Northern/Western travels, and Dealing with Abuse Issues

 As the two thousand teens moved along, Marie and I went to North Bay at least 2-3 times a year. Kristin had moved there, going to Canadore College, getting married and working with the North Bay Computer Services. We always enjoyed the trip usually in the autumn or spring, but during a break in the weather, sometimes even in winter. It was a pleasant time to visit Kristin, but also to enjoy the wonderful landscapes of rocks, hills and trees, so different than the flatlands of home. 

Roadside just north of Huntsville

This next photo is of the La Vase River, at the south end of North Bay, and was a main passageway for the voyageurs as they canoed through the country to bring beaver pelts to the major centres in Canada for distribution to Europe.

Laurier Woods Conservation Area

Observation platform along the LWCA trail

Hiking in late winter

White-breasted Nuthatch coming to Kristin's hand

We also made a road trip to Alberta, 2018, with the primary purpose of attending a niece’s wedding, but also to enjoy the varied landscape and critters along the way.

Scene from the N shore of Lake Superior

The Arm River, in Saskatchewan

The above photo was taken at Grasslands National Park, in southern Saskatchewan, and the next photo was taken from our campsite at GNP.

When we weren’t on one of these forays, there were always other things to attend to. We were the lead gardeners in a community garden in the park behind our place. Gardening, growing our own edible things as well as flowers, was always a priority with Marie.

 We went on a few local excursions such as the one to St. Williams Conservation Reserve, and Marie was quite taken with the display of Wild Lupine in peak flower.

 There also was a steady stream of dental visits, naturopathic doctor visits as well as massage/chiropractor visits for Marie. Some were in Chatham, but a fair number required travel to either London or even Burlington.

Of course I produced my two books, Life on a Sandspit and Natural Areas of Chatham-Kent, and she was quite helpful in various ways providing support, ideas, editing comments, etc.

And now I will begin to deal with some of the significant things that she and I had to deal with, and in part are for the reason I was felt led to start Life Is A Journey. What follows is difficult to adequately portray or even write about, but I feel it is very important to share in the overall unfolding of significant events that affected her. I have been working on this post for many days, to try and share it truthfully and respectfully. A helpful book that she had, and encouraged me to read, was on the topic of how the struggles that an abuse victim experiences, will also impact the spouse of the victim.

I could never have imagined what was in store for us as our life's journey continued. But God knew what she had to deal with, and what I would eventually have to deal with, and it has been part of His plan for us. It has been a challenge, as well as a joy, knowing He loves us regardless of what life throws at us. His plans are better than ours! The last few years, and especially the last year or two, have been an incredible learning curve for me. One of my frequent prayers is asking how God wants me to deal with what I have learned, and this blog is one thing. And on occasion when I am out on a trail, I might share a bit of it. But I keep wondering if there is someone God will place across my path for a more in-depth purpose, so that person knows that they are understood, supported and loved, and God has healing available. Lots of thoughts come to mind, and I am continuing to wait for His plan to unfold.

Disclaimer

At least some of the following things are based on my interpretation of the events. I know that in reading Marie’s journals, etc., and with the various discussions we had, even she wasn’t entirely clear on some of the things she was wrestling with. A lot of the things she struggled with were done internally, or with counsellors, which I think was why she did so much writing in her journals.

The topic of Forgiveness

There were many, many visits for Marie to counsellors, and these occurred for more than three decades. Again, some were fairly local in Chatham or Wallaceburg, but others were much farther away, even as far as Cambridge. While I am sure these counsellor visits were at least partly beneficial, I think most of them followed a secular approach. I was invited to sit in on 2-3 occasions. In my own reading on such matters, I was especially interested in the role of forgiveness. Christian writers such as Philip Yancey and Lewis Smedes were particularly important on this topic. At one of these sessions that I was invited to come along to, and this one was with who I thought was a Christian counsellor as she was quite active in a local evangelical church, I was asked if I had any questions. I did, and asked ‘What about the role of forgiveness?’ Unfortunately, I was immediately shut down, almost pounced on, and the counsellor’s response was more or less “Forgiveness? Do you mean forgive and forget? No, it doesn’t work that way….one has to deal with the memories and trauma before you can consider forgiveness. Just forget that and move on….” And based on the forceful response, that was the end of the discussion.

However, the very basis for the Christian faith is forgiveness. We have all sinned in numerous ways, and it is only because of Jesus paying the price for our sins on the cross that, if we have asked him to be our Saviour, we have been forgiven and have eternal life with Him. And the Lord’s prayer specifically states to forgive others as we have been forgiven. Both Yancey and Smedes strongly focus on the role of forgiveness overall, and Smedes specifically states that children who have been abused seldom experience healing unless they practice forgiveness. I also read where an Indigenous elder said that the first step for healing is to forgive the perpetrator. And there is a famous quote by Corrie Ten Boom, who was a young woman during World War II and held as a prisoner at a Nazi concentration camp. She saw and experienced horrendous abuse but stated: “To forgive is to set a prisoner free and then discover that the prisoner was you.” Wow…..

I tried to raise this from time to time with Marie, but she had been convinced of the secular counsellor’s approach over the decades. I think it was her last counsellor that described her as being a ‘complex case’, and in reading Marie’s journals, I could tell that label bothered her. And one of the books she had been reading, written by a psychotherapist who herself had been a victim of abuse in her early years, supported the secular approach and was definitely against the Christian forgiveness approach.

I want to emphasize that I do not blame Marie. When I look back at the many things she had experienced especially in her younger years, and the direction of all of the counsellors later in life, she had a lot to deal with. God knew what she was going to have to deal with in her life, and I feel blessed to know that God had Marie and I in mind right from the beginning, and for me knowing He was going to be with us throughout this journey, and even after He rescued her. This has been such an amazing journey! Having regular walks with God at various locales has been a blessing to me.

 

Certainly things she had to deal with, included:

-the sexual abuse by a non-family person who came to the farm regularly to collect farm eggs;

-she had at least partial recollections of other sexual abuse in her youth;

-there were times when she didn’t necessarily feel loved by her parents as a member of the family when she was young, and even when she brought the sexual abuse to the knowledge of her parents years later, she didn’t feel entirely believed or understood at first;

-she was treated as a prize pupil by one of her elementary school teachers, which she didn’t appreciate at all;

-when she was investigating her ancestry, I think it was in the later ‘90s, she became aware of a more distant member of her family who seemed to have had a connection to an evil group. I don’t know that she was able to pin point exactly who, at least I haven’t seen it in the many journals that she wrote, but I remember seeing a picture of a certain person, possibly a distant great-great aunt, who had an evil looking expression on her face. Also she had in her collection, a photo of someone who, I believe, was that great-great aunt, that she felt had an evil connection. She made a point of burning that photo. It is biblical that the sins of the fathers can be passed on down three and four generations so perhaps this was another cause. 

Dissociative Identity Disorder

An abuse victim usually suppresses the initial memories of abuse, but they become more and more of a real, living memory as the decades go on, and it may be 2 or 3 decades after the abuse when the memories become vivid enough that one starts to try and deal with them. One of the results of being a victim of abuse at an early age, is Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID).  When a young child, who is led to believe that adults are to be obeyed and trusted as they know what is right, and then abuse you when you intuitively know it is wrong, the child creates an alternative identity to dissociate oneself, as a defense to deal with the unsettling confusion. Marie knew this had happened to her, and had created at least two, possibly three, different identities for herself, that represented things that happened at different ages. She told me two of those identities, with different names, and even in our marriage, on occasion when we were discussing something that was a little more difficult, I thought to myself “Am I talking with adult Marie or one of her other, childhood identities?” I never asked her, just realized that she was challenged by the topic of our discussion, and so I tried to tone down the discussion. A book that Marie had, and I have read a couple of times, deals specifically with DID and has been quite helpful along the way.

So with all of these things, it had a collective effect over the years. It was such a blessing that in her teens, she became an active participant of a local evangelical church, and it was then that she asked Jesus to be her Saviour. Hallelujah! When I first knew her at Guelph, she was a very beautiful and committed Christian, which emanated from her, and had a lot to do with me being attracted to her. I couldn’t believe that God had such a beautiful person available to be my wife and best friend, and I have thanked God thousands of times over the years, and still do, for such a major blessing. She is still a significant blessing for me, no question, especially as I look back over the years and realize how significant she has been throughout my life. Thank-you Lord!!

However, I think with all of the things she was dealing with, and the counselling direction she was being given, the devil was constantly working to take her down, slowly and subtly. The devil’s most successful strategy has always been to convince people he doesn’t exist or is not a factor, and he gradually gains a bigger and bigger foothold. His main goal is to destroy us, God’s creations. I know he had his grip on Marie, and it was very, very real, and an intervention with our pastor of the day confirmed it. It wasn’t something that she did, but it was another example of her being a victim of something evil. It was something that I have never shared with anyone to date, but may share this with close family at some point. Regardless, the eventual results were a decline physically, spiritually and mentally, and they were steadily influencing her especially for at least the last decade or more of her life. While her decline wasn’t obvious to many people, it of course ended in her passing away early on May 26, 2024, and surprised many of her friends. So, so sad, and I miss her greatly, but I do thank God regularly for rescuing her from the devil’s influence. I can almost imagine a confrontation between the devil and God, something to the effect with God saying “Back off Satan. Marie has been my child since she asked Jesus to be her Saviour, and although you have done your evil deeds in messing with her, I am calling her home, so be gone”.

Marie was such a kind, gentle, thoughtful, supportive, fun-loving, creative, cute, vivacious, mischievous (in a good/fun way) etc., etc., sweetheart and certainly a Christ-focused individual for much of her life. I know she is even more perfect and beautiful in heaven!!

Whew! This has been a long and challenging post to write about. It has triggered lots of emotion, but is certainly one of the most important ones to date. If you have made it this far, thanks! And if you have any thoughts or questions, don’t hesitate to contact me via my email at the end of this post. A future post will likely deal with these things again to some extent, but even more so with the huge learning curve that has been the main focal point of my life since then. Certainly some challenges ahead, but God’s blessings continue!!

Sunrise from Erieau Harbour

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