The Gifts of a Difficult Season

An open gift box full of dirt sits on a wooden table among other wrapped gifts, spices, dried oranges, succulents, and a small container of earth or ash. A hand rests on the table, holding a stylus. From the box grows a small, magically glowing tree with a golden star ornament on top. Created using DALL-E3 with Bing Image Creator using the prompt “The Gifts of a Difficult Year, showing hope and growth through hard and difficult times, or beauty from ashes.”

I’m writing this on Christmas Eve Eve, almost at the end of the year. And while I’m not someone who blames a calendar year for the hardships and difficulties that fell within its boundaries, I must confess a certain excitement for the turn of the page to something new, and fresh, and full of undefined potential.

I remember also feeling optimistic going into 2023, so the optimism itself doesn’t always forecast beautiful things to come.

I tend to mark my life by big events—births and adoptions of my children, deaths of loved ones (including one of my children), falling in love, getting married, and big trips full of new experiences and friendships that I’ll forever hold in my heart. And this year definitely holds significant landmarks in the landscape of my memory. Sadly, the painful moments have nearly overshadowed the beautiful ones.

In this post, I want to take a moment to reflect on a year marked by pain and remember the blessings it also contained while I look for the signs of healing and growth that are coming out of the whole. If you want to come along while I meander through the garden of a winter year and look for signs of spring, then I invite you to grab a mug of something comforting and read on.

A poignant still life of a weathered wooden desk covered in old books, rusty clocks, keys, and teacups and bits of natural detritus such as feathers, seed pods, and dried leaves. A tarnished vase with dead and dried twigs and plants covered with cobwebs holds a single fresh orange bloom. Created using DALL-E3 through Bing Image Creator with the prompt “The Gifts of a Difficult Season”.

Our lives occur in seasons, and those seasons don’t always reflect the calendar or the world around us. Sometimes they do. But many of the sadnesses and joys of our lives are personal only to us. And for me, 2023 was a winter season.

After that initial optimism last January, my life very quickly became filled with turmoil. There was a lot of loss this year, and some of it is of a nature I don’t feel at liberty to discuss publicly. But, among the losses were my grandmother and my young niece on the same day—Easter Sunday.

Even one of those would feel like a lot to some people, but, this year, they were just a few more bundles on a load I was already overburdened with. Because those two extremely difficult events fell hard on the heels of a personal trauma that will forever mark a turning point in my memory. A “before” and “after”, like the letters B.C. and A.D. following a Gregorian year.

I can’t share the details of what happened, though I did give a high-level overview in my May post entitled “Summer is Coming” when I referred to my dad’s acute episode. But I can tell you that it shook me to my core, pulled me up by the roots, and I’ve spent most of this year trying to figure out how the pieces of me fit back together. (How’s that for some mixed metaphors? C’mon, that’s half the reason you read these posts, right?)

Compounding the effects of trauma, or perhaps compounded by the trauma, I’ve dealt with several other health issues this year that have affected my healing path.

Perhaps the most dramatic discovery was that after several years of dealing with symptoms such as brain fog and fatigue that I had laid solely on the door of perimenopause and stress, followed by several months of acute and excruciating cramps after almost every meal, I finally figured out that I’m gluten intolerant.

The final nail in the gluten coffin occurred on the trip between Edmonton and home on the way back from our summer vacation.) Within a week of going off gluten, I felt like a different person. It felt like being cured of a chronic disease.

Did that take care of all of my issues? No. In fact, the more I’ve been learning about perimenopause, the harder it is to draw a line between symptoms caused by trauma, symptoms caused by food, and symptoms caused by hormonal changes. However, I’m still grateful for that discovery. I miss bread, but not more than I enjoy feeling energized and mentally clear.

However, our physical and emotional and spiritual selves live in an interconnected web, so no wonder it’s difficult to separate the symptoms.

Are the long stretches of this year that I’ve gone without being able to experience joy because of trauma and grief or hormones?

Probably both.

Are my changes in ability to focus and concentrate and be creative due to trauma and grief or hormones?

Again, probably both.

However, as is usually the case, I’ve been learning and growing through this season of difficulty. Through a combination of therapy, journaling, self-study about the enneagram and other developmental tools, and the love and longsuffering ears of my family and friends as I processed verbally, I’m slowly emerging from the winter and darkness of this year into something new. Into being something—someone—new.

A traveller with a walking stick and a box walks along a light-filled path lined with trees at sunset. The trees go from stunted and barren toward being filled with fruit and green leaves. At their bases are enormous wrapped gifts that increase in size and number the further along the path the traveller goes. Created using DALL-E3 via Bing Image Creator using the prompt “The Gifts of a Difficult Season, showing hope and growth through hard times.”

The trauma I experienced this year tore open parts of me I didn’t know existed, and it exposed patterns so deeply inlaid I didn’t know they were a pattern, I just thought they were part of my essence. In doing so, they allowed me to see parts of myself I’d never seen before, some ugly, some beautiful.

Healing isn’t a quick or easy road, and the deeper the wound, the longer it takes. The wounds of this year merely exposed old wounds so deep they lay next to my core. But in being re-injured, I discovered the nature of the original wounds.

“A painter should begin every canvas with a wash of black, because all things in nature are dark except where exposed by the light.”

— Leonardo da Vinci

Fantasy composite image showing a hooded figure walking toward a horizon between a split landscape of light pastoral setting and a dark urban one. Mysterious and magical figures bearing staves and ornaments race toward the trail, doves fly all around, and the figure leaves a room full of enormous fruit, gifts, and a beautifully decorated Christmas tree in their wake. Created using DALL-E3 via Bing Image Creator using the prompt “The Gifts of a Difficult Year, showing hope and growth through hard and difficult times.”

I’ve mentioned grieving several times in this post. Every change brings grief, and it’s never simple, but especially so when dealing with core wounds.

I’ve had to draw some boundaries for my own protection to allow me to heal. Because of that, I’ve been grieving a relationship that has had to change because it was never what I thought it was.

I’ve been grieving the little girl I never got to be, and learning to reparent that part of me and give her what she needed.

I’ve been learning to see her inherent worth, apart from all the achievements and hard work she felt was so necessary to prove herself and earn love.

I’ve also been learning to see the value and blessing of the hard work and service I give others without attaching value to myself because of it. When I first learned my enneagram type and heard that this was possible, I didn’t know how. I’m learning.

(For you non-enneagram Threes reading this, this struggle is probably nonsensical to you. You have your own struggles, don’t worry. This is mine—to separate and acknowledge my value apart from my achievements and the work I do for others, while still being able to bless others with my work from a place of strength and wholeness.)

Illustration of a phoenix rising from the flames behind a pile of rubble in front of a starry urban background. A small evergreen grows from the rubble, decorated with flowers and with a literal star at its tip. In front of the rubble are boxes wrapped in ribbons, Christmas ornaments, and some new green and blue plant life. Created using DALL-E3 via Bing Image Creator with the prompt “The Gifts of a Difficult Year, showing hope and growth through hard and difficult times. A phoenix and new growth rising from flames.”

I still spend a great deal of time struggling with overwhelm. I still tend to say yes when I should probably say no. I still attach more value to the opinions of others, especially people I respect, than I wish I would.

But I’m also learning to own my own worth. And to see that even when I can’t feel God’s presence (trauma and hormones again), he’s still working in my life. And to learn, again, that God has never forsaken me, even when I feel forsaken.

I’m learning to take risks again, to put myself out there and try for things I’d lost confidence that I could achieve. And I’m seeing the rewards of that.

Does everything pay off? No. But some do. And those make the difference.

I’m learning to make space for myself and my own needs. To remember that I don’t have to lose myself in giving to others, and to learn where the line of my responsibility ends. (It’s a work in progress.) Boundary work has been an ongoing growth curve for me for many years now. This year, the growth curve felt like climbing a mountain. But it’s been worth the climb.

I could never have done this without the support of my husband, kids, friends, and extended family.

Is this a year I would have asked for?

Heck, no.

Is this a year I wish had never happened?

I’d like to say the same, but I can’t. Not yet.

However, I’m grateful for the gifts that are coming out of it. I’m grateful for the work the Lord is doing in me because of it. And I’m hopeful that, at long last, I’m seeing the first signs of spring after a dark and difficult season.

Illustration of a dark still life scene of a round wooden tub tied in a ribbon bow on a weathered wooden desk next to a small succulent, wooden cutlery, a steaming cup of coffee, and broken bits of wood and dried leaves. The tub holds a glowing arrangement of flowers in vibrant colours that are glowing with life and vitality. Created using DALL-E3 via Bing Image Creator with the prompt “The Gifts of a Difficult Year, showing hope and growth through hard and difficult times, or beauty from ashes.”

I’m looking forward to 2024 with hope. Not because I believe it will be a year unmarked by more of the pain and tribulations that permeate life as a human, but because I’ve discovered a strength in myself I didn’t know I possessed. I’ve trained new muscles to trust in the Lord, even when I can’t see his hand.

And because, with each passing day, I’m healing a little more. I’m stronger than I was before. And I’m beginning to remember what it was like to touch the light.

A broken blue pottery sphere is partially reconstructed using molten gold to bind the pieces. A mystical light glows at its centre, pouring in from a source above it, and shines out through the cracks. Created using DALL-E3 with Bing Image Creator using the prompt “A beautiful piece of kintsugi pottery with light shining through the cracks, showing beauty in brokenness.”

Whatever season of your life you find yourself in, I pray you also find beauty and strength and wisdom there. May you learn to see and appreciate its gifts.

God bless, my friend. Merry Christmas, and a very happy New Year to you and yours.

“Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light;
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.”

— Sarah Williams, Twilight Hours: A Legacy of Verse