Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars. Khalil Gibran

Helloooooo out there! I feel like I have come out of the dark, risen from the ashes after five years and I want to participate in life again.  I have missed blogging,  I want that connection with people to share stories as well as work through my growth and changes.  Five years ago I went through a traumatic explosion of my marriage that shook me to the core. There were multilayers of betrayal, lies and secrecy and at the time I really didn’t think I could go on.  I want to get to the point of being able to share the story, to have conversations and maybe even help others who feel as isolated as I sometimes do.  However, right now there is still too much shame and anger that gets triggered that leaves me wanting to hide under the covers with my cat.  It is my goal to break free from that. At the time I rallied for my kids, grateful for a job that was my refuge and a posse of friends that helped me piece my life back together. My life became small for a long time, I focused on surviving. Take care of my kids, get myself to work and pay the bills.  I really didn’t do much else. Slowly I started healing thanks to my devoted family, passage of time and the burning desire to get out of pain and feel happy again.  Now five years later my kids are grown, I am in a new relationship and I am feeling more optimistic. I am ready to reengage. Five years ago this blog was a place for notes about my knitting and other crafting, kitchen creations and a little about my nursing adventures.  I am not sure where I want this blog to go now, I still want to talk about creativity and about nursing but I also want to explore who I am on the other side of trauma.   I have done so much therapy, read so many books, gone to so many workshops; journaled, meditated, and cried gallons of tears.  I guess I thought that somehow I would get back to the confidence and stability that I had before. But no, the innocence of that former time is not coming back. I may be a stronger more compassionate human, but I will forever have a dent in my trust and a scar on my heart.