Brave Enough To Be Bliss

(Author’s note: I shared the first chapter of the book, the self-talk journal, food=life, paragraphs about my first anger at the rapist, child sexual abuse, information on numbing, your brain is full of stories poem.)

Allen, I have not been through all you have been through. I can only imagine and hear from what you have shared that it has been very painful. However, I think the real pain you're avoiding lies beneath what you did and how that behavior hurts other people...I think those are the results of whatever happened to you in some way at some point earlier in your life perhaps. That is the wound that needs healing that may be the key to healing everything else that has happened or that you did as a result. You are a very intelligent, hard-working, fun, caring, handsome man who clearly loves his kids very much. You are also an imperfect human just like the rest of us. When you're ready to uncover your own answers, you will and that is when you will be able to experience all the joy God wants for each of us. I will pray you choose to be brave sooner versus later so that you and your kids can share as much joy as possible and they will know by the way you are living and loving them and others now that no matter what you may have done earlier in life, it is simply that, what you did, not who you are.

"Fear grows out of the things we think; it lives in our minds. Compassion grows out of the things we are, and lives in our hearts." Barbara Garrison

A few hours later as often happens, I realized the process of writing and sharing taught me an important lesson.

From: Ginger Bliss To: Allen Thu, Nov 9, 2023 at 1:42 PM

Oh, my goodness, when am I going to get it?!?! The lesson is always mine. All this time I thought I was waiting for you to trust me enough to tell me, but after what I just said below...I think it was so I would finally realize no matter how I learn something, nudge or otherwise, I need to just talk about whatever it is at the time I become aware of it. I wanted to think I was helping you in some way, but I was really keeping a secret and that never does anything good for anyone. If I had asked you from the beginning, maybe I could have been a more trusted person from the start because I was willing to ask hard questions and be completely forthcoming and honest. I limited the depth of our friendship by keeping it a secret and not being totally honest with you about whatever came up over two years. I really am sorry...It's been a few weeks of apologies with all the epiphanies I've been having.

From: Ginger Bliss To: Allen Thu, Nov 9, 2023 at 4:38 PM

I learned a lot of important information about how my lack of transparency and expressing all my thoughts and feelings has impacted relationships, I just wanted to say that your being so open and honest about everything you've experienced and struggled with has been a great example to me of how it must feel for other people when I am open and honest with them. It's such a good feeling on both sides...to know someone trusts you to share and the relief that comes being able to be fully who we are with another person. Fear is such a barrier to healthy relationships and self-worth. If my deep thoughts and the conversation this week has been overwhelming to you with work and everything you've got going on, I get it. I do thank you for taking the time to call those couple times and talk as they've been very insightful and enjoyable conversations for me at least. What first attracted me to you was your willingness to share your thoughts, your self-reflection, and your openness. The emails you would send me were the highlights of my days and I learned a lot through them. Thursday, November 9, 2023 at 11:33 PM Ginger Bliss> wrote: And since you know all, I’ve now shared below, you may not even remember it, but there was a time you wanted to come see me and I declined stating that I had something came up…I didn’t mean to lie back then, but it was because I had taken laxatives and was too embarrassed to say that. In my family nothing unpleasant was verbalized or acknowledged in any way so I didn’t know how to be honest about anything like that. Anyway, I invited you to come over after your trip but then you wouldn’t and it was a time you mentioned eating unhealthy/too much on your trip, and feeling down, etc. Anyway, if my lying hurt your feelings at all or made you feel unwanted or rejected, I wanted you to at l east know now that wasn’t it at all, I just was too scared to be honest. I am truly sorry for being too scared to trust you with the truth about me. When Kylee was terribly depressed, I remembered how years earlier after her life-altering concussions when she decided to create a Foundation and use her experience to educate others, it turned everything around for her. I nominated her for an award, and she was once again recognized for her efforts to spread the message of post-concussion syndrome. It gave her a little boost remembering how she had used her experience for good to help others. I'm wondering if in a similar way, that was a very helpful piece for you to turn something painful for you into something that could help others avoid or minimize their pain and help them know they aren't alone in the struggle, and if it helped you work through further things yourself and gave you a support network. You had that once and I believe you could have that again. What about sharing your story with male college athletes? I mention athletes because you were one and the body image, attention that comes with that often leads to an overinflated ego with women throwing themselves at the athletes. What about educating yourself about the female perspective and how young girls can often seek attention/sex/etc. because they have had pain in their past and they just want to be cared for and loved in any way that feels good to them at the time, similar to how men may use porn to try to feel good. Nothing good comes from either scenario and can lead to lots of trouble if people aren't careful. You are really such a good communicator; you have experience helping men so what about spending some time and energy thinking about how

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