When friends called, why is it that I couldn't force myself to reveal my neediness? Why is it that I did not call any one of the many phone numbers I have for people who care for me...?

Loneliness is, after all, only human. In fact, a lovely part of being human, an evidence of our connectedness. In theory.

It feels to me like a weakness.

A shameful point of vulnerability

A flaw.

A fault.

!@#$%! this old prison.

I hate this part of who I am as a wounded woman.

This cold, aloof, superior, hard, machine-like, unbending, frightened part of my soul.

Even as I lash out at myself, I know this is not the path to healing.

Catherine would say, “Hug her. She needs your love. She‘s just scared and lonely.”

Tears come…and so does gratitude.

I am thankful I don’t live in this prison anymore.

Though I do, from time to time, find myself visiting an old prison.

I hear God’s inviting words echo in my head, “For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” Galatians 5:1.

Have you visited any old prisons along your way? 

Read more from Janet Davis and gain the wisdom of professional insight and the heart of a hurting mother as she walks through the news of her son's brain tumor, just as he is about to enter law school.

        ----Taken from SACRED HEALING: MRIs, Marigolds, and Miracles, Janet Davis, p. 195-196.