I have started this line so many times, but my inability to follow through compared to what others may think has me frozen like a deer in headlights. Even though this is a calling on my life it does not make it easy. It is to hard to look at the past and see where all the insecurities you feel about yourself come from.
You do not want to shift blame, point fingers at the people you hold most dear to your heart. So, you bottle them up, push them down and build a fortress around them. If you let someone sneak peek into a key hole and they give you an opinion that frees your soul just a hint, you may open the door for just a few more. Just as you do someone tells you that you are a liar, that it did not happen. Accuse you that for some God-awful reason you are faking. You slam the door and hide the key so far that even you have no idea where to find it.
So, I start with the present. I can slam as many doors as I want. Hide as many keys as I want to hide. This thing that I don’t want to surface does. Like a ghost going through walls. We often refer to this as our baggage. The difference is that baggage is normally apparent. It is seen in everyday life.
You may be able to disguise it for a while, but the people you are closest to see it in your finances, emotions, schedule, communication, or the things you put in your body. These are the things you do to hold the Ghost behind the door, this is your baggage.
You probably have seen the scary movie where the Ghost is coming down the hall and the victim runs into the room and places all the items in the room in front of the door. None of those things stop the Ghost, but we still push them in front of the door hoping they will somehow work THIS TIME. We are doing exactly this every time we over eat, go shopping, hibernate, work extra hours to avoid the Ghosts of our past.
I have a sin to confess, matter of fact in the bible it talks out right about my SIN. What SIN am I confessing? BIG FAT UGLY JEALOUSY! Not the kind where oh I wish I had that car, or that house. I could go without material things, but for me it is people. Why can’t they love me the way I need to be loved?
Why can I not come first in my husband’s life? (after God of course)
1 COR. 3:3 for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?
OUCH!! If I have this Jealousy, I will also have Strife. And where jealousy and strife are in me Christ is not in me.
John 17:14 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
My husband Adam God love him, has a huge heart, he is so comedic that if he ever stopped trucking he could go on the road as a Comedian. Our blended family would not be what it is today without his support.
Adam has his own Ghosts and unfortunately his ghosts are not the kind that stay under lock and key. They are the kind that drag the both of us to the ground. The are ever so sneaky. They find my keys and unlock the doors to my deepest darkest scars. Bring them to surface and we are standing face to face in a battle that neither of us see coming.
See this is what happens when Ghosts of one person want to play with Ghosts of an unwilling participant. In our case when the addictions of one come face to face with the hidden wounds of a rape survivor. Satan will meddle in times of weakness and guards are down. Insecurities and weakness collide like two Semi Trucks full of Eggs. The shells will crumble, and the insides will be a slimy gooey mess. The road impassable until each drop of yolk is sponged up with tears.
Regardless of the addiction or the addict the Ghost is ever looming whispering that they are not worthy of life. Not capable of saying no. Around every corner a temptation that is easier to give into than stand up to. When faced with the consequences all reason flooded out by the few moments of not feeling less then, not feeling out of control. Just give in and let go.
For the Rape survivor the whispers of the lost innocence, the inability to have control of any part of their life. The lack of feeling trust or unconditional love even from those who you try to trust. The price that you will never be good enough! No amount of weight, money, sex, work, time, can make someone love you for you! The thought of never letting anyone have control. Controls you. So, you don’t let go.
Two worlds that collide that ooze ugly gooey mess all over each other. One of us won’t let go of control and the other let’s go of control at all costs. I picture the ghost Slimer, from the movie Ghost Buster. He left this kind of ooze everywhere he went, and this is what our Ghosts do to us.
Here is the good news. Ghosts are not real. Our mind makes them real. Things that we have told ourselves over time. The things that others have said. All the way back to when the first time we had this feeling. Be it a choice we made or something that happened to us.
We blame ourselves in some way. That becomes a Ghost. We blame others, they did this to us. They didn’t protect us, that becomes a ghost. They didn’t guide us. That becomes a ghost. We try to move on, and we are triggered from a new event, a new Ghost. Before we know it, we have a pile of ghosts that seem to all be connected just like those two semi-trucks of broken eggs on the road. You have no idea which egg came from which truck because they have been scrambled, beat, and spread into a huge mess.
I am not here to say that there is a way to get these Ghosts to go away forever. The event that manifested the ghost is a part of you. It is a part of your story. There will be times in our lives they resurface to remind us of where we have been. Or to help someone else that is going through something similar. Sometimes they surface because we really haven’t worked through them as well as we thought we had.
If I stay in God’s truth its harder for Satan to use my own Ghosts against me. If it comes through my husband’s addiction. I find it a little harder. I first must speak truth to myself through God’s word that his actions are not a reflection of something I am or am not doing. That his actions are not based on my appearance, health, beauty, or love. They are strictly his actions and his inability to have impulse control and take responsibility for his own wellbeing.
So, if you are reading this and you love someone with any kind of addiction please remember this. It has nothing to do with you. YOU can’t love that person more to stop them. You cannot have a breast implant for them to stop porn. You cannot lose weight to help them stop eating. You can not work more to help them stop shopping. You can not refuse to have pain medications after a surgery, to keep them off drugs. If they are an addict, they will find a way. (this is by no means saying that healthy helping is not a good thing. Just not at the cost of your health)
For my husband and probably every male out there. Satan is aware of what every man in our past has told us, including our fathers, uncles, grandfathers and past relationships. If you point out a weight issue, a blemish or a scar as an issue for you on your wife’s body. You will find it very hard for her to have intimacy with you. Do not let Satan make you think that this is an inadequacy in your manhood. Or that you’re not good enough for your wife or whatever he uses in your mind because of her own Ghosts. Can you see where as a couple it is very important that we raise each other up and not tear each other down.
If you have a spouse that has been a victim of abuse of any sort you will trigger those ghosts to surface with what you say or do in these moments. We don’t want it to happen, but it does. There are specific sounds, smells, feelings, words, songs etc. that can bring out these Ghost’s and this would be a good thing to talk with her about.
Depending on where someone is in the recovery process, each time this surface it can set them back days, weeks, months or even years. I am 47, I have had my 1st ghost since my 12th birthday. I wrote my story later that year and gave it to an adult. Whom told me not to tell anyone. Over the last 35 years I have let more people have the key to this door and as I have, I was told of many stories like mine.
Through the years more than a handful of friends have called, because their child has been a victim and I had shared my story with them prior. It is one of the hardest things to watch your friends go through, but it also has helped me with this next part.
In the Adults that have confided in me, many said when they were kids and it happened or was happening, they reported it to an adult and was told to keep it quiet. For the sake of the family, money, or for the sake of keeping dad out of Jail (he would kill the perpetrator). Or the simple fact the adult was unsure, because children lie. “GHOST”
If you have read this far and have been or know someone that has been abused, raped, molested. Whatever the word is that you use and were told to hide it. I hope this helps you. That day you started valuing your worth on what those people said and did.
The Perpetrator took something from you, you were taught that was wrong, so you did the right thing and told. Then when you told it was hidden, covered up Concealed made into a Ghost and with it they buried your self-worth, self-esteem, trust, unconditional love. Even if you didn’t tell there was a reason you didn’t, I cannot answer this for you. I am going to say that its going to go along the lines of you believed it would go just like this, so you didn’t chance it.
Hear me when I say Forgive yourself, somewhere in that pile of Ghost’s there is one that says something like. I shouldn’t have been there. I should have told that day. I should have listened to my gut. I should have left with my friends. I should have not worn that outfit. Whatever that I should have is forgive yourself!
No one has ever told you this, but it was not your fault! I am saying this to you and me, so I am going to say this again. THIS WAS NOT YOUR FAULT!
So please if you know your spouse has been a victim, pray with her. Use kind words, think about if your child had gone through something like that how you would want her spouse to treat her.
So how do these two worlds come together as one and survive. HARD WORK. Some days are down right draining. Keeping god as our Foundation. I am responsible for my own actions, but if we are to move forward together as one as God intends us to, I just can’t say well have a nice life if you’re not going to put in the effort see you on the other side. I must be his helper and he mine to guide each other. If we slide through our own slime and don’t help each other pick up the pieces we are just to lonely broken people with big messes.
If we work together and pull each other through the sticky mess. We can talk about events of our past in DELIVERED HEARTS over a breakfast of DELIVERED EGGS.
If you or someone you know has been a victim of sexual assault please do not stay silent. Contact a hotline or tell a trusted spiritual leader of friend. If that person does not help you reach out again. Love opens doors not closes them.
https://www.rainn.org/about-national-sexual-assault-telephone-hotline
