Dear Sister

Dear sister,

Is this the day it ends, or is this the day it begins?

It’s possible that both can be true at the same time.

Since your recent Independence Day, I have spent every day walking beside you. Sometimes literally, mostly figuratively. (Oh, the miles we’ve put on our shoes and the minutes we’ve logged on our phones!)

I have carried your burden. I have cried your tears. I have screamed your rage. And I have lamented your loss.

That burden, those tears, that rage and that loss: they have permeated everything. Every waking moment, and your sleeping moments too. The cruelty that has been directed towards you is enough to squash your soul and it provides massively strong building material for you to wall off your heart for the rest of your life.

Because, after being a victim of this sort of damage, who in their right mind would ever trust another again?

Ah, but not you, sister. Within 48 hours of your unwanted Independence Day explosion, you set in motion a plan for your healing. While that plan has been adjusted, scrapped, and rewritten many times already, I can’t ignore the strength you’ve shown by even wanting to pursue wholeness.

I would have crumbled. I would have sought vengeance. If I was going to burn, I’d for sure take the arsonist down with me.

Again, not you, sister. You lavished grace upon grace. You (shockingly and immediately!) forgave the terrorizer and sought healing for everyone involved. I’m still not even one percent as far down that road as you are, but you’ve modeled love for me yet again.

I say “again” because over the years, I’ve watched you love in a way I’ve never seen - a way that was not modeled for either of us. You kept your word. You sacrificed yourself. You forgave as you’ve been forgiven, and protected the very person who left you unprotected.

You don’t deserve what has been done to you and neither do other parties involved. Because an explosion of this magnitude didn’t start and end with your one heart. The shockwaves have affected every relationship that even remotely shared space with yours. The rot that was exposed has spread like black mold and will continue to spread until it is exposed to the Light.

I am proud of your courage to pursue that Light in your own life.

I am proud of your honest self-assessment and efforts to seek guidance to learn another way of living.

I am proud of the work you’re doing to erect boundaries that will protect your future.

I am immensely proud that you have begun the hard work of fighting for yourself.

Because, the truth is, you’ve always been worth fighting for and you always will be. The person who can’t see that is someone who is a blind, self-serving, cowardly peacock. (Full of strutting but lacking something to truly be proud of.)

As much as it hurts to carve a new path that you never thought you’d have to carve, you and I both know you’re already better off walking this road.

I started this letter with a question and a statement: “Is this the day it ends, or is this the day it begins? It’s possible that both can be true at the same time.”

I choose to mark this day as a beginning and claim it as an Independence Day - one that’s ever more important than your first one.

Today is the day you walk away with your head held high, knowing you are loved beyond measure and your best is yet to come.

I’m with you, and I love you!

Always,
Poozie