The Letter I Didn’t Write 4 Years Ago
Dear Friend,
I’m so sorry I didn’t write you sooner.
In the summer of 2020, I was fired from my life’s work, while we were at a counseling center in Fresno. I remember knowing it was coming. I remember the counselors telling me that would be illogical, irrational, unthinkable.
They were wrong.
Within 30 seconds of the unthinkable happening, an email was sent out to all of my supporters, all of you, telling you I no longer worked with the organization. Thirty seconds is a long time when you’re holding your breath, but it’s not a lot of time when you’re gasping for breath.
When your life lies shattered on the floor in front of you. When you’ve just been told that you can never return home. When you’ve lost your entire community. All of your belongings. When you’re on the far side of the country from your family with hardly more than the clothes on your back to your name. When not only your job but also your identity has been stripped away and “bible translator” doesn’t seem like a transferable skill. When you have to tell your children that they will never return to the only place they’ve known as home. Before recovering from that initial reeling, my phone was pinging and ringing with people wanting to know what was happening.
But I didn’t know.
I didn’t know what was happening.
I hadn’t even begun to comprehend what was happening.
Every morning dawned on me in the depths of depression. Every shower was drowning myself in shame. Every day was trying to keep it together for my family, ignoring the constant scream of panic like living through a cicada summer.
That’s in addition to the unbearable pressure of coming up with something to say.
I tried to think about what to say. How could I explain what was essentially a he said/she said spiraling out of control? I didn’t want to be divisive, but it seemed like that left me the one tarnished.
I tried to think about what to say. But even the most vague terms came with backlash and further emotional distance from the community I had lost.
I tried to think about what to say. But I couldn’t even think about my home – I couldn’t even think about never returning – I couldn’t even think about all I had lost with losing it again.
I remember seeing posts on Facebook: “Don’t assume people heard on Facebook, pick up the phone and call.” Was that directed at me? Should I pick up the phone and call 100+ supporters and try to explain this thing that I can’t explain 100+ times? Explain the irrational, the illogical, the unthinkable 100+ times? See if people confirmed the shame narratives replaying in my head 100+ times?
I took another shower. There’s no shame in coming out of the shower with a wet and red face.
Weeks turned to months and I still didn’t know what to say.
And I don’t think you knew what to say either.
So we stood there waiting until someone said something.
Until we realized that no one was going to.
Until it became awkward.
Until we drifted away.
But I want you to know that I really hated that.
I hate that I felt like I lost the relationship we had. I hate that we don’t talk so much anymore, in real life or even just through social media. I hate that we feel distant. And I’m sorry that I didn’t write this letter sooner.
I don’t think I have an answer or an elegant explanation now anymore than I did then. But I’m showing up with a reason and an apology:
I’m sorry it’s been a while. Healing from that trauma was brutal and I didn’t know how to start again. Until today, when a new-era friend suggested that I write the letter I wasn’t able to back then. And I was just wondering if we could. Start again, I mean.
I’ll go first with catching you up on what I’ve been up to for the past 4 years:
2020
I’d like to thank Kendal Hayden for messaging me out of the blue while we were in Papua New Guinea and calling my social media “attraction marketing.” Marketing is a much more transferable skill than Bible Translation. I started working remotely for CodeWizardsHQ doing outreach marketing. (Just an FYI: outreach marketing isn’t as fun as attraction marketing.)
2021
We decided to start traveling full-time, first and foremost because we couldn’t afford to live in America. We didn’t make enough money as missionaries to receive unemployment. We had no rental history. All I had was a remote job and the cost of living in Mexico was way more reasonable than in the States. My husband started a travel blog so continuing on from Mexico seemed like a strategic option and we’ve been loving this adventure!
Meanwhile I was caring for TCKs. Do you remember the art camps I did in Papua New Guinea? I wanted to do that everywhere for missionary kids and other globally mobile children. In the course of that, I read Raising Up a Generation of Healthy Third Culture Kids which is how I met Lauren. Lauren wanted to create a company with worldwide impact for TCKs and I convinced Lauren that if she had dreams of that scale, she’d need help. CodeWizardsHQ had given me social media experience to make Lauren an offer too good to refuse. So I started working with her in 2021.
Before I left the counseling center in Fresno, CA, a counselor spoke a blessing – or was it a prophecy – over me. That I would find people who didn’t confuse my strengths for weaknesses. Lauren fulfilled that – speaking those words to me, almost verbatim, on a beach in Georgia.
2022
During all this time, I did therapy for my own healing. Art processing for grief and healing, a year of EMDR (it normally only takes 8 weeks but leaving PNG had a lot of layers). I focused on healing and processing which was extremely difficult because… I don’t know that I entered 2020 with a lot of those skills. But I gained them and I gained them quickly, because I needed them desperately.
In working with TCK Training, I quickly realized that a lot of families didn’t have these skills of emotional processing and I wrote out everything that I had learned in The Practice of Processing. I’d like to thank my linguistic background for giving me the skills of taking an art and breaking it down into pieces for analysis. I did that with emotional processing and it’s helped so many people to see it laid out like that. I’ve had such a generous reception on how helpful that book is! It’s so encouraging.
Up to Today
I’m now Chief Operating Officer of TCK Training and in leading my team, I’ve been very conscientious of being trauma-informed. My healing journey took so long, not because of anything terrible or heinous, but because of common practices and behaviors that were not trauma-informed. Seemingly small things compounded my trauma, adding layer upon layer that had to be processed systematically. So, as a leader, I did things differently. And I heard from my team that being under my leadership was helping them heal from previous workplace trauma.
In working with TCK Training, I quickly realized that a lot of leaders and a lot of workplaces didn’t have these skills of trauma-informed leadership and so, again, I’m in the process of writing out everything I know. I’m writing a book about Trauma-Informed Leadership. Honestly that’s what spurred me to reach out. Because community is who you share these big endeavors and accomplishments with and I feel like I’ve lost half of mine. Because as I was telling my new-era friend about this, it was tinged with bitterness that my old-era friends felt so distant. But I don’t want to leave this relationship in the silence after trauma.
So what do you say to starting again?
It’s your turn! How have you been?