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I Still Mourn
My ex-husband’s wife suddenly and unexpectedly died. Most of you who know or follow me know that I went through a general hell for the entirety of my marriage, spanning from 1994 to 2018, when two years of separation mercifully ended in divorce. If you are new, you can read more here or watch here…
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My Winter Coat
That sweet aunt was never able to raise her own child, but she certainly had an impact on me. And my winter coat was not the only special gift of encouragement that G’ma gave me.
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If I Should Die Before I Wake
Trigger Warning: Child abuse is an inextricable part of my story. This is the first entry where instances of abuse will be mentioned. I said “I love you” to my abuser. I wrote “Love, Steph” in cards. I spent more than a few years trying to make myself small enough to satisfy her. I participated…
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I Don’t Like Mother’s Day
May is now in the past and I am feeling like I can breathe again. This happens most years because I find Mother’s Day very difficult. Even though I have my own children and we have figured out a way to make the day our own, I still struggle for weeks before and after. I…
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The Girl in the Plane
I have many vivid memories of my early years. Images of my dad’s banjo and how tan his arms looked against his white tee shirt when he played. The Datsun and laying down in the back seat as we went down the road with the 8-track playing the Bee Gees. I remember the garden out…
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Why I Write
Last fall a reader asked me, “Why do you write? I mean, what is your purpose?” And I had a couple of answers ready for them. Because I have always wanted to. Because, I have a story to tell and maybe one day it can be published, if I can just discipline myself to write…
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A Hornworm Kind of Love
Humans are admittedly a bit complicated. The same person can be hateful with some and the most loving individual with others. Some people have what could be called toxic traits: harmful behaviors that drive their personality and sometimes worsen over their lifetimes causing irreparable rifts with those around them. Others can be problematic to those…
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Weigh Down Before There Was Weigh Down
In retrospect, it really isn’t surprising that I fell for Gwen Shamblin’s Weigh Down Workshop diet. In my family of origin, thinness was next to godliness. The only thing my mother wanted to see more than a thin kid walking in the door of the church on Sunday morning was a kid who outperformed the…
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Twenty-three and Me
My partner knows of my love for studying history and culture and looking into my family lineage, so for Christmas he bought me a 23andMe membership. I was already fairly certain of the geographical roots of my ancestors and had only one small surprise. What I wasn’t prepared for were some of the physical and…
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Beaches Bodies and Elisabeth Elliot
As the equatorial sun toasted their skin, they walked, not schlepped: some with canes or strollers, others with toddlers on their hips or lovers on their arms.
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Caleb’s Story: Healing
(Part 5. New readers can click here to start at the beginning of the story.) Caleb was gesturing and speaking with an urgency that made me immediately regret making him wait to tell me. As I reached out to hug and reassure him, I wished that there was someone there to hug and reassure me.…
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Caleb’s Story: Eyes Opening
(Part 4. New readers can click here to start at the beginning of the story.) During Caleb’s high school years, I kept busy with homeschooling, Caleb’s vocal training, and my kids’ local theater involvement on top of my church volunteer work. But my mind was still churning because a bumper crop of national church and…
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A Tale of Two Cover-ups: The Pastor’s Wife
Originally posted September 2022 This seems an appropriate time to share the tale of this church cover-up because eighteen years ago my world was turned upside down. And, as it is prone to do, the church prioritized its own reputation and protected and coddled the man responsible. In 2001 my husband (now ex) was in…
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A Tale of Two Cover-ups: The Girl
I imagine that there are as many ways for churches to cover up their corruption as there are churches. Though shame and intimidation are primary, pastors and church boards and denominational leadership can be quite creative with their methods. I have a handful of church cover-up experiences that I could share. But there are two…
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Caleb’s Story: My Mind’s Dissonance
Our family made an unspoken pact that day for my sake. For years we continued to pretend that the obvious wasn’t the obvious. And my son carried the weight of his burden alone until it wore away at his soul.
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Caleb’s Story: The Light Faded From His Eyes
(Part 2. New readers can click here to start at the beginning of the story.) Since I was a serious kid, I held tightly to the church and, as someone riddled with anxieties, held tightly to the assurances the church gave me. It is funny to me now that I recognize just how many of…
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Caleb’s Story: How I Learned to Be
(Part 1) “We accept the reality of the world with which we are presented.” – Christof, The Truman Show I think the foundational doctrine of Christian parenting is what most evangelical and fundamentalist churches refer to as original sin. Parents are taught that every child is born sinful by virtue of being descended from Adam.…
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Reflecting
I used to view this as some sort of fatal flaw – as proof that I wasn’t a good enough helpmeet in that godly, Christian marriage type of way.
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Pro-life Apostate
Though I was once ardently anti-abortion, my views have shifted. As I dared to step outside of evangelical dogma, I allowed myself to study things I would have never studied while still under the gaze of authoritarian preachers. When a person does that, they quickly learn that their preachers and teachers are not always completely…
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In Name Only
Had I been raised to be nominal, I would likely still be in the church.
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Lunch with Two Men
The day I went to lunch with two men – neither my significant other and one of them married – felt to me like a day that warranted a gold medal. That may sound a bit hyperbolic to some but hear me out. As a former evangelical, I spent most of my life in very…
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Lesson From the Lake
My experiences in Girl Scouts are some of the best memories of my childhood. And Girl Scout Camp was one of my favorite times of the year. Our camp was primitive for anyone older than the Brownies. We had canvas tents, pit toilets and a cold-water communal sink as a bathhouse, and we cooked over…
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Why I Finally Left the Church
I chose to speak rather than silently submit to the misogynistic nonsense.
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Snicklefritz Chronicles 