Unbelievable Grace

Okay, I'm definitely digging out. My heart hurts like crazy and my head is screaming and I'm dead tired but I'm definitely moving forward.

Praise report #1 - not one complete flashback since the dream. only partials and they're getting rare. this in and of itself is a miracle of God. It's been over a week - AMAZING. ABSOLUTELY AMAZING. Praise God.

#2 - things are beginning to make sense. finally began to accept my past as it was this week - quit running, quit trying to change it, quit trying to deny it or wish it away. Just sat down with God and cried over it. Mourned for it. Gut wrenching days of sobbing but honest tears instead of fear and confusion and fighting the truth - just honest grief. painful as it is, I've never been able to do that.

Part of accepting it also came with having to accept my need to be loved. I never got to feel like a real kid. To rejoice in the simple stuff around me and to just relish life. I never got to know what it's like to be loved and accepted and treasured just for being me. My whole life (Christian life included) has been centered around trying to make everyone else happy - to meet everyone else's needs - to be invisible. I've wished for far too long that I was never born - or worse. Felt like half a person with no right to be alive unless I was earning that right by doing stuff for everyone else. I had no right to have needs. But I'm realizing that it's okay to have needs.

It's okay that I'm tired and worn out and need to heal. It's okay that I need friends. It's okay that I need God to love me. And it's also then, okay that I needed a Dad - that I, as a little girl, desperately sought his attention, and that I, as an adult, still have a hole left by the lack of it. And if it's alright for that need to have been valid, then it's also okay to ask God to fill it. He frees me to no longer feel worthless because I'm not perfect - He gives me permission to relish His amazing love and incredible grace... and take the time I need to bask in it and absorb it and not feel guilty for it.

This is a major change in life view for me. Everything to this point has all been about running, earning, doing... never say die - never show fear - never be vulnerable - never have needs - anything less than perfect is unacceptable. Push harder. Do more. Why can't I be enough? No one can live up to that. And I've hated me for it. Hated the little girl inside me for it. And this isn't the way God meant for it to be. And I'm finally realizing that.

Got a long way to go. I still hate that little girl. I want to forgive, I do. But the pain runs so deep. so very deep. I'm asking God for help here because I know that's the next step. finally letting her be. finally letting it end. It sounds stupid, but I have no idea how to do that. I see the truth. I understand it with my head. I know in my heart where the guilt lies. But changing a lifetime trajectory is not an easy task.

I praise God for taking me this far. For being so patient. For carrying me thus far through the hardest thing I've ever done. The progress to now alone is miraculous. I know I couldn't be here without Him. But I can't stop here. I know the trajectory is still messed up. I'm not done yet.

God, help me forgive. Help me to put things in order in my heart. Help me to forgive little Angie, to forgive my father, and to forgive the other people who have hurt me or contributed to it. Help me to complete this journey. I know You have so much more for me. I want to live the life You intended. I want to help other people do the same. I want to breathe and dance and sing and live. I want to share and love and help others. I want to be honoring to Your glory with my whole being. Please give me the strength, courage and wisdom to finish the course. In Jesus Name!