What is the first rule when you’re hiking in the wilderness and you come around a corner…and find yourself looking into the eyes of a predator? Okay. I mean, a four legged predator – not a two legged one.

You hold your ground. You look confident. You speak up. You stay calm. Make yourself big. Walk away, slowly, confidently, non threateningly.

Actually, it’s not that different with the two legged kind… Then, when you’re safe, you’re free to let those emotions swamp over you. Overwhelm you. Fill your being until your pores themselves are shaking with the emotions you held in.

What if it’s every day though? What if every single day, at fairly predictable times, you knew something dangerous this way comes? What if that danger wasn’t the kind that would hit, or bite, or draw blood… but would cut you deep in places not visible. Would demean you, strip you of your worth, would frighten you by smashing or bashing nearby… if the pattern of frightening events and talks were suddenly on a scary cycle you could predict with a clock – no matter what you did, or how you behaved?

Over time, you might go crazy. You might think it’s safer in the wilderness than in your own den. You might start fantasizing about how to walk away to face the elements with nothing at all, so that you can be evaporated by whatever nature has in store… because surely that’s better than staying put where you’re so very much not wanted, needed, or cared for?

Then. Let’s say the day comes when you find the strength to stand straight and get free. You walk away. You fight with the tools given to you by God. The people He puts in your path to educate you, support you, help you take steps carefully into a safe independence.

You make your own den. You protect your cubs. You store food. You try to start healing. But the fight isn’t over yet. It may never, ever be. For the rest of your life you will be on guard, because your predator views you as his own personal toy to torment.

The day comes when you have to defend the small bit you have built and assert your claim to your former home, the life you built before you set yourself free.

That day. That day – it doesn’t matter the weather. If it’s sunny, the sun will burn and be harsh and cruel. If it’s rainy, it will rain a deluge; God himself drowning the earth with his tears. If it’s windy, the trees will whip back and forth. If it’s calm, it will feel a deadly calm. That day you spend sitting. sitting. sitting. quiet and still. And the men will come with their questions. Asking for proof. Asking for evidence. They will poke and they will pry. They will look for your lists. They will need documentation. They will want your stories – the stories you don’t tell people.

And you look away – at the windows. At the sky. Wishing yourself to be like the birds who can just escape all of this. You will stumble and answer… cupping your trembling elbows and your shaking self and trying to hold yourself calm. So calm.

You.Cannot.Fall.Apart.Ever. Not. Ever. Do not let them see you shake. For these men, these who question. Who mediate. Who seek to end the fight and restore what’s right to the people, they hear the lies from the serpent in the other room. They hear the roars from the predators. They ask what is true. You are so rigid.

You seek your cubs. Cared for by others, of course. You seek your friends, your family, anyone so that you stay connected. And you wait. and try to remain calm and level headed. And you never, ever betray your fears or show weakness…

The day ends. There is no winning or losing these battles. That would be grotesque to define your life in those terms. There is only pain, and some hope that you can care for your cubs and protect them from the world and life you had before.

You return to your new den. Your mouth is parched, it doesn’t matter how much water you drank that day. You find your cubs. You hover, you check on them, you try to remain normal.

Someone shows you love. Someone who truly cares for you sees you and brings you the food your soul needs… and then. You close the door and turn to a private space, and you can’t hold it together any more. And you cry. And you cry. The earth itself cannot swallow up the tears choking their way out of you. You are so very alive. The emotions you feel are so hard to define, not sadness, not happiness, not glory, or despair…but yet they ooze from your being; your heart a hard hurting knot desperate for comfort and still so lost in the storm built by a day of tension and anxiety and questions and fear.

Healing is such a private journey. You need to be loved. You need to love. Yet, no one but you knows what that path in front of you looks like.

But Don’t Fall Apart. The predators are never far away.