Why The Trampled Rose?

Life at birth is like a new rosebud - small fragile petals wound tightly awaiting full bloom where all the potential contained within the bud will be seen. It is at full bloom that the whiff of the sweet smelling rose will permeate the air and the vibrant color of the flower will enthrall all who set their eyes upon it. That was my life when my mother conceived me.

Alas, plucked from the family that brought me into the world, I was given to another. I was taken to another garden and there I was "nurtured with violence, insults and subjected to degrading acts"so that I may submit to a life of servitude.

I am the trampled rose - trampled by the hurtful actions of others but if you look closely, you would see that I am still and have always been a rose. I may have lost some of my petals and my color may not be as bright as when I was a bud but no matter how "myopically ugly" I may look, look closer still and you will see that I am in essence what God created - a rose.

My story is not new and I know that there are many "trampled roses" out there but one of the greatest pain is that many of us who have been hurt and traumatized in our lives are still holding on to our stories. We hide behind masks so that others will not know the awful truth that exist in our lives. We make excuses for our inadequacies and many times, we try to deny that we behave the way we do because of what happened to us in the past. In fact, it took me 20 years before I was able to speak about the abuses in my childhood that ranged from verbal, emotional, physical to the deprivation of food.

I thank God that He has opened the way for me to be healed somewhat - of course healing is a life-long therapy but He too has called me to come out in the open and to share my pain - to help the many who may have experienced what I had experienced - the intense loneliness - because we dare not share our stories. Our fear is that people do not know how to react to such stories and as such, they may find it easier to judge us as the problem, when in actual fact, we are the victims. Talking about my story has helped me heal quite a lot but the war is not over for me. Daily I struggle with many fears that still continue to rise from the depths of my past. Many fears still tail me in my life. I am still confronting them but I believe that speaking about them will help me confront them and each time that I do, I become a little more free.

Free to be the person with the potentials locked in at my birth. Free to express myself and to most of all to understand myself and to see the silver lining in my darkest clouds and to use that little as foundation to build more.

So journey with me as I walk this path of sharing and if you know of anyone who would be blessed by this sharing and find release from the "demons of an abusive past" - then please feel free to invite them to read this blog and share their thoughts and questions with me. I will try to answer them as best as I can.

God bless