“We are not responsible for what breaks us, but we can be responsible for what puts us back together again. Naming the hurt is how we begin to repair the broken parts.” Desmond Tutu

Nobody gets through life alone. I know many people who because they have been hurt terribly, try. But, in almost anything we do, there is another person involved. 

This leads to trust issues and having difficulty functioning in the world. 

A number of years ago I was working with a woman who had some horrible things happen to her, perpetuated by her ex-husband. He was able to get her arrested for something he did and then take off with their child. This was truly horrible for a loving mother to have to endure.

As we met together over the course of several months, I said to her one day, “Hey, have you noticed that in all the sessions we have been having over the past several weeks and even a couple of months, have you noticed who the story is about?”

She said, “Oh, my gosh, it’s him, isn’t it?”

I said, “Yeah, who’s paying for these sessions?”

It wasn’t him.

True growth began to occur as we named where the cause of the problem was (him) and then what was going to happen from this time forward (her choice). The focus shifted to what he HAD done to what SHE WAS going to do. 

His part in the story only extended to the point of getting her daughter back, not to how she decided to live each day. 

Was she going to be mad and upset or happy and helpful to others while she waited for her daughter to return home? 

She took control over what happened in that time and life got a little easier for her. 

Dr. Paul