Month: July 2018

Why I Forgave the Dog Who Bit Me

On By LisaIn Arrow, Faith, Stella2 Comments

I tell everyone it was my fault but really the dog had a choice. Sure, I shouldn’t have feed the visiting dog at the same time as my own beasts, I should have realized this other dog didn’t see me as a pack member. I forgot that often one can be perceived as a threat even when intentions are honorable. The dog (not one of our beasts) bit me, leaving me with 6 stitches and a thumb that aches a month later. Still, the fight was a choice and the aggression was unnecessary.

I immediately recognized my mistake, I took the dog’s side, looking out from her perspective even as blood soaked the towel and dropped onto the floor. I understand fear and protectiveness and poor impulse control. I too have bitten when I should have backed off. I know I have caused rips and tears and bloodied up those who merely want to come near. Forgiving the dog was easy, forgetting is harder. I’m leery, a bit anxious when I am around her. When you discover the harm one is capable off, do you ever truly let down your guard? So it is with relationships I long for, can I ever ask them to forget harsh words when the ache surely reminds them I have teeth and may let instincts rule sense when I feel threatened?

I keep visiting the dog, I pursue relationship. Respect and awareness are heightened as we move forward. I choose not to let fear and distrust destroy either of us. To those who have felt bitten by my responses to perceived danger, I ask, “Can you see for even a moment how situations looked through my eyes?” It isn’t in my nature to toss our harsh words, to hurl judgements and leave scars, yet I did just that. During the first few days of learning my son died, I drew boundaries around my pack, I snapped and growled and said things I so wish I could take back.  My objectivity was non-existent, my assessments faulty, just as the dog who bit me. She sensed danger from those around and a fight ensued. How can I not forgive this canine and accept my role in it, I have been her?

The truth is that this dog is kind and loving and gentle. I approach her slowly, I allow her to sniff around, I am working on regaining her trust. I pet her with my other hand, the wound barely healed, often throbbing and reminding me that relationships are hard and rife with wrong moves and restarts. Determining that ignoring her or excluding her or avoiding all potential interactions is not workable for a member of the family, I move slowly and gently reach out to her.  She in turn cuddles and offers comfort. We offer grace, we are careful with each other and we allow each positive moment to blur our difficult past.

I pray that one day I will be offered the chance to show that I don’t normally bite, that I usually offer love and comfort to those around.

Selectively Mute

On By LisaIn Arrow, Faith10 Comments

I keep wondering about the first word uttered by someone who is selectively mute. Imagining all the words unspoken, sounds and sentences swallowed and smashed within the soul, the pressure of holding it all in, finally some phrase escapes, repaving the path for those that follow. The trust involved in sharing that first vocalization, or is it anger  pushing it up and out? When I received my son’s death certificate, I stopped writing. I wanted to scream and rant and point fingers and hurl insults at God and all who enabled my child’s drug use. What could only be the Holy Spirit guiding me, I chose to go mute, lasting now for over three months. I didn’t ask for guest writers to fill the pages of my blog, I didn’t warn anyone that I was taking a break like I did after suffering the second concussion. I just stopped, a bad move when numbers of followers is the measure of meaningfulness to writers of blogs. I became mute.

The words wouldn’t come at first, too deep was my sorrow and too personal was my pain. Words that once were my catharsis now were treasures to be shared sparingly with only a close circle. Requiring absolute trust meant my utterances were heard by only a few, tentative whispers and long howling cries to sanctuary friends who accepted that I was sad, still sad, no end in sight to my sadness. My child died from heroin, fentanyl, speed and xanax. There, you know the truth I have carried for 3 months, a truth I suspected but secretly hoped was false. What if he really had died of some natural cause, how would that be better? Yet 11 years of fighting his addiction seemed wasted, the money, the energy, the hopes. Still, there was comfort in believing he most likely fell asleep, like we say of the elderly who go peacefully. I try to tell myself he wasn’t in pain as he lay in his kitchen, overdosed and alone. I know though the truth, that his life was painful and agonizing and miserable, his use confirms it. Addiction is a bitch, a horrid monster and he was consumed with it. Three months to speak this truth. Finally the pressure to hold the words in has become too great.

I watch friends and family and fellow worshipers watch me. They celebrate and congratulate me when I seem to be having a good day. “You look so good, it is great to see you smiling.” Meeting the expectations of those who prefer to hurry me along in this ugly grieving causes me to laugh and share a joy and put on clean clothes and shut the door to my anguish in public. I go silent. I don’t say that I showered only once that week or that as soon as I leave church or their company, I will collapse exhaustedly for another week. Pushing down sorrow is slave labor. There is no rest, no escaping the ache that is deep within my bones. There is no cure for an apathy that screams , “I just don’t care,” an act of rudeness that would hurt others, that allows for no return. I cannot trust myself to speak kindly, with compassion to others, I go silent. Remembering the anxiety during my first pregnancy, wondering what labor truly would feel like, would I be strong enough and would I embarrass myself by pooping on the hospital bed, I fretted and worried and dreaded, almost. Yet actual birth, the contractions as my body sought to expel the child within was fast and glorious and surely hurt like hell although I don’t remember so much. I do recall that my body took over, an engineering feat that could only be designed by the Master of all. Grieving is desperately trying to reverse that process, trying to hold tears in and push away thoughts and keep from shitting on friends. Silence is preferable, until the pressure is unbearable and the expectations be damned.

I have often wanted to write of joys, indescribable blessings that surprise me and bring a respite from the pain, like those moments when the monitor says you are in between contractions. I have wanted to write of my anger, the fury that sharpens my tongue and explodes from my body as I light another cigarette and throw the damn ball for the dog. I have wanted to write of the tiny moments of peace, of the disturbing dreams and the emptiness, but I went silent, knowing my thoughts were not fit to express in polite society and could cause harm to others. Selectively mute for three months, resisting the urge to wipe the dust away from my laptop, pushing pushing pushing the words back inside. Until now.  Until this day when I can safely say that I am sad, I am still sad. I can’t find the light and I have little grace to offer.

Choosing to break the silence has become an equal burden to maintaining my quiet. Progress? Please do not expect that.  Wisdom, I have none. Every breath counts when you are giving birth and when you are dying and when you are trying to remember that smoking is bad and pop tarts aren’t dinner. I am still trying to breathe, to bring air into this messy soul and shattered heart. I have broken my silence, though, if only to relieve a bit of the pressure within, if only to say that I am still here.