Toughened by an abusive childhood, even after becoming a Christian, Stacy remained emotionless and strong. But she was also very angry. What she didn't understand was that she had been simply enduring life in her own strength. Stacy had to become weak so the Lord could be strong within her. Eventually she got past her anger and began healing by learning to feel.
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Stacy's Sweet Submission
“What did your mother do to you?”“Nothing,” I replied.
“She did something. What did she do to you?”
Again, I answered, “She did nothing to me!”
This was the beginning of my first counseling session to help determine why I was so angry. The counselor continued to ask me the same question, knowing eventually she would get a different response. She was wrong.
Then she decided to rephrase her statement and said, “Tell me about your life, beginning with the day you were born." Now we were in business.
Taking a deep breath, I started ...
I was born to a very young couple. They were madly in love. They dropped out of school, got married at 16, and had my brother at age 17. I came along when they were 21 years old. My parents were free-spirited rebels who were spunky and feisty. Their love for each other never ended, but the marriage did when I was 3 years old.
My mother met my stepfather shortly after that; they were married and had my sister within the next year. We moved into his house, and I started school. I got excellent grades and was nominated for the GATE program. During this time, my biological father asked my stepfather to adopt me and my brother. We were terribly frightened of my stepdad, but we agreed.
I began smoking marijuana and doing drugs with my biological father at a very young age. Later I was raped, sodomized and tortured for two years. All this led to an eating disorder that I have had for 22 years. I made horrible decisions, and I started hurting myself. I picked fights with my schoolmates, and went to school drunk or stoned almost everyday in junior high.
I started working when I was very young and by the time I was in high school, I was managing a large video store. I met my husband my freshman year in high school and we dated all four years of school. During my senior year of high school, my husband and I moved into an apartment together. I have two children and have been married to my husband for 11 years.
Then I repeated, “My mother did nothing to me.”
She sat there with tears in her eyes and said, “You just said all that like you were talking about somebody else. This is your life; this is what happened to you. Do you understand that?”
Dwelling on the Past
I smiled at her and said, “Yes, I understand that, but I don’t need help understanding what happened to me then. I need help changing the way I am now. I want to be loving and I want to be a person that other people want to be around. I want to be a Christian and I can’t be an angry Christian. I have made sense of my past. I know my mom had to work. I know that the men who tortured me were sick. I know that I have to continue living, so I see no reason to dwell on the past."
She shook her head and said, “My dear, sweet child, until you dwell on the past, you will continue to be angry. Until you realize the magnitude of what was done to you, you will continue to be angry. Until you realize that it is okay to be weak, you will continue to be angry.”
That was not what I wanted to hear, but it was true.
