse and brokenness, of grief and loss, of rebellion and redemption, or perhaps it's not gory to glory but simply God's faithfulness and family legacy over many years.

For so many years, my story was an untold story.  Oh, there were a few who knew, from snippets that I shared.  There were others who guessed because the evidence was there.

But two years ago, I decided it was time for me to stop protecting people who did a lot of damage, to stop making excuses for them, and to start telling my untold story.   

The catalyst was listening to Grace Tame tell her story as she gave her acceptance speech for Australian of the year.  Her story was graphic and heart-breaking, complicated by outdated and damaging laws in Tasmania at the time.  You can hear it here, from the 4 minute mark.   

In part of her speech, she said this:    "So let us redirect this discomfort to where it belongs: at the feet of perpetrators of these crimes."

I had done the opposite - I had buried and carried the discomfort and shame, for years, almost 40 years in fact. It affected my identity, every relationship I've ever had, everything I did and tried to do, affected my body and my health - everything.   

It's taken two years of counselling, prayer, processing, wrestling, weeping,  worshipping and renewing of the mind to get healed.   And I'm still not there.    Sometimes I wonder if I ever will be, this side of heaven, but I'm incredibly grateful for how far I've come, how much freedom I've gained from fear, guilt, shame, lies and pain.   

I started blogging consistently again in July 2021 as a way of processing what God was doing in my life, partly to help myself understand my story, but hoping that my story would help someone else.  It's very healing if you can find some purpose in the pain.  

I have been given the gift of amazing people who have listened to my story and believed me, after decades of silence.   They have wept for me and with me; they have prayed for me and with me; they have held me and supported me, and held my story sacred and validated my pain.  I'm incredibly grateful for all of them, whether their role has been large or small.  

So what is my story?  My two brothers and I grew up in an abusive home, though it looked normal enough from the outside.  There are five kinds of abuse children can suffer - emotional, physical, verbal, sexual and neglect.   Between both parents, I copped all five.  My brothers copped varying degrees of abuse but they don't say much, so I don't know exactly what went on for them.   They are still both very damaged and have avoided help.   We don't talk about it together.    My parents don't talk about it, though I have a very short note from my father acknowledging the sexual abuse.  That's it - no apology, just two short lines, acknowledging that it happened.   

Two short lines doesn't begin to cover the damage done.  But God does.  He has uncovered it, layer by layer, slowly and carefully and precisely, like an expert surgeon, to let the garbage out.    And then He has covered the raw wounds and healed them.      He really does heal the broken-hearted and binds up their wounds.  I can look back and see that He was weaving His love and support through a very broken story, and bringing me through to a place and time to get healed.  

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.     Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you.  And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.    I will be found by you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back from your captivity.    Jer 29:11-14

These verses, that I had heard and seen so many times, finally set me free late last year as I realised that the story I had told myself, as a 15 year old, was not true.  I realised I had a God-given purpose and it was not to be the scapegoat for my family, to be the silent, sacrificial lamb my mother expected me to be to 'keep the family together'.    I realised that I had another story to live, one that my heavenly Father had written many years earlier, before my time began.    

Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.

And in Your book they all were written,

The days fashioned for me,

When as yet there were none of them.

How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!   Ps 139:16,17

These days, I can truly say I know that my Redeemer lives!!

I will cry to God Most High (Elohim Elyon), Who performs on my behalf and rewards me [Who brings to pass His purposes for me and surely completes them]!  Ps 57:2

These journals are the record, the scribbled down story, of my cries to the God who fulfils HIS purpose for me - to be healed and to thrive.   

But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God;

I trust in the mercy of God forever and ever.

I will praise You forever,

Because You have done it;

And in the presence of Your saints

I will wait on Your name, for it is good.  Ps 52:8,9  

God is in this story

God is in the details

Even in the broken parts

He holds my heart, 

He never fails

When I'm at my weakest

I will trust in Jesus

Always in the highs and lows

The One who goes before me

God is in this story