Category Archives: Skills & Tools

Another Kind of Single

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Standing in the self-help section of the bookstore at the age of 49, looking for a book on divorce, I felt conspicuous, desperate and in a state of disbelief. I wished that I were invisible.

Once before, years earlier, I had become unexpectedly and painfully single because of my husband’s death. The role of a widow seemed somehow more honorable. Death was clear cut; divorce was not. This is the trajectory no one wants their life to take. Being divorced seemed shameful, tainted with regrets and uncertainty.

Everyone knows that marriage takes daily attention and work. My second husband and I had managed this for many years but eventually we saw that we could not maintain it for a lifetime. We became aware of the destructive nature of our life together. What had been for us the joy of meals, conversation, games of hide and seek, appreciation of the moon and one another had eventually dissipated into disappointment and despair. As much as each of us loved our son, we could see that our marriage relationship was draining our home of its life-giving quality for him – and for us.

To embark on the path of divorce required courage and a great deal of discernment. For us, it wasn’t an easy way out; it was a necessary one. While we were divorcing each other, we were clear about the need to remain connected in order to parent our son well. The losses we all sustained were many.

I believe that our communities have the capacity to support us all–those who are married, those who are divorced, those who have never married, and those who are widowed. We all make choices and life happens to all of us. Whether we are coupled or single, it is our responsibility and our privilege to live a life that speaks of energy and hope, a life that is rich and makes room for meaning. For me, in the various ways I have lived, the one clear and unchanging factor has been my faith. My belief system may shift, but my faith has remained a constant. I have been strengthened and supported in times of scarcity and times of plenty. I give thanks for this and for those who were there with me when I needed someone to listen and care.

In retrospect, if I could speak to that woman who stood in the bookstore feeling so anxious years ago, I would tell her that, yes, there are books that might be helpful — Passionate Marriage by Snarch, Hold Me Tight by Johnson, Anxious to Please by English and Rapson, and The Good Divorce by Aarons. In addition to that, I would advise her to get some exercise each day, try to eat decently and suggest that she would benefit from entering into a practice of daily prayer and meditation.

May God bless us all in all.

Trauma and Recovery

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At first glance, there was nothing outstanding about the way she looked. I stood behind a woman and her young family in a buffet line—all of us waiting to fill our plates. Nothing caught my eye until the woman turned toward me, making her full face visible, showing half her face unmarked and half seared with burn scars. An additional quick scan took in scars on the exposed parts of her right forearm and hands; she walked with a limp. I also noticed the easy manner the woman and family related to each other. In the seconds viewing the woman’s scars and her family, I imagined a story of trauma and recovery.

It is nearing ten years since I saw the woman in the buffet line, and while I never learned her story, I often think of her scars and how I came to see them: hidden at first, then visible when she turned to full view. For this woman, a piece of her story was available for others to see and I’ve often wondered what people would look like if faces showed the many scars of traumas and pain experienced in daily living. Would scars serve as a reminder that pain from trauma and loss is not quickly or easily healed? Would we feel less isolated and alone in our pain if it were easily seen on the outside?

Three years ago, a friend knocked on my Samaritan Center office door at Bellevue Presbyterian Church’s Upper Campus, interrupting a meeting to find out if I had heard from my daughter, Katie — was she safe? At that moment, Seattle Pacific University, the school my daughter attended, was on lockdown and there was a shooter on campus. Twenty minutes after the knock, Katie called and reported she was safe after hunkering down in a nearby apartment. While I was quickly relieved for the safety of my daughter, I soon learned the story did not have a happy ending—what shooting does? My daughter, and hundreds of other victims, came out without visible scars, but the pain did not stop—has not stopped—for many. Two of the shooter’s victims were wounded, and one young man, who was a dear friend to many, died. Many others—untouched by bullets—have invisible scars on the inside. Two years later, many continue to feel the pain.

As a Marriage and Family Therapist at Samaritan Center, I spend most of my workdays listening to stories of physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual pain. The issues cover a range of topics including recovery and healing from various traumas. Trauma events, like the shooting at SPU, often impact individuals long after the event, and long after friends and families think it should. Perhaps one of the difficulties in healing from trauma is that many wounds are on the inside, invisible to others. Months and years after the event, individuals may experience symptoms of post-traumatic stress, anxiety, panic, and depression. The same is true for emotional and spiritual pain of any cause—we feel the pain, but our faces may not show it, especially when taught to hide the pain from others.

I’m thankful for the Psalmists who wrote about both their joys and laments. I’m also thankful for modern Christian writers who have shared their personal traumas and grief—Gerry Sittser and C.S. Lewis to name two. The stories of grief validate both the feelings of wanting to quickly “get over it” and the experience that grief and pain pay no attention to our desire. In order to heal from traumas, we need to move through the pain, as the way to move forward, weaving the event and impact into our daily life and faith. Individuals often come to counseling when help from family and friends has been exhausted, and when working through the pain on their own is ot enough.

Understanding Childhood Grief

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Loss affects all people – children and adults – in profound and unique ways. One interesting and often challenging feature of grief is that it is a personal, subjective experience – no two people’s experiences of grief, even over the same loss, are the same. It is, therefore, important that parents and caregivers work to understand their children’s possible grieving. Then can a child receive the support they might not know how to ask for, and feel understood when they are in an emotional state that can feel foreign, confusing and uncomfortable.

In anticipation of or following a loss, the following guidelines can help facilitate a child’s grieving in a way that promotes healthy development. Symptoms can vary in children, from sadness to anger and irritability, loss of appetite, and difficulty sleeping. Understand that no loss is too great or too small to grieve. The experience of loss is relative to the person, so the death of a pet can be as painful as the death of a loved family member. What causes grief can be different for every child.

Answer all questions and tell the truth. When a child is curious, give him or her answers in ways that are clear and easy to understand. The less a child has to wonder, the less he or she is likely to rely on fantasy or imagination, which often can cause anxiety. Difficult feelings are actually opportunities. While it can be difficult to see a child feeling sad or in pain, resist the urge to “make it better.” Instead, join in the sharing of their hard feelings, helping to name the feelings when that is possible.

Remember, the goal is not to “get over” a loss, but rather to learn how to live with the reality of it in healthy ways. There is no timeline. Understand that grief is a personal process that requires working through very difficult feelings. Rushing this process can get in the way, unintentionally drawing the grief out longer than it needs to be.

What Brings Men to Counseling?

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Samaritan’s Men Counselors Reflect on the Question

It may happen in their 30s, 40s, 50s or later.  Men who have dealt with everything life has handed them – those whom Michael Rogers, a therapist and formerly the clinical director at Samaritan Center of Puget Sound, describes as “testosterone-driven fixers”– find that their defenses are wearing thin.  The pressures come at them from all sides.  Frustration, depression and anxiety threaten to overwhelm them and their relationships.  “At the point when they can’t outrun their fear,” Michael said, “it’s usually through someone close to them who sees or feels their distress – a doctor, wife, employer, or friend – that they come to counseling.”

“In fact,” said Rob Erickson, one of the 12 men who provide counseling at Samaritan, “it’s often the women in their lives who ask them (either lovingly or with some level of hostility) to come to counseling.”

Gary Steeves, Samaritan’s coordinator in South King County, noted that he eventually had to admit that he couldn’t fix himself in the aftermath of an auto accident several years ago.  Physical therapy and “dealing with it myself” was only helpful up to a point, he said.  “It was as if I was carrying that traumatic experience around in my body.  I was like a block of concrete.”  When he finally went to a movement therapist, he said it was transformative.  “First of all, the roles were reversed.  Someone was working with me—not ‘fixing’ me but, rather, helping me manage those forces within me.  I think it is incredibly powerful when we face our limitations and our vulnerability.  We can stop carrying the mantle of having to do everything by ourselves.”

Mar Houglum, a pastoral counselor as well as marriage and family therapist, said that he thinks it is “a huge step for men to seek help.  They resist the notion that talking with someone who listens in a safe, affirming, empathic way could be helpful.  I find that when they take that risk, they find a sense of greater ease with themselves—a generosity with themselves.”

Michael Rogers notes that there are a number of men’s groups in the area.  “I’ve been part of a small men’s group for years,” Michael said, “and I have to tell you that we aren’t nearly as good at self-disclosure as women are.  It takes us a long time to get to an authentic level of sharing.”

“Coming into therapy seems to give men ‘a Walden Pond’,” said Bill Collins, who has been with Samaritan as a therapist and supervisor for many years.  “It provides a reflective space where they can take stock of themselves and consider healing possibilities.  In The Way of Man, Martin Buber notes that Yahweh asks Adam in the garden, ‘Where are you, Adam?’ not because Yahweh does not know the answer, but because Adam doesn’t know the answer.”