I have sat on this particular post for a few weeks. I have never jotted down notes when I blog to figure out what I want to say. I don't really often think through what I am going to write. Instead, I write for the simple therapy of it. This is different. I have jotted down notes, I have thought it through, I have prayed over it. What you are about to read is sacred to me. It's holy ground in a sense. I'm not sure I can do it justice.
Deep Cries Out to Deep
She walked in the room with a poise and grace I have never seen before, yet there was a deep vulnerability that consumed me as she sat down. The vulnerability radiated all around her, it permeated the air, and fell heavily upon me. As she sat at the table across from me, I couldn't help but realize I was about to embark on holy ground. Just as Moses was instructed to remover his sandals, I knew I need to remove a peice of myself before we began the interview. Any preconceived notions I had about how this was going to play out, or what course the conversation was going to take, needed to be removed, and very quickly.
We will call her Grace. It seems appropriate after learning all she had been thorugh and still carried herself with dignity and respect. Grace was just like any other teenager growing up in her small apartment in with her single mother in a small town in Minnesota . She had friends, she laughed, and she had crushes on celebrities as is a tried and true right into the world of teenagers. Being from a single parent household money was always tight, but they had shelter, and food, and heat in the winter. There wasn't a lot left over for extras but it never mattered much to Grace.
One cold particular rainy day, that's when things changed. She came home to discover her mom's new boyfriends coat hanging up on the hook in the hallway. She wasn't a fan of this new beau. There was something about his smile that left Grace feeling unnerved. He offered lot's of promises of a new and better life, but there seemed to be binding strings attached to each one. His appearance didn't seem convey the money and affluent lifestyle he talked about concerning his job and the financial gains he had.
As Grace grabbed a few crackers and a handful of grapes she sat down on the couch waiting for her mom and this man to emerge from the bedroom. She turned the TV up so she could drown out the intimate sounds coming from the hallway. She never made it through the sitcom. This new boyfriend with the leering smile, emerged took one look at her sitting on the couch, and dragged her back to her bedroom. Her called it her intiation into the game. From that day forward he would have his way with her body, and bring countless men over to do the same. He walked her to school, and would breath down her neck threats of how he would kill her and her mother and it would be her fault if she dared breath a word to anyone. After the terror she experienced at his hands she believed him. He was there when she was done with school. her chances for escape where narrow and she believed she had no choices except to continue on.
The profits he made from her, she never saw a dime. Neither did her mother.
Nearly 19 months after it all began he was arrested on drug charges, while spending the few days in jail, thats when she made her escape. She told the school social worker. She showed the principal her bruises that she had always hidden with baggy sweatshirts and long pants. Less then a week later she was removed from her home.
Grace has only seen her mother once since she was removed. Her mother refused to press charges on the man, and told Grace she should have kept quiet.
While recounting her story Grace never once wavered. Her voice never once quaked. No tears shown from her eyes as she looked at me from across that walnut covered table. Behind her eyes was a fierceness that was beyond her years.
I asked her what she felt people needed to now about her story, that could help them. She stared down at the table, for a long moment. Looking up, she said, "To fight. Sometimes fighting to survive is all you have. It's all I had. Fight." Then the tears broke. My own heart ached.
Grace calmed down and said, " They tried to break me. They almost won, but each night when everything was over, instead of laying in bed and feeling sorry for myself, I told myself, I still had the choice to live. I still had the choice to learn. I still had the choice to breath. They couldn't take that from me. Since, being away from that situation and getting her four year degree in psychology. I have learned one more thing, that I still have the choice to love. I can love the people around me, I can love a great big God who protected me, and I can love the hurting. That's another thing they couldn't take from me. If they did they win. They don't get to choose the condition of my soul."
Moving Forward
Grace is currently enrolled in a graduate program to do grief and truama counseling. She will graduate this Spring. She spends weekends serving at the coffee bar at her local church and reading to children in a shelter for abused women and kids.
After speaking with Grace, I couldn't help but evaluate my own life some. Do I freely love the way Grace does? Do I love inspite of hurt I have experienced? Do I trust God the way Grace does? Am I vulnerable to those around me?
Grace exhibits the unbreakableness of the human spirit when faith and love are exercised within.
