Heart Devastation and Inner Healing

9/16/24

Hello Reason-For-Hope ~

Do you ever have a lot going on yet not in a physically active sort of way?

These last couple weeks have been quite the journey yet I haven’t traversed many highways. It’s more like riding the waves of the heart – whether it’s breaking into bits with mini tsunamis of pain, or being rebuilt stronger with The Master Builder and good friends.

I’m handling this stuff so much better than in the past, if I do say so myself :). Hallelujah! See? I am growing up!

One of the more painful tsunamis hit when my beloved and imperfect beast, Super-Duper-Awesome-Cooper died. (That’s his picture above, showing the angel wings he started growing while still in this realm.)

He was a proud pittie, four legged walking partner, resident of the middle seat of my vehicle, and a living, breathing security blanket who delved into my heart and then broke it open when his increasingly debilitating aliments wore him out last Tuesday. (sniffle)

Since he went pretty much everywhere I did, many people got to know and love him in spite of his stinky farts, ferocious sounding barks that were really only saying: “notice me! Pet me!”,  and incessant licking of their exposed limbs. 

And by the way, those stinky farts put grins on a couple of the students’ faces at the school he visited as a therapy dog. (There had been a mass shooting a few weeks earlier and Cooper was on one of the dog therapy teams that ministered to the students when they returned to school.) 

I so miss my smelly, faithful side kick. 

It was a wild ride for his last week; had told someone on Tuesday how well he’d been doing with regaining attitude and energy, then had an emergency trek to his vet on Friday. The new meds helped him so much on Saturday but on Sunday had to consult with his vet again. Monday he seemed to be doing better and on Tuesday he gave up. 

He was getting wobblier and with any exertion he was breathing like a locomotive’s engine trying to gain momentum with a hundred fully loaded freight cars dragging behind. Got the impression that when he quit eating and refused to budge once he was outside, he was telling me with his proud ‘tude that he didn’t want to keep going one more step.

So, I honored his wish. (sob)

(He had a ‘mass’ pushing his windpipe into an acute angle and an enlarged heart/congestive heart failure.) 

And after living with the credo: “I don’t need anyone, God, I just need You!” for a couple decades, this newer one about ‘it takes a village’ is proving much more healing. (Go figure ;))

It’s been such a blessing to be able to allow people to help heal my heart while it’s still in the process of falling apart. 

I took Cooper to visit a couple of his favorite people before he went to the vet for the last time. They loved on him like he deserved, and I received a couple of hugs as an added bonus.  

There was the friend who went with me for that last trip to the vet, like she’s done in similar situations in the past. And in spite of not wanting others to know right away word got out anyway and there’s been quite an array of sympathy received via texts, emails, phone calls, and the hug from a friend when she stopped by to pick some stuff up (even though I was sweaty!).

There was also some good advice received when I confessed to a wise comrade I couldn’t figure out how to grieve and she recommended talking to Cooper as if he’s still here. It works!

All of these good people and their acts of kindness are helping to fill that chasm that’s forming as I’m letting go of a being I love.

Thank you.

(If you have a memory of a loved one – whether four or two legged – that you’d like to share please do so in the comment section below.)

I’ve also been revisiting, and removing the effects of, some of the devastation experienced during the trafficking and abuses of childhood, marriage and beyond with the “Prayers That Heal the Heart” course I’ve been taking.

This process is so effective! And what’s been so wonderfully confounding is, as my coach and I are peeling back all the shame based lies I’ve believed all these years due to how I was treated and all I survived, I’m also being showed what I deserve in relationships with a focus on the romantic kind. It’s been quite an eye (and heart) opener. This work is so instrumental in increasing and strengthening my faith for all the different hopes that’ve been dwelling in my heart.

Thank You, Jesus!

I’ll be writing more about this next time (probably!).

My hope for you is, if you could use some inner healing for yourself that you, too, know you are worthy of doing all it takes to set yourself free from the past and fully live the amazing life God as for you.  If you want to see if this path is right for you, please check out the CWG Ministries website (cwgministries.org). They have quite a selection of courses to choose from, and they offer a different one for free on a monthly basis.  If there is a resource that has been helpful for you and you’d like others to know about it, please leave a comment below and I’d be grateful to share it for you!

I hope you notice, at the very least, a few heart smiling moments until we meet again.

Don’t know if you’ve ever seen the VanHalen video “Can’t Stop Loving You”. It has so many images of the different types of love, including that of a beloved pet. Enjoy!