SHINE- the Newsletter

Are you ready to step out of the shadows?

I’ll let you in on a secret.

For years, I didn’t think I’d make it out alive. I was trapped in what I called a “velvet prison,” isolated away from friends, family, and freedom. I wasn’t caged or physically restrained, but it felt that way. Christian Fundamentalism spiraled tighter and tighter around me and I felt like I was dying. I knew death was only a matter of time.

I couldn’t understand a God who created me to be invisible and silent. I couldn’t make sense of the Bible stating I was “fearfully and wonderfully made” when nothing about ME was allowed expression. And I couldn’t fathom how my prayers and tears echoed back to me unheard and unanswered.

So I tried. You know? I tried. I tried to flourish within the bounds. I threw myself into being a resourceful, creative housewife and to giving my children a nourishing childhood. I worked an MLM and then started writing a blog. I psyched myself up in prayer and gushed over every small improvement my husband made. I didn’t know to call it yet that, but I fawned––serving and anticipating needs as well as any Martha, eager to do whatever I could to make an impact in the life around me. When I got in trouble for writing in my own name, instead of my husband’s, I kept writing anyway. Words had become breath that kept me going.

Maybe you can relate.

The day came when my blog stepped over the line too far, too many times, and I was excommunicated. And another day came when I made a harrowing break for it and escaped an abusive marriage. But I still had years ahead of recovery and it’s exactly like the therapists say it is: THE BODY KEEPS THE SCORE. I faced the fight of my life; the fight for myself.

I didn’t know what I didn’t know.

I cowered out of ignorance, shyness, anxiety, and fear. For a long time, I thought that would be all that life would offer. I’d been too used, too traumatized to do more.

That was fifteen years ago. Today, I share a lot about the shadows of Christian Fundamentalism. But I also share the light I found in healing. Because religious trauma and domestic abuse took enough of my past! Those are years I’ll never get back. What I refuse to do is allow the shadows to also have my future.

I’m stubbornly and doggedly committed to healing. We deserve to feel whole. To that end, my platform is devoted to the meta-analysis of how fundamentalism has infiltrated our society, from entertainment to politics. It’s also devoted to love, light, fun, and healing. You know this if you’ve celebrated a Diamond Day, or been part of the Pants Party, or wondered why I sometimes just have to scream in all-caps FOX!!

The question I get the most is how I did it. How did you get from there to here?

Well, SHINE shows you how.

SHINE is a subscription newsletter that costs about the same as the cup of coffee so many of you have offered me. Whereas this email list is only for times I have announcements to make or quarterly author updates, SHINE is a deep dive into the process of reclamation after trauma. 

I’ll cover topics like:

How to discover your speed bumps and what’s holding you back

Claiming your audacity––and stop waiting for permission take up space

What it’s like to reparent yourself and take back your time

Releasing the lie that suggest the traumatized will never be whole

You’ve heard me share how I used to stutter too hard to order a pizza, how I was once too locked by social anxiety to speak up, how stored trauma made me so sick doctors told me I had MS, and how I’m using somatic therapy now. With SHINE, I’ll build off those experiences to share how I transformed, what worked and what didn’t, and how you can find the sunshine after shadows too. 

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