I Can't Breathe
These song lyrics running through my mind…I don’t really know the whole song but the chorus loops, over and over…
“I can’t breathe/You’re taking my life from me/I can’t breathe/Will anyone fight for me?
It’s now 7:13 AM in the morning, Rip is cuddled next to me on the couch, his chin on my arm, and everyone else is asleep. I woke up at 4am, wide awake. The wind was howling as I took the dogs outside. I woke up to the worship song “Worship Your holy name…O my soul, Forever I’ll love you, forever I’ll trust in You…” A gentle voice in my mind clearly asks, “Do you trust Me?”
This weekend has been a whirlwind. My thoughts are going a mile a minute and I can’t keep up. Remembering a fight with Dad when I was in middle school that ended up with him taking me to the ER. I was hyperventilating, got a headache and started vomiting. They gave me medicine to calm me down. The ER doctor assesses me, and asks what happened. I tell him we got into an argument, and I know something bad might happen if I’m not careful and I tell him I told my dad to fuck off and I deserved what happened. He nods his head, and I feel relieved everything will be okay. He recommends counseling for both of us and my dad readily agrees. We go home and everything is good again—like a spring storm the fight cleared the air and we can all breathe again. I call the number the doctor gave me and go to the counselor. He’s an middle aged man and I feel uncomfortable. He spends the hour giving me a personality quiz and I watch as he looks up the answers. If this is therapy, this is bullshit. I leave and never go back.
The epitome of victim shaming…realizing I left a small piece of my soul in that ER bed that day, flashbacks that will happen many times over when I’m taking care of patients lying on that same gurney 20 some years later. I make a mental note to talk to Trista about this…the thought of this happening to other children makes me so angry I can hardly stand it. What if there had been some kind of mandatory counseling for both of us? How many other children are out there living in the same situation? It absolutely breaks my heart.
I picked up my dresser from Dad’s last night. I had called him yesterday morning and told him I wanted to do it since Kayla and Brenda could probably give us a hand if we needed it. He made it clear he wasn’t going to be able to help because of his bad back and I completely understood. Tyler asked me if Dad had a strap to secure it to the dolly, and anxiously I asked Dad and braced myself as I saw the expression on his face, his lips tightening, eyes narrowing. I recognize the face—I can feel my face doing the same when I get in that zone of indignant rage and feel like I’m about to explode—I try to speak faster, trying to reassure him we’re okay, we don’t need help, we’ve got it really, hoping to prevent the impending attack. He’s getting bigger and bigger as I get smaller and smaller, like we’re both in some bizarre scene of Alice in Wonderland.
God, please show me how to not do that to my sweet boys. I will do anything to save them from feeling the way I did.
Tyler and my dad get the dresser move, and I’m asking if I can help, wondering what I could have done differently to avoid this drama. I know it’s dinnertime, but we have the dogs at home and we really can’t stay—Tyler and I were just going to get it and be on our way, we didn’t need the help. He tells me it’s better if I don’t talk, and I choke my words back, the gum forming in my throat, and I realize this is why I had those dreams over and over—I’m chewing gum and it’s getting stuck in my throat and I try to spit it out and as I try to pull it, it stretches thinner and thinner but it’s not coming out, it’s lodged and I feel like I’m choking. I choke back my words, my shame and watch as my dad barks at me to go do something instead of just standing there gawking. Afterwards Tyler and I meet outside and I try to explain to him that I had called him and he said he wasn’t going to be able to help and he kept making comments asking when I was going to move my stuff out of the basement—Brenda was thinking of using it for her quilting—and all I was trying to do was get it done but somehow it turned into this and no matter what I can’t win and I’m so tired of feeling so fucking small and ashamed. I wish I can disappear and honestly I can’t help thinking I wish I could just numb away this pain that is building inside but I push it away as far away as I can I will not do that, I’m not going down that path in hell again. My thoughts are going a million miles an hour, every synapse alive with adrenaline as I plea d my case to Tyler until he can finally get a word in. “Jen, breathe…it’s okay.”
I look at him and start bawling, feeling like I’m collapsing in on myself. Big girls aren’t supposed to cry, but I can’t help it. He gives me a hug and something starts to crack inside of me. It’s hope and it’s dangerous and I should really run but I can’t help it. I fold myself into his arms and let him hold me, and even if it only lasts a minute and he eventually ends up another lesson learned, I’m a fool and I can’t help it and so I give in.
We say good-bye and I thank my dad and he is calm now. “Every time we get attached you move in with them and then you end up ruining it.” I know, Dad, all too well, I know. But he seems different, I remember talking with Cory and Kayla late one summer night before their wedding. I’ve never seen my brother so head over heels in love with a woman, we’re all tipsy and carefree and as he steals a glance at her he looks at me and shrugs his shoulders. “She lets me be me.” Ironically they’re in the room watching and I suddenly realize. “I know Dad, but he’s different. He actually lets me be me…” Realizing for the first time I’ve held onto my own identity and he still seems to like me…
We get home and tuck the boys into bed. Lying there talking, I hesitantly explain the dresser is symbolic—I no longer have one foot out the door, and can’t easily leave if I wanted to. It means I’m actually invested, I see myself putting down roots with him and even though we both agree we never want to get married again, that we’re just taking things day by day and if things change, we can be honest with each other and we’ll part ways amicably. I know he’s been through a lot too and he keeps his cards close to make it easier to fold when the time comes. I hesitantly ask him if that’s okay with him—the dresser being a symbol—he’s holding my hand and says he knows and of course it is, otherwise he wouldn’t have helped me move it.
Spending the day yesterday deep cleaning this beautiful Montgomery Ward house, built in the 1800s. Each spritz of the cleaner is therapeutic and I give thanks for this sweet house. Tossing the empty shampoo bottles and making notes of things I would like to buy, getting ideas for decorating…it scares me—I don’t know if I have it in me to put myself and my family back together if everything falls apart but he has been my rock through all of this and if I only listen when he gets frustrated with me, I realize his words come from love and they resonate. He doesn’t punish me for things that aren’t my fault, and so many times he will say the exact same thing Mom did when I ask for his input—a sign to me, confirmation this is a message from the Universe when I hold their words up close and they resonate deep within. He’s not flashy but he’s genuine, he’s definitely got a past of his own but has put in the work to make himself a better person.
I would love to work side by side to get his $15 million ranch/farm—self-sustaining with a focus on healing wounded souls and giving them hope. I woke up yesterday with so many ideas of how to use Chiron’s Lantern to bring hope and healing to others—resources I wish were available when I was struggling, feeling so alone. I look back at my journals and I am so amazed at how far I’ve come in such little time. It has been hard, I feel like a gaping, walking wound, sometimes feeling like I’m drowning in emotions and can’t catch my breath. I remember being 4 or 5 years old and on my mom’s bed—I was crying because she had to go somewhere for work and I didn’t want her to go…she told me to stop crying because ‘big girls don’t cry’. I vividly remember chewing on that mentally feeling my heart harden and my throat tighten as I swallowed back tears. I’ve been holding my emotions in ever since and numbing them with alcohol. They come in waves and it’s all I can do to grasp onto Him. Instead of running I lean into it and let Him support me as I face the tidal wave. I sit with it, feel it, the pain is almost sweet because finally I can fucking feel something and is this what it means to be alive? It’s not as painful as I thought it would be and I’m still here, and I realize only by leaning into it, sitting with it, feeling it, that I can accept that it happened because everything happens for a reason.
I’m finally facing the monsters in my closet only to realize the pain of hiding in fear for so long is far, far worse than anything he can do to me…
Feeling so overwhelmingly grateful for the people God has placed in my path who give me enough hope and reassurance to keep going. Synchronicities everywhere and we’re all connected by His love for us. We’re growing and learning and He’s calling us home to Him. Finally for once I look forward to the day breaking, seeing what miracles will unfold.
My amethyst fell off my necklace sometime during the night. It fell off yesterday too and Dillon found it on the couch and handed it to me. The last time that happened was Halloween when my quartz fell off my necklace three times in one hour—finally I took it as a sign and changed it out for the amethyst. Halloween was my last drink and I have no desire to go back to numbing out falling away from God. I heard Him tell me clearly Monday morning it’s time to let go of the DXM. But I’m so afraid of losing all this—will I still be able t hear Him, find my way, have the courage to believe in myself without a crutch? It’s been this painful dealing with everything without alcohol…can I withstand it without DXM? And what if I go back feeling numb, empty—this is the worst, when the world goes gray and it’s so painfully lonely I just want to slip away, forever. This is my worst fear, that the DXM is what makes me feel like me. Deep down, I know this is irrational. Even after I heard Him, I asked for a sign—a black feather, which I found Friday on my walk, along with 4 pinecones weirdly in a wheatfield—Tyler, me, Dillon, Logan and it spoke to me symbolically of protection and planting roots. Even now writing this I want to take some DXM…I wonder if it could be a placebo to a degree.
But I’m pretty sure Jesus didn’t have DXM when he was wandering in the desert for 40 days and yet He still found God. Feeling compelled to read My Utmost for His Highest, so here goes….
The Bounty of the Destitute
The greatest blessing spiritually is the knowledge that we are destitute; until we get there Our Lord is powerless. He can do nothing for us if we think we are sufficient for ourselves; we have to enter into His Kingdom through the door of destitution. As long as we’re rich, possessed of anything in the way of pride or independence, God cannot do anything for us. It is only when we get hungry spiritually that we receive the Holy Spirit [I call this The Glimpse] He imparts to us the quickening life of Jesus, which puts “the beyond” within, and immediately the beyond has come within, it rises up to “the above” and we are lifted into the domain where Jesus lives.”
He gives the example of Romans 3:24, and as I read the footnotes, it talks about pagans and calling on Jesus for my sins. This doesn’t resonate, but the mention of Abraham does, so I flip to Genesis 1:1 to read more about his story. I read the story of Creation and my mind is blown when I put it in context just how powerful God really is…
“The simple statement that God created the heavens and the earth is one of the most challenging concepts confronting the modern mind. The vast galaxy we live in [the sun, moon, planets, and stars”—[I explain to Dillon to think of each cell in our body, working in tandem to keep us alive, now think of how many people there are, how many plants and animals just on this Earth. God masterminded the human body and breathed His breath onto it to bring us alive. He knows each and every one of us, gives us our free will. We’re planted on this planet, circling the sun in a] galaxy that is spinning at the incredible speed of 490,000 miles an hour. But even at this breakneck speed, our galaxy still needs 200 million years to make one rotation. And there are over one billion other galaxies just like ours in the universe” (NIV) and God created and knows it all.
My mind is so blown and I’m a little overwhelmed. I decide to continue watching the show Kayla and another friend recommended to me on two separate occasions—a sign from the Universe guiding my way. It’s only 5 something in the morning so I open my laptop and launch Netflix’s Maid. I’m watching the scenes unfold, tears leaking from the corners of my eyes as I watch the scenes unfold. I know all too well this is reality for so many people, trying to escape abusive situations, not realizing it’s not normal. How did I ever think this was normal for everyone?
“You can stay at the domestic violence shelter.”
“I’d hate to take a bed from someone that’s been abused for real.”
“You’re here. You can breathe.”
Flashbacks of being petrified, checking into treatment. Being shown my room. There’s a dragonfly sticker left behind by someone else on the window, a sign from the Universe I’m where I’m supposed to be. I lay down on the bed as the Librium carries me off to sleep. I feel so relaxed…I can finally…breathe. 30 days later I feel like a whole new person. Nate has been so supportive, bringing the boys to see me every weekend during visiting hours, buying me the cigarettes I started smoking because this was the reward and it gave us something else to latch on to while we tried desperately to let go of the spirits that had latched onto our souls. A week before graduation is Family Day, Nate and I facing each other, my counselors, peers, and their families surround us. I can only listen as Nate reads his letter to me. My heart freezes, my chest tightens as he brings up my miscarriage. “You should have told me, you shouldn’t have let me go camping for a week. Instead you hid it from me and suffered through it by yourself. If only you had told me I could have been there.” Inside I’m dying as memories flood me, the baby we tried for for so long because we wanted Dillon to have a brother. Deep down inside I knew my drinking was affecting me periods and this was why I was having trouble getting pregnant but I couldn’t face my demons without drinking. As I watch everyone looking at him in sympathy—he really is a good husband, tall, good-looking, cooks, cleans, does the dishes, takes care of the boys, works hard, I should be grateful, I feel them all looking at me, wondering what’s wrong with me that I can’t be grateful, that I have to drink. Their scorn prickles my skin and inside my throat clenches as I yell at him, “I did tell you!. I told you I was bleeding! Why else would I be going in for bloodwork every other day? I told you it was okay and I meant it…I didn’t want you to miss out on your elk hunting trip that you’ve been looking forward to all year, I knew I could handle it on my own and so I told you to go. But the fact that you’re now throwing this in my face, heaping it on the pile of my shame is almost more than I can take. I know at that moment if I go back my soul won’t make it. He finally finishes and we stand up, everyone all smiles as he kisses me and gives me a hug. I turn away, giving him a sideways hug. My counselor is watching and she scolds me, “Cmon, Jen, give him a real hug. He loves you!” I look at her and try to smile but inside I’m remembering flashbacks, he’s home now, the baby is gone. Cory is there and he’s trying to be supportive, get me to talk but he’s been drinking and every time I try to choke the words out he interrupts until something inside me explodes and I throw the glass of water at him. Suddenly I’m on the floor, Nate’s 6’5 body pinning me down, his hands around my throat. I can’t breathe…I can’t win. Another piece of my soul floats away and I’m even emptier than I was before.
Reading my art journals from that time. It’s now 11:24 AM and I’ve had a heart to heart with Dillon, taught him how to sweep and mop the dining room floor to earn the $4 he wants to buy a video game, given Logan a bath, helped him to the bathroom several times over—he has a virus that has ended up with him having diarrhea and now his butt is chapped, among other things. In other words, the every day life of a mom but at least I’m not hungover and yelling at them. Instead my heart is swelling with gratitude, my patience infinite as I silently plead with God to please let my boys grow up to be strong, emotionally resilient, caring husbands and fathers. Yet I’m so triggered and in all honesty I tried to go without taking DXM but I’m just not there yet. I’ve told my mom, my therapist, and my primary care provider I’m taking the DXM after reading this article, and I know I need to give it up eventually, but I’m so raw right now and it just takes the edge off a little so I can come up for air once in a while without drinking. It’s been 27 days since I’ve had alcohol and Thanksgiving came and went and I wasn’t even tempted.
My friend texted me the other night, struggling with being sick and tired of being sick and tired but unable to give up the alcohol. I empathize with her and my heart goes out to her…I tell her to stop, just breathe. It will be okay. I know the feeling, all alone with darkness closing in, groping for a light switch as monsters in closets swirl all around. I tell her to take baby steps in whatever direction feels most healing. If you have to drink, just be honest about it. If you have to keep it a secret it only adds to the shame and self-loathing, a vicious cycle of drinking even more to forget the regret of drinking in the first place, getting nowhere but a new rock bottom—interesting how each rock bottom gets worse until finally sweet death gives us a respite from a soul lesson we tried to learn but just couldn’t master in this school of life on this tiny little planet in a vast galaxy surrounded by billions of other universes.
Yet God knows my heart and He loves me anyway. So I cling to Him in all my brokenness, confess to the world how destitute I really am, how weak. Tyler walks in from going to town, returning my dad’s truck (he ell Tyler of my morning, the flashbacks, the triggers and in tears tell him I’m trying, I know I should be more supportive—I ramble on about the laundry I’ve done, and the dogs are taken care of, and Logan is wearing a feminine pad and a homemade butt balm I made because his poor butt is so chapped he’s in tears. I’m trying to get my shit together, really I am but I’ll be honest, I took the DXM dose I read about in the article and he just gives me a hug as he starts making breakfast, telling me it will be okay.
It’s now 12:39 and we’ve just finished up brunch. I return to my journal from this morning, picking up where I left off. Connecting the past with the present, everything has so much meaning to it, I try to write it down because I’ve already forgotten so much of my past and if I write it down I won’t feel so empty, I’ll be able to remember. I don’t know why my past feels like a dream I struggle to remember, bits and pieces. I tell Cory stories only to have him tell he knows, he was there, and I’m shaking my head trying to figure out why I can’t remember my own life. I don’t know if it’s because I’ve self-medicated myself for so long that I’ve ruined my memory, or maybe I have Alzheimer’s, all I know is I’ll do anything to avoid that awful, numb, empty feeling inside, my soul gone like the dementor’s kiss in Harry Potter. So here I am, writing, writing, writing, because it feels so good to finally fucking feel something, even if it’s painful, even if I cry while I’m writing, at least I know I’m still alive. The way out is through…Rosie the Lizard is telling me I need to hurry up and get my shit together, Tyler won’t be patient forever and he’ll leave too, and maybe I should just go back to drinking because then I could at least act like I was normal, sleepwalking through life, moments disappearing from my memory as soon as they’re over like Addie LaRue in a novel I just finished.
I know I sound crazy, I can tell, shame is washing over me and I wish I could just be normal. I realize I’m crying while I type. The only way I can silence Rosie is to share what she’s saying, prove her wrong, so I tell Tyler I’m going to go upstairs, he looks at me and says okay, he realizes I’m crying and I try to explain in a hurry that I’m trying I really am, but Rosie is in my head, I’m trying to get my shit together for him, because if I don’t, he’ll get fed up and leave, and maybe I should just go back to drinking because then I could at least act normal but then I’ll be sleepwalking again and it just keeps repeating over and over but I’m so afraid. He tells me to breathe, it’s okay. Do what I need to, that he’s not going anywhere. I think about our conversation at brunch, about this man as I walk up the stairs, the needlepoint picture he stitched of him and his ex-wife’s wedding day, the hours that it took. It still hangs on the wall next to the stairs, and I don’t mind at all because his ex is a cancer survivor and a badass and I secretly admire her. I don’t even notice the other girl’s name tattooed on his neck—if he can accept me as broken as I am, still let me be me, then I can accept he has a past too and removing the tattoo doesn’t erase her…every tattoo has a story and these stories are the lessons we’re learning as we walk each other home.
I am going to finish typing what I’ve written in my journal this morning, sit with it, feel it, lean into it, get it out of my heart like the festering splinter it is, to learn from it and it heal, have a good cry and then I’m going to go with Tyler and the boys to water the cows and let nature work her healing magic on my soul, knowing I’m finally free from this demon I’ve carried with me for so long.
I know at that moment if I go back my soul won’t make it. He finally finishes and we stand up, everyone all smiles as he kisses me and gives me a hug. I turn away, giving him a sideways hug. My counselor is watching and she scolds me, “Cmon, Jen, give him a real hug. He loves you!” I look at her and try to smile but inside I’m remembering flashbacks, he’s home now, the baby is gone. Cory is there and he’s trying to be supportive, get me to talk but he’s been drinking and every time I try to choke the words out he interrupts until something inside me explodes and I throw the glass of water at him. Suddenly I’m on the floor, Nate’s 6’5 body pinning me down, his hands around my throat. I can’t breathe…I can’t win. Another piece of my soul floats away and I’m even emptier than I was before.
I shake my head to clear the memory as I join him on the deck, my soul heavy and dark.
January 13, 2018 I had stopped drinking because I was using the DXM instead, but Nate told me he ‘wanted his wife back’ because he didn’t like my new spirituality, so I stopped the DXM and went back to drinking…sleepwalking. Nate knew I was having a hard time, so for his Christmas present he paid to fly my mom, stepdad, brother, and sister from Maine to Montana for a few weeks. I needed my mom so badly and I sobbed when he told me….deep down I know Nate loved me, but the way he had learned to love was by caging and controlling me until I didn’t even know who I was anymore…
This one of my art journal pages:
If You Don’t Like Something, Change It
Memories of Grandpa Jack, how I miss him. Trying to enjoy every moment with Mom, S & the kids, to push down that inevitable devastation of another good-bye for who knows how long. Work is work and is so unfulfilling, but it lets me be there for my family. I constantly feel on the edge and wonder when I became so weak. I wonder what is wrong with me that makes me feel like I need to be numb all the time. I have a beautiful life, and I would not change anything about my husband or my kids. Is it my outlook on things that makes me feel like I am suffocating? Life doesn’t have to be perfect to be wonderful…maybe I need to try some cognitive behavioral therapy. I don’t know. I feel like I’m sinking deeper and deeper into this weird headspace and I don’t know how to get out. It’s so easy when it’s not you…you simply walk away, change whatever it is you don’t like about your life. I guess I’m realizing I don’t like who I am, but how do I change that? How do I become someone I can respect? I feel like the best part of me is Nate and my kids…without them I would be nothing.
I snap back to the moment, it’s a beautiful day in May, 2019 and I’m almost done with treatment. My counselor and I are smoking as we stand with Nate on the deck. They’re smiling, everything is going so well. I join the small talk until we’re done, then I follow her in for my session where she tells me I need to go back to Nate and my sons. I look at her, feeling lost and I don’t know why.
My graduation day comes and it’s a rainy day in May. I feel so raw, on edge, and I am so proud of my sweet boys. Dillon has grown up so much, and as we get home, Nate lets him drive the truck to bring hay to the horses. I hold Logan in my lap, feeling like an alien. I come inside and get out my diary.
Days of dark nights
Overwhelming shadowside
Sodden murky clouds all around
Swallowing gulps of air
Trying to catch my breath
This existence is painful but true
Not feeling is so blissfully easy
But what is a life not lived?
A dam I so carefully crafted long ago
Cracking and giving way
Scared. So scare
Will the inevitable tidal wave wash me away?
Mourning lost childhoods and lost innocence
Flickers of steely resolve
His strength gives me courage
Dragonflies and owls; their sweet youth
Give me courage to know
The way out is through
Back to my journal from this morning. My counselor told me I needed to go back to Nate and every fiber in my body recoiled but that’s what everyone wanted and so I did. He was so attentive, promising a greenhouse and that everything would be okay. I try so hard to be whole, to be present, but every nerve is on fire and I can’t breathe. I’m drowning I can’t stay. I am so fucking scared but I pack what I can into my Jeep and as I pull onto US 87 I have no idea what is up ahead but at least I don’t feel like I’m drowning anymore. I’ve convinced myself the boys will be better without me but as I make my way to my apartment in Fort Benton, my loneliness overwhelms me so I go on Tinder. I’m sober but now I’m self-medicating with guys. I meet Morgan and warning bells alarm. I don’t know how to be alone and I am so afraid to face the monsters in my closet. He’s a welcome distraction and there I go…
Sitting here in the beautiful house, this black German shepherd named Gray that I’ve come to love lying next to me, I realize I’m okay…choosing to silence Rosie, choosing to love the scared little girl inside, choosing to communicate what I’m going through to Tyler so he can understand, choosing to take baby steps in the direction that feels healing, sharing my story, that finally I can speak my truth and be not only accepted, but loved. I’m a hot mess and so weak, but I know I have my God, and as long as I following His Glimpses, I’ll be okay and maybe someday I will finally be free—that I can stand tall, take a deep breath and speak my truth once and for all.
I finally have my purpose in life—to do whatever I can to help others know they can find the strength to heal, to work with people to get resources in place to rescue drowning souls before they give up, to educate and advocate, because no one grows up to be an abuser, it’s a vicious cycle, one I know all too well. Even this morning, Dillon mopping the floor, I watch him, he’s so proud. I inspect it, and my father’s voice is in my head. He’s trying to teach me a lesson, the way his father taught him. I point out a few spots he misses, and tell him he earned the $4 for his game but if someone offered to do it for less, I’d probably take their offer. I watch his face crumble and tears come to his eyes. I see myself staring back at myself and my dad’s words from last night ring in my ears—Jen, maybe it’s better if you just don’t talk.
I beg him to stop, let me explain. He’s pulling away, I hurt him. I silently pray to God to show me the way. He lets me hold him as explain through my tears that I was just trying to teach him something, and that really I am so fucking proud of him, and it came out all wrong, and instead I hurt him. I keep telling him I’m sorry, that I really am proud of him. I confess all this to Tyler as he makes breakfast. Dillon listens in and Tyler asks if he can explain something…that we’re all human and mess up, we’re all trying the best we can. We only know what we learned and unfortunately we have to learn from our mistakes. All we can do is apologize, let them know that wasn’t okay, that we still love them and ask their forgiveness as we pray to God for His grace that they’ll somehow be okay.
I feel a passion burning in my soul—throughout my nursing career I’ve seen so many ways we as a society can let God intercede through us—to share His love and accept everyone right where they are, no matter how broken they might be. To understand the idea of rock bottom is abstract, and if you’re hurting like Chiron, there is a way to heal, if only you ask.
I write down my ideas and fire a text to Tyler’s sister. I don’t really know why I’m doing it, I just know I am. I feel like I’m being swept away on this current, and it feels good, so I just go with the flow, following these sweet Glimpses, knowing I have my God. We agree to meet for coffee this week, and, I have finally found peace.
Baby steps, I tell my sweet six year old self. Baby steps in whichever direction feels most healing.