Hope Has a Cold Nose continues to lead my path to extraordinary stories of hope. As I have the sacred privilege of listening to and writing stories of brave military veterans, Hope Has a Cold Nose is desiring to expand my awareness.   I am being guided to hear stories that may not involve experience fighting a war as a soldier; yet, it does involve fighting an enemy as a civilian – the enemy of pain, trauma, sorrow, and despair (PTSD). The enemies of negative perception and judgment.   And. Or. As you are about to read, the enemy of abuse.

Once again, I have had the sacred honor of writing about the strength and beauty of the human spirit. I have listened to how courage and will are mightier than the barrage of inflicted reasons to doubt, to feel unworthy, and to feel stripped of dignity and value.   I have listened to how hope prevails. Through another inspirational story, I am witness to how hope flourishes with the aid of a soul in fur who exhibits no greater attributes than unconditional listening and love.

It is my privilege to share with you the story of:

JOY and SARA.

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom – Unknown

Some say that in order to fulfill our purpose in life, we must first experience the opposite of our destiny.   I can share with you an example, or perhaps two, or maybe even three. One would be growing up as an apple of a father’s eye; an only daughter among brothers, receiver of my father’s adoration and pride. I was safely wrapped in the protection of his love when I relied on him to take care of me. When daddy’s little girl grew into her independence, his self-worth began floundering. Not able to “make it all better” as he could when I had a skinned knee or a boy made me cry, he chose to build a wall around his feelings of helplessness thick and tall enough to push me out of his life.

No longer my father’s favorite little girl I could be. Broken from my heart was another piece, though it wasn’t the reason for my heart’s shattering.   Because I was trying to glue the broken pieces inside me back together again was the reason that being my father’s daughter came to an end.   Like that bud that reaches a point where it must begin to bloom, I had reached a point where I had to honor what was my own authentic truth.   I had experienced pain and trauma that had striped me of my self-trust and my sense of security.   That I couldn’t flip a switch and move forward easily my father’s struggle to be understanding.

Before I share the third experience, let me share the second experience that has greatly influenced who I am meant to be.   The second example is being a teenager who experienced seizures frequently.   Imagine studying for a test, and then in an instant the material you studied has been wiped from your memory. If only it could be as humorous as the movie Fifty First Dates, but that isn’t reality.   There is a gift in this, though, for it led me to serve others in need.   First as a 911 dispatcher and then training as a technician assisting during surgeries.

Let me first talk about being a dispatcher, for that will lead me to my third puzzle piece, the piece that snapped “perfectly” into place to guide me towards my wholeness that had been stripped away from me. When you become adept at living with an unknown you became a calm voice when others experience significant uncertainty.   Never certain when a seizure would render me to a blank stare; the exact timing of my mind’s erasing I was never aware. I became a 911 dispatcher receiving incoming calls; help me, I don’t know what to do, she’s unconscious from her fall. Or, he’s not breathing, I can’t get him to wake up, please hurry, help me, please! Or, I’m scared, I’m so very scared he’s going to find where I’m hiding.

Sure, not all calls were of such gravity, yet for the more distressed ones, I knew I was where I was supposed to be. That I would enter a career in the medical field had been calling since I was a patient, too. After all, an attendee of hospitals and doctors’ offices I frequently knew. When you have unexplainable seizures, you become a specimen to test, trial, and prescribe medications to.   My choice to respond to these experiences was to be develop a gift of empathy for what others who are ill go through.

I met my first husband while in college, while both of us were in need.   I, with my seizures; he with a kidney disease. Illness our bond until my seizures ceased. No longer being dependent on him unveiled a deeper sickness I did not see when I said I do. His sickness in the form of verbal, psychological, and border-line physical abuse.   It began on our honeymoon, though I didn’t realize it at the time.   After all, I was still a for better, for worse, until death do us part blushing bride.   Though our honeymoon was eleven months after our wedding due to a restriction on vacation days, I was still focused on happily ever after per the vows I had made.

How is it said two sides to every coin, or said another way, two ways we can look at signs we receive?   It is hindsight that often provides us our best wisdom, to see more than what we initially see.   Our honeymoon was bumpy from the moment we flew to our destination, flying over Hurricane Rita’s tumultuous energy. In my naïve-ness, and my dutiful wife love, I thought our honeymoon experience about the tests that marriages endure and rise above. Now I realize it was symbolic of the massive storm that would soon rage, a storm that would try to erode my self-worth and dignity in every way.

The storm began as near-misses, meaning a remote control that avoided my head yet caught my arm. An immediate second later was the “make it all better” by his expressing he meant no harm. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that, I believed had been spoken with sincerity. Until a coffee cup, an office chair, and then a fire extinguisher was at later times hurled towards me.

Though I was familiar with First Response processes and procedures, I was not knowledgeable about how to work around the rules meant to be in place. The man I was legally married to was very savvy in leveraging relationships to sweep his actions away. The marks he was leaving on me were invisible to the naked eye; the rips and tears I was experiencing were administered deep inside.

The psychological wounds took place in public by the continued monitoring of my whereabouts while I was working.   If only those were the only wounds I had received. Pieces of my soul were pierced when in the privacy of home. Behind closed doors where the only witnesses were the walls who couldn’t communicate what they know. Actually, I take that back that the concealed injuries only took place in what was supposed to be a safe haven from harm externally. There was also an experience while at the Mayo Clinic after he received a new kidney.   Not at home, yet still a shattering nobody – except my dear mom – could see.

About four years before the fire extinguisher met with my strength to leave, we traveled to Mayo Clinic for the transplant operation as more than a two-person family.   I was pregnant, though my condition was not of importance in his mind.   In pre-op, during-op, and post-op, unwelcome tones and words by him and his family communicated it would be best if I remained out of sight.   My mom, always only a phone call away, flew eight hours to offer moral support to me.   If it wasn’t for her, I would have been alone during a time of increasing grief.

It is said we have guardian angels that keep us in safe keep. Yes, my mom as one, but there was additional guardianship that took place, or at least how I believe.   A child I was not meant to bring into this world and myself were angels to give each other what would be best at that time. I had a miscarriage while in Arizona, a baby that would not know this life. I was not able to fully grieve the loss, yet I was also at peace. I know that it was best for this little soul and me. My mom taught me well that unconditional love is about loving another over one’s own needs. As much as I would have loved this child, this soul was safer not becoming part of our family.

After a three-month recovery period at Mayo Clinic, we returned home where once again we were hidden behind closed doors and out of sight of a closed support systems like the police.   It was during this time my second guardian angel was conceived.   This time my child was meant to enter this life and our family; twelve years ago, my son Benjamin entered this world to complete me. My son Benjamin, whose name symbolizes strength of the right hand, is without a doubt my right- hand person who inspires my strength to believe I can.

In the beginning I talked of opposites and how we must experience one extreme to then fulfill our destiny.   I am thankful every day for the gift of my son I received.   He was conceived from fear for my life -and his – that I would then learn I would give my all for my son and I to live. My son was conceived from a deep hate directed at me, that I would learn there is no greater love than the one I have for my son and his well-being. Benjamin entered this world full of smiles and laughter, exhibiting the joy I had locked tightly away. My emotional pain and my despair have been anchored from drowning me by Benjamin’s giggles and radiant smiling face.   Benjamin my right- hand strength, anchoring me in the moments when the rest of my life has felt in such disarray.

There are things I haven’t been able to shelter him from, innocence my son is losing far to quickly.   Yet, unlike his miscarried brother or sister, I know Benjamin – and I – are better that his soul entered this life to experience it with me. Benjamin’s biological father had tried to develop Benjamin into a weapon of control since my former husband is unable to yield domination of me as if I a puppeteer on a string. It is not easy to share joint custody with an individual who views his son as a chess piece.   Yet, true to Benjamin’s strength and his wisdom beyond his tender age of twelve, Benjamin knows that he is close to setting his wings in flight. He can already discern between genuine love and love that comes with a price. I strive to bring a foundation to Benjamin that fosters his independence and his safety; in turn, Benjamin gives me the bricks in which to build a solid foothold beneath both our feet.

And now let me tell you about my third experience in which – at long last – my heart has found home. I first had to know the depths of lost, frightened to the brink of death, and feeling completely alone.   To know what unconditional love feels like one must know conditional hate. If I hadn’t experienced someone’s hatred, I may not have recognized when I found my soul-mate. Though our souls very old friends, we have been newlyweds every day since August 7, 2011 formally.   Informally it was the day Ken offered to cook me dinner and our voices and text messaging became a face-to-face meet.

My husband experienced his own storm, his opposites to guide him to his destiny.   Though his journey was not filled with emotional abuse, his experiences were guiding him to me.   A military veteran, well-versed in serving those at their most vulnerable time, my dear husband has saved lives and has graciously held dignity for those who reached the last moments of life. Both of us calming voices for those who are struggling. We have been brought together to heal within ourselves as we walk towards a purpose to serve humanity.

I’m not yet able to go back and work in an operating room because I still need Sara – my service dog – beside me, and her fur is currently a barrier for sterility. I know we haven’t yet talked of Sara – I promise I will share more about Sara shortly.   My husband has paused his role as sheriff, currently serving people in a different capacity.   My dear husband – the kind of unconditional love that puts first above all else my well-being. I need more time to heal the sight of uniforms and side arms from my memories. That my husband can wear plain clothes to his job is helping reframe the images that equal my T (for trauma) in PTSD.

What do you think when you hear the numbers 9-1-1? Maybe you think emergency or perhaps you think September 2001.   For my husband and I both meanings resonate equally. I was dispatcher when my husband and I began communicating casually. My husband was at the Pentagon when life became before and no longer the same for all of us nationally.   This number so significant to us, it formed the development of my wedding ring.   Some interpret the number nine as symbolic of living one’s life committed to being of service to humanity. The number one is about unity and new beginnings.

Our four sons – three from Ken’s first marriage and of course Benjamin who I’ve already introduced to you – are the center of our committed service in all that we do.   Our extended family such as my mom, my brother Mike, and my niece are the next layer of who I strive to service, and who equally give back to me. As Ken and my servant-hood expand, we wish to inspire others on their healing journeys.

I know what it means to fight for my life, not just in my past, but each and every day. Fear is such a powerful force that threatens to imprison one from believing they are no longer in harm’s way. I also know what it is to fight not only for that inner voice inside me that has a will not to give in; I know what it is to fight for one who is an extension of my flesh, blood, and each of my limbs.

I didn’t understand the depths of the cuts when objects were being hurled at me, nor the depth of the trauma the day my son was conceived.   I could apply a simulation as if I was a teenager again having a seizure to render my mind a blank. Only this time I was still alert, opting to erase any feelings that might distract my focus on staying safe.   Being scared was allowed only enough to keep me on my toes; caring that my dignity and self-security was slipping away I swallowed and then buried whole.

I did not know the pain that would sear me and nearly cut me in two while in the throes of fighting for my son and what he had been through.   Like a person whose adrenalin leads them to extraordinary feats despite the fire raging around them nearly burning them alive, what was creating scar tissue inside me I was oblivious to as I focused on ensuring my son would be alright. This time I could feel emotions – feelings stronger than anything I had ever known. What I wasn’t feeling was the flames burning into my flesh and bones.

Like that bud whose petals can no longer remain tightly wrapped around its soul, the pain and trauma I had experienced needed a place to go. It started to rise to the surface in a place where I felt safe.   Thankfully it was caught by unconditional love and gentle strength. Ken was wise enough to look beyond a wall I was building to not take my distance personally. Adept at calmly breaking down barriers, Ken guided me to people who could help me.

One such “person” is Sara, who I briefly mentioned above. Yet another to enter my life giving me unconditional love. It is said that we have experienced a fortune if we are blessed to have one great and true love in our life. I thought my cup overflowed to have two great loves in mine. It was love at first sight when I held Benjamin in my arms after his first breath. It was love at first sight when Ken was peeking around the curtain to see his dinner guest. Somehow despite the darkness that makes up a significant portion of the life I’ve lived, I have found not just one, nor two, but three great and true loves to share my heart with.

I think of that rose still a tight bud and I think of the so very prickly base in which it rests atop the stem and waits. The thorns a protection that no harm will come to its delicate petals before they are ready to unfold and captivate.   My physical self-cutting moments in which I was trying to release the core to my bones pain of not feeling worthy. My panic attacks and my anxiety heightened in crowds who I was certain was full of people who wanted to further hurt me. These crippling fears my thorns to protect the fragile yet strong heart tightly tucked inside. Through many layers of believing I was not loveable, my soul was whispering there are three angels who will be your guides.

Sara and I met for the first time when she was a mere four weeks of age. Another love at first sight when her tongue and my hand integrated that day. No, it wasn’t a puppy teeth bite, but a kiss she gave me. In an instant I knew she was the service dog for me. We have been inseparable since she could come home.   I am convinced she can read every whisper of my soul.   Without words Sara can hear my body and my heart when either or both in need. She senses my emotional fears and she is in tune to my hypoglycemic crashes before I know they are about to happen to me.

Sara is my crowd control to be my front or my back ensuring people don’t step inside my box of comfort when I am in a public domain.   Sara can turn on and off lights and press the button to open a handicap assessable doorway.   Before Sara I found the risk of leaving home greater than my bravery to leave.   Now the petals around my heart are unfolding ever so slowly. Thanks be to Sara who is my guardian, my eyes, my ears, and my even breathing.   Sara enables me to believe again in my own bravery.

Both Ken and I have had individuals try to tarnish our reputations, to discredit our integrity. We chose not to fuel the lies printed about us as a result of court proceedings.   It would also be easy to keep my personal story tucked away – after all, most aren’t comfortable listening to another’s pain. Yet, the more I bravely risk stepping out of that bud, and the more my petals unfold, the more I fulfill my destiny. If one person finds the strength not to give up because I have found the courage to share my story, then I have made it matter and given purpose to the pain, trauma, sorrow, and despair that has engulfed me.

Mom, it’s me Sara, and have I told you lately that I am proud of you? I know it isn’t easy, yet I continue to watch you pushing through. You give me credit believing I am the one that has given you your life back since my paws entered your life. I would like to remind you it isn’t until a student is ready does a teacher arrive.   You and dad consider me a guardian angel to keep watch over you. I appreciate that, yet your forward momentum is at the hands of YOUR bravery, too.

I know I alert you before you can hear that the sirens are about to get louder and nearer to our home. Yet, it is you that makes the choice in how you will respond as the frightful noise draws close.   You could choose to flee, to hide, to ask dad to sell our home so that you could find a place even more isolating.  Yes, I know we live in seclusion now, but there is always hermitcy. I am your strength, I know, but please don’t diminish the strength that is growing in you because of your own courage to boldly and beautifully bloom.

Mom, do you know what one of the best things about our relationship is to me? How you and I can communicate so much without my ability to speak to you in English.   I know you feel there aren’t enough words in a dictionary to communicate how much I have helped you find your gentle petals waiting to beautifully unfold. It can be hard to adequately express what a heart feels and knows.   Yet, mom, that is the joy of our relationship – yours and mine.   You and I don’t have to try to find words to express the rhythm of our hearts that beat in perfect unified time.    It’s like the beautiful roses you talk about in your story; when the petals of a rose unfold, they can take someone’s breath away because of their beauty.   And in that intake of breath someone doesn’t need to try and verbally convey their awe and reverence of a most miraculous grace. We are like that rose that has unfolded to steal a breath or two; such is the power of our love and how I show you the courage that is YOU.

            Mom, you know what else I can’t wait for is to see what number forty-five, forty-six, and even eighty-eight might be! I love how your tattoos also communicate your story.   They contain beautiful colors and imagery and they are the healing art to release your deepest to the bone once held belief that worthlessness was your only deserving. In their messages they communicate your invisible scars are what enhance your radiant beauty. Forty-four petals visibly showing your bravery; forty-four tattoos telling a most extraordinary story.

I would also like to say thank you for equally giving to me what you so lovingly say I provide.   Unconditional listening and love you give back to me every moment of my life. I see it in your eyes, I hear it in your voice, and I feel it each time you touch me. I feel it in the home that you, dad, and Benjamin have created for all of us as family. I know the song “1000 years” is one you and dad share to signify you are each other’s everything.   There are certain words to that song that my heart also sings.  

“Time stands still
Beauty in all she is
I will be brave
I will not let anything take away
What’s standing in front of me
Every breath
Every hour has come to this” – David Hodges, Christina Perri

Mom, you are everything to me and there is nothing I wouldn’t do for you. Thank you for the honor you’ve given that I would have the privilege to keep watch over you. I could not think of a better person to be a guardian angel I was sent to.   And mom, as much as I wish you had not experienced the pain, trauma, sorrow, and despair you’ve known as part of your story, I am grateful only in that because of your journey I have been able to fulfill my own destiny.

I have been sharing military veteran life stories of brave men and women who have found hope and healing on their journeys with PTSD in the form of fur. Translation – service dogs. I have shared these sacred stories with the intent that the stories can reach others who struggle on their journeys not to give up.   I have also shared with the intention that the stories become a bridge. These stories can create a platform in which those who struggle to share their voice for fear of judgment and rejection are met with those who are setting aside their negative perceptions to listen and listen more. Yes, stories that contain pain, trauma, sorrow, and despair, and the moments that created one of or up to all four of these, are not easy stories to listen to. Yet, they are extraordinary stories that matter. The more we listen, the more the story becomes reframed into something that becomes a tender scar and no longer an open wound. For the story teller, the loved ones of the story teller, and us as story listeners; for when we give, we also receive.

This week’s blog is a military veteran story. It is of bravery, hope, and a service dog who brought healing to a family.   It is not necessarily a story of diagnosed PTSD. Yet, it is a story of pain, of sorrow, and in some moments despair.   And how from that pain, purpose was found and every day since a family has found gifts in the journey with autism.   Judge tenderly, if you must. There is usually a side you have not heard, a story you know nothing about, and a battle waged you are not having to fight – Traci Lea La Russa

JACK, SASSY, and a FAMILY WHOLE

Here is my secret, a very simple secret.   It is only with the heart that one can see rightly.   What is essential is invisible to the eye. – Le Petit Prince

The world would soon be shaken to the core when I was being shaken to mine in pain.   The world didn’t know what was coming on this particular August day.   I didn’t know my family’s world, nor the larger world in which we belonged, would soon be turned upside down, sideways, and then begin spinning relentlessly round and round.   I only knew this moment in the ambulance in which my body was screaming at me.   And I, in turn, was screaming inside, please, oh please, let nothing happen to my baby.

I was a lawyer in the Navy, I was a wife, and I was a mother of a daughter not quite two.   And I was carrying her baby brother, our son, with two more months until I was due.   I was strapped to a gurney unable to move while the bumpiest road known to mankind was unmercifully scrambling my body. The medicine to alleviate the pain from my kidney stone did not seem to penetrate the acute agony.   I was being transported to a hospital with a natal ICU just in case it would become a need.   Three hours travel on a good day, now five hours because of traffic was my journey.

After arrival and tests, I became another who stands at the crossroad needing to decide. Would I like good news first, or would I prefer the news that stops time.   My kidney stones had dissolved, the grace and gift of roads that jostled every inch of me.   Yet, my son did not meet “standard measurements” of where he should be.   His brain, his lungs, his kidneys – all at risk of deformity.   Excess water on the brain meant our son had hydrocephalus or he would be a Downs Syndrome baby.

In this moment the world began turning at angles I had not experienced before now.   So incredibly quiet as time stood still, yet my ears pulsing from a most deafening sound. Was this my reality or was it happening as if I was watching a movie? Surely, the medication had left my mind foggy and this couldn’t be happening.   The medical staff seemed to think my husband and I needed time to decide if our son was meant to be.   Without hesitation, there was only one option – our son deserves to be on this Earth! the staff heard unanimously.

An ultrasound four weeks later revealed no change.   No additional risks, yet the first prognosis the same.   My family was on high alert awaiting my due date.   We were no longer alone, though, in this vigilant watchful state.   The world had just received a jolt unlike anything it had known before, too. New York City, the Pentagon, twin towers collapsed, brave yet non-surviving passengers and flight crews. September 11, 2001 and suddenly my purpose was not only guiding one soul through his transition from the womb into life.   I was now writing hundreds of wills for soon to be deployed soldiers preparing that they may not come back alive.

Jack entered this world approximately one month after 911, “normal” with no signs of the concerns once seen.   No excess water on the brain and no Down’s Syndrome as his soft spot revealed “healthy”. Of course, true to a parent, my high alert did not ease.   Ultra-sensitive that Jack meet the medians for his age my priority.   His walking, his height, his appetite, and his speaking.   His motor skills were right on point, though at twelve months momma and daddy were not yet his vocabulary.

A wellness check at eighteen months revealed his speaking was not a defiance or a slow start. Once again time froze as my breathing stopped while my blood coursed through my rapidly beating heart.   It is not definitive, but we have a high degree of certainty.   Your son is autistic, your son is “special needs”. It is said that when time becomes before and no longer the same, hindsight can reveal something deep within us knew something would soon change. We were dancing between protecting ourselves from the sting of reality and preparing for inevitability.   Tantrums and “acting out” had already became part of Jack’s coping. In the throws of these moments, our hearts desired to believe. It was nothing that couldn’t be “fixed” with more nap times or the foods he would eat.

Imagine being a mother of a near seven-year old, a five-year old with autism, and a newborn baby.   Imagine physical tantrums so forceful, one wasn’t sure there would be strength to keep both mother and son from injury.   Imagine medical and alternative health appointments multiple times in one week and driving to these appointments all for one child, while wrapped tightly in that natural maternal guilt for neglecting his siblings.  And now that you are imagining the lack of sleep wishing for a few hours reprieve, and then when sleep is available, instead it is insomnia as you lay awake worrying.   If you are a parent or a care-giver you can empathize with me.   Yet, you know what was hardier than feeling helpless to my son’s needs.   It was how people saw Jack for what he was not instead of seeing him for all that he could be.

I don’t say that to judge strangers who saw me in a store with a child screaming until he could barely breathe. Their eyes communicating “can’t you control your spoiled child who is clearly manipulating?” I don’t say that in anger at day care providers who would nervously say your son is too disruptive, taking away from the other children, so we will need to ask you to respectfully leave. I don’t say that to make you feel guilty that I swallowed back many a tear when you turned the other way shaking your head in disgust at my family.     How can I blame you when there aren’t visible signs to communicate disability? And, I understand for my husband and I had moments we had to learn to better see.   To notice what our son was and not only look at “was not” has not always been easy.

Our son, a runner, and an escapee.   More than once he would leave school bound for home with only two things – his running feet. His emotions crested hills and soared to valleys faster than a roller coaster careening through loops, twists, and rapid falls. No longer a baby, and yet, swaddling him tight in my arms sometimes his only sense of calm. And even then, if he had passed a point of no return, my arms were incapable of keeping his raging storm inside him at bay. The only safety Jack could then find was riding out what he felt but had no words he could adequately convey.   Being on high alert had new meaning now for me; would it be the school calling in crisis needing my presence immediately?

And then North Star Dogs became a lighthouse shining a beacon to the East.   They were presenting opportunity for another alternative therapy. We were feeling we had exhausted multiple holistic healing avenues to give our son the best chance of flourishing.   Perhaps a service dog could hear Jack’s torment better than all of us who tried our best to understand his cries he couldn’t always explain.   Perhaps a dog would be able to soothe Jack’s fears and inner pain.

A waiting list and unconditional love of grandparents to give Jack this furry gift.   Then notification one of ten puppies were destined to be his.   Sassy joined our family and once again life became before and no longer the same.   Only this time, the storms that often swirled our home were now kept at bay. Sassy had brought new beginnings. Sassy provided service to not only Jack; she brought comfort to our entire family.   Sassy, the intervener, distractor, calmer, and paw to hold.   Immediate calmness she would bring Jack as soon as the emotional thunder started to rumble and roll.

An unknown author writes and then my soul saw you and it kind of went “Ah, there you are: I’ve been looking for you”.   It was an immediate best friendship when four furry feet joined our family brood. Jack was the first to say Sassy was his best friend to anyone he might meet.   I am certain Sassy would have said the same words if English she could speak.   Her eyes ever watchful of when Jack was in need; unconditional love in the most calming manner her immediate responding.   Sassy didn’t bat an eye when the torrential storms of his emotions were at their peak.   By his side until he felt at ease, day and through his entire nights of sleep.   Sassy was not able to attend school with Jack, for this was before service dogs were more accepted into a school’s routine.   That Sassy was waiting for him at home enabled Jack to manage school with a semblance of ease.

While Jack was at school, Sassy would tend to my needs.  Though she was Jack’s primary service dog, she was also in-tune to my emotionality. She would remind me I had the strength to keep going and that I was doing okay.   She would be my calming force through each of my fast-moving days. Her fur caught my tears when I didn’t want anyone else to see. Her brush against my leg would whisper you are not alone on this journey.  I can’t explain what it meant to have Jack find comfort in someone other than me.   Somewhat indescribable that instead of my swaddling, placing Jack’s hands against Sassy’s fur lightened a weight I had been carrying.

Sassy has retired as service dog, though her heart is still the wholeness to our family. She is still Jack’s companion while he sleeps.   And though now her fur captures far more laughter than my tears, by my side she also brings her serenity.   Our son is flourishing with a creative spirit, a caring heart that desires to work with children when he graduates, and a passion that perhaps could lead him to movie script writing.   Who knows what the future holds for Jack, but this we have as certainty. What ever Jack decides to do in life, we will all owe much to beloved Sassy.

Little ole humble me, I’m not sure I deserve all these kind words in which you speak. I’m “just” Sassy, fulfilling my purpose and doing what I love to do.   To provide comfort and unconditional love to Jack, and to all of you.   Some puppies may have been nervous to leave a familiar place and then enter a really large and loud machine.   I knew I was boarding a plan to travel from Connecticut to Washington for an important destiny.     There was a little boy that had been crying for a friend who understood him when the world around him was a scary place.   I could hear his heart across the stars and through space.   I could also hear his big sister, his little sisters, his mom and his dad, too.   I knew this was a big job I was receiving to serve not just one but a six humans crew.   I also knew there was no better job that to become your hope and faith.   To remind you that no matter how hard certain moments were, it would get easier and better “someday”.

I know you are proud of Vanessa, as I am, too.   How beautifully she is making Jack’s story matter in what she is setting out to do.   There will be no teacher more compassionate and equally strong in her leadership as she guides special needs students to their own flourishing.   I like to dream of Jack teaching beside her someday.   Even if he isn’t a co-teacher, I believe he will be influential in the lives that, together, they will positively change.  

I know I never told you, either, that I find my big, talkative, sometimes pushy, sometimes silly, yet always loveable fur brother a good addition to the family. Clive has brought laughter and joy into our home, along with another important quality. Clive is a guardian, too, keeping watch on everyone’s needs. He may not act exactly like me, but as you already know, visual looks don’t show someone everything.   He acts like a young lion, poised to react if need be.   Don’t be fooled though, that his calmness is also present as he listens attentively.    

When we give, we receive, so my dear family. Please know that as you so kindly say I helped each of you, you have given so much to me.  You have lovingly said I came into your family to help make you whole.   Know that because of all of you, I’ve known no better home.   I love you unconditionally, and I thank you for giving back the same to me.   Jack, Vanessa, Josie, Colette, Clive, Cathy, Mike – my family.   Because of you, I am complete.

This week I am honored to share Jennifer and Onyx’s story of hope.   In conversations with others, when I use the acronym PTSD, rarely do I have to explain what the acronym stands for.   In conversations, when I have used the acronym MST, most of the time I am met with the question what is MST?   I was given the privilege of listening to and then writing Jennifer’s journey of how, like her brothers and sisters in arms, she knew the deepest levels of Pain, Trauma, Sorrow, and Despair.  Where Jennifer’s experience is different – her journey into darkness that proceeded her courageous journey to hope was for military sexual trauma, or MST.

Onyx has the best smiles in these pictures, don’t you think?!   Some include Onyx showing you the joyous adventures of visiting different national parks.   Read on to discover just how meaningful these adventures are!

“Sometimes God will put the Goliath in your life to find the David within you” – Unknown

            I, Jennifer, entered this life vowing to fulfill two things; that I would serve and that I would lead.  Like the missions I promised to give me all to, to the death if need be, my soul also promised into all of life I would lean.   Life is lived one moment at a time, yet the moments stitch together into a large tapestry.   Moments that, had they not been experienced, would leave the canvas incomplete.   I’ve had times I longed to take scissors to a section, to rip it away clean.  I’ve also come to understand that these sections are an essence of me.

I raised my hand and I turned over my soul for safe-keep.  I proudly embraced the goals of the military.  I would lead for the greater good of all.   I would sacrifice limb and life if deemed necessary I fall.   For fifteen years my pledge I did uphold.  A lifetime career my original goal.  I had my own mind, my own body, my own soul, poised and ready to sacrifice all three.  My own wholeness was secondary.  My words became not my own but of those part of a collective vocabulary.   Duty, honor, dignity; I will die for my country.   I was not afraid, my trust that I was ready for battle if need be.  I knew there was an enemy; thankfully the enemy did not walk beside me.   Or so I believed.

Each of us experience trauma in memories we can’t erase.  It could be from war, with the image of a comrade’s face.   It could be a car accident that didn’t occur holding enemies at bay.   Yet, over and over, and non-stop, that accident replays.   I vowed that any mission I was ordered to fulfill, I would most certainly do.  That I might not be able to quiet my mind while my voice slipped away could be a reality I also knew.   I also believed that any post trauma I might endure would be the result of war I would bravely fight.   I didn’t yet know that the biggest battle of all would be on this side of the enemy line.

Fear is a powerful weapon, mightier than the heaviest artillery.  Fear clouds judgment and blurs the ability to clearly see.   It holds the soul at gun point, it holds one’s truth at the end of a knife blade.   It tortures personal ethics and a sense of universal right gets misplaced.   Two people can hear I will obey.   Two different choices can be made.   Both hold allegiance to authority.  One earns trust while, for the other, trust becomes obsolete.   I was the one to lose trust at the hands of others who earned prestige.  My soul held at the end of a barrel as the essence of me was stabbed in two.  No longer trustful of military virtue.

Some describe a life-changing moment as one in which the world grew dark and still.  That moment in life when the ability to feel becomes nil.   I have known this cavern, one in which I resided for several years.  I couldn’t see it at the time, but light was still near.   I stayed in the cocoon of this cave, the only place in which I felt safe.   I lived in this cave, and I lived outside in the surroundings.  Outside I moved through the motions of a reality I could not touch or reach.   Outside of this cave, I heard dishonor, undignified, a promise you did not keep.   Inside of this cave, faint I heard warrior, fight, there is purpose you are meant to achieve.

Cut in two, I would first need to know two more slices with the knife.   One occurred when a request of leave was denied.   My father was given six months to live, cancer his Goliath he would not be able to defend against its might.   I was not allowed a leave of absence to be by his side.   My father had given his armor to me to wear in court when I sought legal justice for the crime of my stolen soul.   Into the cave I retreated further that I could not give that armor back to my father as he died alone.

The fear from sudden attacks, death on our home soil out of the blue, leant to only one priority of leadership, only one option they saw to choose.   Fight for the honor of 911, country over family.   I already a dissenter in the make per the eyes of the military; certainly, my request was only another form of my trickery.  Another blade inserted to stop the beating of my heart now; end the breathing of a sense of self to honor my military vow.

A next cut would come with a gift, though at the time I did not readily see.  A confrontation took me too my core, bringing my soul back to me.    In 2008 another slice took the form of a nervous breakdown.  Into the deepest part of the cave I moved, certain I would no longer be found.   I thought I knew silence when that first knife cut me in two.  In the back of this cave it was the loudest stillness I ever knew.   It deafened me and was a thief taking from places I didn’t know I had more that could be stolen away.  I was safest in this cavern, and yet I longed to escape.   Words filling pages, rapidly turning through my mind, reams and reams of paper capturing what I was trying to hide.  Yet, if someone stepped inside the doorway willing to listen to me speak, all the words were gone, a fleeting retreat.

One does not know courage until one has decided to rise from where one lays.  When a blanket and a bed are the only safe refuge, walking to the couch requires enormous strength.  You may not understand how someone who fought a war so bravely found it her biggest win to say no to anxiety.   My hope is that you never have to know this intimately.   And for those who have walked a similar journey or perhaps you are still peaking your head out of the cave, I am here to tell you here is my hand; it will be okay.

I do not say it will be okay lightly to you my friend, for I know at the end of this rope, it feels like an end.  I know how words can be said but hold no meaning.   All the dictionaries in the world cannot begin to describe how you are feeling.   Add the well-intentioned expression of I care and that feeling of isolation grows ten-fold.  Now there is expectation, of which you feel you are not meeting, leading you further towards alone.

I mentioned that in that darkness there is a light you cannot see.   A force mightier than us all is busy orchestrating.   It is lining up messengers who each hold a locked box awaiting a key.  Inside the locked box is hope that is ours for the taking.   Only one person holds the key that can open as many boxes as one wishes to look in to.  That person that holds the key is – you.   In that cavern I did not realize that as fear was reaching for me, I in turn was reaching courageously.   The warrior within me that had vowed I would fight at any cost had not abandoned me.  I had to tend to her warrior wounds for a bit until she was ready.  But oh, when I put back on my uniform of self-worth, of honor and dignity, beside my tags was a large key.   It opened the first box which contained the words I have the ability to be free.

My freedom came in the form of fur and four feet.   She, too, a warrior, like me.  Onyx, too, had been fighting her own war of survival, a desire to serve and lead.  She entered my life in 2013 with three things I had lost along the way.  An open heart to love without fear, to grab hope, to feel faith.  Onyx understands what my heart is unable to communicate.   She knows better than I do when I feel unsteady and not safe.  Onyx has given me the ability to leave the cave for extended periods of time.  If I have moments that feel better to re-enter the cavern, she enters with me until my fighting spirit again I find.  She doesn’t need me to tell her where she should sit, or she should lay.  In a vehicle, in a store, in a national park – Onyx has my back at every place.

Like I who entered this life with purpose to achieve, Onyx, too, had reasons for her being.  What adds to the gift of my soul-restorer in a fur coat is that she is my comrade with mutual goals.  Now we both strive to fulfill our mission to save lives who face a new deadly war.  An assault on wills to live, attacks at individual cores.  Onyx and I both had to experience what it felt to lose trust and hope then find it renewed.   Otherwise it is only lip service if it isn’t something we’ve went through.   A quote from an unknown author reads “sometimes fear won’t go away, so you will have to do it afraid”.   Ask Onyx and she will speak on my behalf that fear is a partner to my every day.  It hasn’t been removed as a foundation in which I stand.  It’s just that now I have four helping pawed hands.

I gave a part of my heart away by choice when I said I do to my husband Lee.   The other half of my heart was stolen from me.  I thought I would never recover it, that shame would be the only feeling I could embrace.   Yet, that force bigger than us all was putting another plan in place.  On the day I met Onyx she walked towards me carrying a treasure bag gently between her teeth.  I looked into her eyes as she carefully dropped this bag at my feet.  With shaking hands, I pulled apart the draw string to look inside.   I have moments still, five years later, when I can’t quite believe my eyes.   In stillness I looked, in silence I listened as the rhythm began to evenly beat.   For in that bag was my heart that Onyx had brought back to me.

With Onyx by my side I have stood in front of others sharing my story in an effort to bring atonement to things that have taken place.  My purpose I knew was to influence and lead change.   Advocating to congress and major news agencies, spent to points broke of money and time.   Non-stop promotion for laws almost passed and factual investigation of crimes.  In each interview anger and bitterness walked out the door as forgiveness and worthiness slowly entered the doorway.  Amidst judgment, hate, and disbelief, I found the courage to not shy away.  That my story could inspire others to fight my aim.

Now my mission has expanded to new territory.  Now it is time to inspire those who are searching for their key.   I know what it is to enter the cavern looking for dynamite to create the rock collapse.   I also know it is possible from that darkest place to start crawling back.   Crawling may seem slow, but each hand print forward is a gigantic leap.  Each inch forward is to the cadence I cannot be beat.  I have known a life without joy, I have known a fear of sunrises and sunsets.  The sunset a reminder that the dark will only grow darker and the sunrise that a long day lies ahead.  I also know what it is to rediscover that every twenty-four hours of new beginnings is friend, not foe.  To relish laughter that springs forth from the happiness of one’s soul.  I have known what it is to feel numb and yet feel the most searing pain.  I have known what it is to will the next glass on the rocks to keep torturous memories at bay.  I also know what it is to no longer need a drink, that leaning into what hurts the most is mutually benefitting.  When I am willing to share my story without embarrassment, shame, or guilt, others who are struggling find in my story their own strength and will.

One step at a time or a puzzle piece that connects link by link.   I opened one box which contained the next key.  The next key opened another box that reinforced you can do this, in yourself believe.  The next support system or life-line available each time I opened another lock.  I shifted from I’m not sure to I cannot not.  Many messengers have been put on my path, angels sent from God up above.  Next to me, spelled backwards as D-O-G, is the best one with wings of unconditional love.  Onyx loves me, her honor to serve and lead.   She loves me not despite of, but because of my story.

I can stand at an entryway into any one of our spectacular national parks where the eyes cannot begin to absorb the beauty to take in.  I can watch the sun set over a mountain or listen to the lyrics of the wolves as the evening begins.  In the space there is no worry – there only is and be.  Before Onyx I couldn’t come to a park, to vast the space surrounding me.   Now it is the majestic expansiveness of these national parks I seek.   I know that somewhere at the base of one of the mountains is a tiny cave, but no longer do I feel the need to run to its cold walls and hide.  Onyx reminds me I have within me a light that needs to shine.   In these parks is a natural rhythm, a beat that hums in harmony.   Like Onyx and my heart, in unison, a warrior team.   Duty, honor, dignity, I would give my life for you.  Dear Onyx, for guiding me to live again, my unending gratitude.