mental health
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There is a strange thing that happens when you have spent most of your life surviving. You become very good at it. You learn to read the room before anyone speaks. You learn which footsteps mean trouble. You learn to anticipate moods, swallow needs, stay useful, stay busy, stay alert. You become capable. Independent. Productive.…
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We have a strange habit of explaining away the things that should stop us in our tracks. I have carried a needle full of Hepatitis C into my body. I’ve looked down the barrel of a gun. My heart quit beating at twenty-seven. We speak about miracles as though they belong to another century. As…
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If you’re grieving, you’re not failing at anything. You’re just human in the rawest possible state, stripped down to what can’t be argued with or managed or optimized. There are days when the heart doesn’t feel “broken” so much as shattered early and quietly, like something cracked in childhood and you only learn later how…
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Jesus keeps setting tables in the strangest places. I know because I’ve stumbled into a few of them. A child’s bedroom where something sacred was being violated. A house full of secrets. A girl learning too early that the world could be beautiful and monstrous at the same time. I thought I was abandoned there.…
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“It is strange”, he said at last. “I had longed to enter the world of men. Now I see it filled with sorrow, with cruelty and treachery, with those who would destroy all around them.” “Yet, enter it you must,” Gwydion answered, “for it is a destiny laid on each of us. True, you have…
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Introspection — what better way to start a week. Question: Do you easily call out the deception in your abuser(s) or do you deny what you see? One of the easiest ways to stay outside of healing and freedom is to deny what you see. As children, if you came through childhood sexual crimes, you…
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Oh, my love, I know. The world is a dark theater, and the players lie so beautifully, so effortlessly, that you begin to wonder if truth is just a ghost story we tell to comfort ourselves. The cynics whisper in your ear like tired prophets, saying: Nothing changes. The liars win. The strong devour the…
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How I Learned to Redirect a Rebellious Spirit Toward Purpose There is a peculiar strength in a woman who refuses to conform. She is rarely loud, seldom fashionable in her convictions, and almost never understood by her peers. Yet history bends in subtle ways because of her. She does not follow the crowd. She builds…
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Prudence doesn’t get clicks. Prudence is slow. Quiet. Unimpressive. It looks like saying no when everyone else says yes. It looks like leaving early, staying faithful, keeping your mouth shut, doing the long, boring work of healing when nobody is clapping for you. Nobody goes viral for self-control.Nobody gets applause for breaking a generational pattern.Nobody…
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King David is my favorite author of the Old Testament. He was a man that was real, honest, and raw with God. He mused and fussed with God, praised Him, and thanked him — all three rather quickly sometimes. An awesome man of God and King David asked God to keep him “as the apple…