into the desert for deep healing and real rest
Hi Resties!
If you read my most recent post you’re likely up to speed as to why I’ve been so quiet. In fact, when I look back I realize that I did not post once in April. I was busy. Distracted. Overwhelmed. Ashamed.
I’d been outrunning my pain for so long, trying to tap into a form of rest outside of myself when I remembered another time when I experienced a major jolt to the system and needed something different. You can read more about it here.
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I took a week off from work to go to Wickensburg, Arizona in August. The program was through The Meadows (Behavioral Healthcare) and it was a beacon of hope for me. I did not exactly know what I was getting myself into, but kept it very quiet that I was going to do this work and care for myself in this way.
Because of shame.
I had been “walking with the Lord” and actively involved in many churches - heck, I even worked for a few. I’d been on mission trips, led volunteers in service and had been part of and facilitated dozens of Bible studies. The knowledge of clinging to God was readily accessible. I knew the actions to take, but what became clear in Arizona (which I now lovingly call “my time in the desert”) was that there was a gaping disconnect between what I KNEW about God and living as if it were completely true.
I packed up my bag for the week and landed at the Phoenix airport on Sunday, August 4th last year.
Can you believe that?!? August 4 (2005) is the day I learned what it meant to be a war widow. In all of the scratching to survive and handle the logistics of getting myself to this place in the desert, I didn’t know the date in my body until I landed at the airport and had to wait for other patients to meet up at the designated location.
Pausing.
Breathing.
19 years. 19 years since we lowered Chad’s broken body into the ground; me at 33 years old, our son by my side having just turned six.
I made small talk as we hustled toward the van but found my introverted self incredibly grateful for the sunset turning into a dark night and quieting the nervous chatter. I think we all sensed our fast movement down the highway into hard, honest work. It was a little exciting, but I was honestly regretting my decision to do this. I mean, I wanted the healing, but I didn’t want to face whatever was going to be brought up while getting to the healing.
We arrived late at night and were given a quick tour of the property - in the dark. Y’all, I could feel the monsters watching us. As they gave us a debrief, I was on high alert expecting to be snatched up by some large animal that was more comfortable in the desert than I ever will be. I didn’t see any wild animals that fit the bill, but those creatures I thought were outside of me - waiting to harm me - were nothing compared to the ones that I had buried deep inside me.
Once the debrief was over, I headed back to my spacious Handsmaid Tale-like room (if you know, you know), and took a shower. I let two people know that I’d arrived safely, then had a burst of energy and a sort of reckoning. With little to no internal debate and in that moment, I decided to remove my Instagram account from my phone for the week.
Since we were not permitted to have our cell phones when outside of our sleeping rooms and I didn’t think this was an experience that was safe to post on social media (even to my “close friends”) I thought it best to abstain from it for the week.
I fell asleep shortly after that decision and woke up with a readiness to ace this experience. You can see that I had already missed the point.
Monday morning was full of my expectation to treat this intensive trauma workshop like it was a college course I would get the syllabus for and then proceed to figure out how to excel and output the knowledge successfully. I mean, I do this kind of work for a living and have had enough therapy to send my therapists to a luxury spa or two.
I dressed like I was going to a conference - business casual - packed my pens and notebook in my semi-professional tote and headed off to breakfast and to get started moving through this intense experience so I could get on the other side to my long awaited and highly elusive permanent healing.
My sweet ego.
My inflated pride.
There was little humility in your gurl on day one.
If you recall, I was barely surviving. I was truly struggling to understand what had happened to me and especially within me. Oh! And I was approaching this experience having just started a 40-day sugar fast on the first of August. Looking back on it now, I can see how conditioned I had become in believing that the only way to heal and grow is through struggle. I expected things to be hard all the time. So, why just go into the desert in August and do the tough work, how about you also denying yourself of sugar for the first time ever?
I met the other women in my group at breakfast. There were five of us from all over the country and one from a different country. We were at similar seasons in our lives, all having had children and been married at some point. We bonded quickly on the first day and it was like we’d known each other for years beyond day one.
In the next post, I’ll share about the intensity of the work for me and ten major revelations I had about myself while doing this work - the work of my group is their business to share for themselves and with those they trust. But, the biggest takeaway that I gained from this experience was that “when one person does the work, we all do the work.”
And it was intense work.
There was no hiding. There was no pretending. There was no one who was half in.
After we checked in (daily check-ins were a thing) and after dipping our toes into the process a bit, I recognized how unrelaxed I was. The women thought that I was a facilitator, that’s how unrelaxed I was. Something about my business casual dress and the way I presented myself. I was “on”, performing for my healing like I’d always done and believed was the only way through this experience.
That makes me cry.
Because, the honesty revealed in that observation is that I had been living for years looking the part, playing the part. All the while, dying inside. No wonder I was struggling to truly live from a posture of rest.
There are instances of temporary rest gained from so much effort and energy that often caused chaos and consternation in the ripple effect. I was trying so hard. So by the time I arrived in the desert last summer, I was so disconnected from who Regina is that I held deep shame and fear about the mountains I believed I’d have to climb to find and reconnect with her again. At times, during that week at the Meadows (and many times since then), I wasn’t sure I could show up for myself in this way and really wasn’t sure I wanted to try.
There are some circumstances happening now that are forcing this work to the surface. I can’t share everything just yet because I don’t fully understand, but know that in my deep pursuit for healing and real rest, I can no longer write from above the surface. I NEED to tell the truth about what it is taking to get to this type of rest and my recovery journey while on the path - enduring the struggle and pain - on the way to true and full embodiment of the best thing…
LOVE.
This time in the desert was life saving for me. So many things shifted for me as a patient doing that intensive work. But, I have to be candid with you…
I’m still wrestling with wanting it to be easy. For it to feel less volatile, to be better able to handle my irritations, frustrations, hurts and triggers. I’m too far into this life to continue blaming others for my unrested disposition. To continue running to others to hold my hurting and wounded heart.
It is time to truly live loved from within.
More soon.