One of the greatest gifts I have been able to give myself in my late twenties and early thirties has been the gift of inner healing.
Throughout my early off-and-on relationship with therapy, I never felt like I was growing as a woman or working through my own baggage. But over the last five years, the therapist I see has helped me dig deep into my own story and do the healing work I have long needed to do.
Therapy is a gift I can give to myself and one for which I am incredibly grateful.
However, I am well aware that, for many women, the luxury of going to counseling is something that may not be feasible in their life for a variety of reasons (finances, insurance coverage, fear of what others will think).
While going to therapy is a wonderful avenue, there are still various tools you can use in your life to help you deal with stress, even if you're unable to go to counseling.
What do those things look like?
Knowing your triggers.
Reading reliable sources.
Practice diaphragmatic breathing.
Daily Gratitude.
Catching your ANTS.
You can read more about each of these suggestions over at Verily . . .
I try to use my little space here responsibly; to share with authenticity and talk about painful topics sometimes we don't know what to do with in the Church.
If you have been around here for awhile, you know at the age 30 I went through a divorce, annulment, and in time began the process of learning to date in a new way. My life is radically different from those years.
I think my experience of those things as a young Catholic woman is a perspective not very common in Catholic circles.
As I have done my own healing work, I've realized God can use my experience to encourage or share hope with other Catholic women in a similar situation.
Over the last few years, I have begun to write and share from that season of my life. I receive a steady stream of emails from Catholic women looking for help, resources, and a place for their voice to be heard and pain to be seen.
In the last week, I came across some blog posts I had published with the CatholicMatch Institute on the experience of divorce as a young Catholic. I offer them here for you; whether you a navigating this in your own life or you have a friend or family member facing the pain of divorce.
Sometimes when we have not walked a particular experience or situation, we don't know how to respond because that has never happened to us. I have heard this again and again from other Catholic women who have gone through a divorce.
There are some helpful and not so helpful things to be aware of when walking with someone in your life going through a divorce.
There have been plenty of times where the many good people in my life have offered me advice that challenged me and helped me grow. At the same time, there have been incidents where people offered advice that was less than helpful or just plain insensitive.
In a particular way, I think for divorced Catholics, receiving helpful or hurtful advice can be sensitive to navigate. When I was navigating my own divorce and annulment, I was very fortunate to be surrounded by an army of friends and family who loved me and walked alongside very closely through the pain of those years.
Thankfully, I only had one experience of a friend who said something hurtful and unkind in regards to my circumstances.
Sadly, I know this is not the case for everyone else.
There are some important things to keep in mind.
You can read more about them over at CatholicMatch Institute . . .
(Another post discussing The Struggles of Going Through a Divorce While Young may be helpful or encouraging to someone in your life).
I never claim to be an expert in any of this but I know I am not the only Catholic who gone through this.
I hope if that is you (or someone close in your life) it speaks to where you are and helps you feel seen and heard.
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