Smuggling Grace

Over the course of several months during the most acute period of the pandemic, I listened to Bessel Van Der Kolk’s pivotal work, The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma on audiobook. This Fall at the Epilepsy Foundation of Michigan, I’ll be leading a book discussion on it. Truly, I’d place this one in the top five books I’ve ever read.

The Body Keeps the Score is remarkably insightful and impactful in addressing how traumatic experiences are carried in the body. In addition to explaining the physiology of post-traumatic symptoms in detail, he uplifts a number of somatic approaches to healing trauma in our bodies and relationships.

Today, I’d like to uplift a quote that really spoke to me. Bessel Van Der Kolk says,

“Study after study shows that having a good support network constitutes the single most powerful protection against becoming traumatized. Safety and terror are incompatible. When we are terrified, nothing calms us down like a reassuring voice or the firm embrace of someone we trust.”

After hearing him talk about so many other protective factors, studies, and forms of therapy, I thought it was really significant for him to say that support networks and forms of community are the single most powerful protection against becoming traumatized. 

When we reach out to someone…
When we share how we’re really doing…
When we introduce people to each other…
When we learn about community organizations…
When we suggest community resources…

We are participating in the protection of the body, mind, and spirit. We are building networks that protect ourselves and our neighbors from becoming traumatized, not only in the present, but also, possibly down the line in ways we can’t anticipate.

–Renee Roederer

I live near the largest peony garden on the planet, and right now, they’re in full bloom. They make me smile.

-Photos by Renee Roederer

It must be said: One of life’s greatest pleasures involves shmooshing one’s face into a peony.

To the Person That Harms,
To the Family That Wounds,
To the Shame That Devours,
To the Violence That Festers,

To the Grief That Upends,
To the Diagnosis that Stuns,
To the Substance That Hooks,
To the System That Discriminates,

You,

Yes,
You,

Any of You, or
All of You, or
More Than You
(That Which Stays Silent or
That Which Exists Beyond Lists)

You.

You
have never been a gift in disguise —
not tied with a bow
or packaged with grand, silver linings.

But here’s one thing you’ve yet to figure out:

The more you knock us off balance —
The more you pummel,
The more you trounce,
The more you disrupt and delight in the off-kilter,

The more we come to know what our balance is.

And that balance,
when we know it,
when we can name it,
when we can internalize it,
is Strength Beyond Strength.

That Balance is Our Sacred Invitation.
That Balance is Our Secret Intervention.

–Renee Roederer

If you’re feeling stressed in any way, I just want you to know about this thing that happens. I want you to imagine it and smile.

I have a friend who lives on a farm where they raise sheep. And every night before sunset, all of this year’s lambs, who are now functionally tweens, get together in a little tweeny bopper gang and run around the farm en masse. It’s a thing they do.

As they near dusk, they just get the urge to be with their peers and exert their energy in a collective romp around all the grounds of the farm. A little gang. Of tweeny bopper sheep. Running around together. In the joy of adolescence.

I just want you to know about these tweeny bopper sheep.
I want you to know that this happens every day.

—Renee Roederer

I was listening to a friend tell me a number of stories when all the sudden, she switched her language into present tense. I’m going to guess that she wasn’t even aware of this, but it drew me in all the more. I thought, “Oh, she wants me even more alongside her right here,” and through that shift in her language, I was.

I was grateful to be invited.

This experience made me want to pay attention for these kinds of moments — these sudden shifts into present tense, particularly while someone is sharing a story that happened in the past.

This is one of the myriad of ways that we can accompany each other. A story, whether funny, meaningful, tragic, or traumatic, slows down, and in the present tense, our hearer is with us. And in a very real way, this presence and this invitation to witness the story, changes the story. It expands it. It can reframe it or even transform it.

In my life and in my work, I’m going to be listening for this. And in my own telling of stories, I may choose to employ it myself.

–Renee Roederer

Sometimes, I marvel at who is in my life.
Sometimes, I am stunned to ponder that I could begin alone
then
become
connected
to
who after
who after
who after
who.

And this never ends.

It’s like a Big Bang, really.
A Whole Universe of Belonging.

We each start as a singularity.
Then
each one of us
bursts forth,
brought into an abundance of connections,
born anew bit by bit
through the particularities of relationship.

And these particularities
create
build
form
nurture
cultivate
and
renew.

They expand.

This is an ever expanding Universe —
this Cosmos
of
who after
who after
who after
who.

– Renee Roederer

Over the weekend, the Epilepsy Foundation of Michigan, the organization I work for, held our Midland Stroll for Epilepsy. For me, it’s a real joy any time I get to meet people I’ve talked to over the phone. I can place a face with a name. That happened several times at the event.

1 in 26 people will be diagnosed with epilepsy at some point in their lifetimes. That means a lot of people are impacted by epilepsy. Whether you live in Michigan or another state entirely, I’d love to connect any of your loved ones — you, your family members, or members of your community — to their local Epilepsy Foundation affiliate. Any time we can know others and be a part of a community, it changes this experience. Let me know if you or your loved ones need connection with a local office.

Photos of the event, shared with permission:

During this Pride season, may we celebrate and work to protect people who are LGBTQIA+.

-Photos by Renee Roederer

I appreciate the perspectives of David LaMotte, songwriter, musician, and author of Worldchanging 101: Challenging the Myth of Powerlessness. He reminds us that we are not always able to fix the many challenges of the world, but we are enabled to change them. Change is the powerful and empowering paradigm.

In my work, I am at times presented with challenges I don’t know how to fix. In those moments, I don’t have the personal knowledge, experiences, or access to necessary resources. In such situations, I have two primary strategies. They sound simplistic, but they are powerful and empowering too:

1) Care and 2) Connect.

Care
We participate in changing situations when we care for the people experiencing them. There are times when people are bolstered by being heard, seen, understood, and loved.

We’ve likely heard about the placebo effect when it comes to medications. But this can be applied to caring presence as well. Studies have revealed that cancer patients do better on their treatment regimen when a doctor walks in to tell them that the treatment is beginning. In such moments, the doctor shares nothing overtly medical. They only offer their presence in connection to the treatment. When patients connect their treatment to a symbol and presence of care, the treatment is more effective.

When we add our presence and care to the people around us, we change difficult situations.

Connect
As I shared above, there are times when we don’t have the personal knowledge, experiences, or access to necessary resources. In these moments, I think, “Get this person to people.” Sometimes, this involves a referral to a trusted source who will have that knowledge, experience, or access to necessary resources. But sometimes, we can’t think of anyone, and this is a general strategy to “get this person to community.”

The community often has the personal knowledge, experience, and access to resources. These are all held in the collective, and while you can’t always anticipate the precise relationships from which they will emerge, so often, they do come specifically from the community. This is something I trust because I watch it happen repeatedly. Every single week, I witness this.

We can change things. When in doubt,
1) Care and 2) Connect.

–Renee Roederer