Freedom

The Sweet Beginning

By: redtentwomen October 16, 2020October 13, 2020

Day to Day, Intentional Living, Monthly Themescourage, Fear, Freedom, oppression, Safety, Secrets3 Comments

What felt like the bitter end was really the sweet beginning. The sweet beginning to a new life. The bitter end to oppression. The bitter end to patterned, repeated, intentional, and willful systematic oppression. The sweet beginning to freedom from suppression and systemic fear.

The Show Is Over

By: redtentwomen September 30, 2020September 29, 2020

Faith, Femininity, Intentional Living, Monthly Themes, WarriorFreedom, Growing Up in Church, Kierra Sheard, Natasha Stevens, Powerlessness, Salvation, Self Acceptance4 Comments

Sing it Kierra! “I don’t know if you have noticed, I’m doing me and I love it. I just ran through the fire. Please don’t judge me.” Piping in the background is my new theme song. The lyrics wrap around me like a veil.

Shame and Secrecy: Gone

By: redtentwomen May 21, 2020May 21, 2020

Day to Day, Faith, Femininity, relationshipsAdultery, Beth Moore, betrayal, Debra Wallace, Dignity, Divorce, Freedom, Proverbs 31 Bible Study, Proverbs 31:25, Recovery from Betrayal, Recovery From Divorce15 Comments

It was a Saturday like any other in San Antonio, Texas — a beautiful, blustery October morning in 2007, the perfect day for our family outing at the zoo — until I discovered a secret so painful, I nearly collapsed. D-Day, I called it. Discovery Day. The day I discovered my husband was leading a…

Downhill

By: redtentwomen January 29, 2020January 28, 2020

Day to Day, FaithDreaming, Freedom, Hope, Shannon Brink2 Comments

She peers over the edge of her handlebars, wondering at the hill ahead. Can she go down it with eyes closed? Can she hold her breath long enough to make it to the bottom? Wind in her hair as she unstraps the helmet, dangling it below the bars, she grips the rubber under her little…

Season’s Call

By: redtentwomen March 14, 2019March 12, 2019

Day to Day, FaithChanging Seasons, Freedom, Growth, Julie McClay, Spring3 Comments

I exit an evening exercise class to daylight. Contrasted with the darkness of prior weeks, the streaks of pink in the sky invite me to hope. I feel a brightening in my spirit. The light always returns! This season, my soul mirrors the winter weather pattern of the valley where I live. One day all…

By: redtentwomen October 24, 2018October 24, 2018

Day to Day, relationshipsBarbara Beecham, Domestic Abuse Recovery, Domestic Violence, Domestic Violence Month, Freedom4 Comments

Folsom Prison Blues “Well if they freed me from this prison If that railroad train was mine I bet I’d move it on a little farther down the line…” Johnny Cash Our daughter is back. After eighteen years of being away, of staying away, of hiding the truth of her messy life. We are…

Friendly wounds.

By: redtentwomen March 17, 2016March 15, 2016

LiteratureChrist, forgiveness, Freedom, God, Honesty, Impact, Lauren Patterson, Poetry, truth10 Comments

Until recently, I had no understanding of what forgiveness is and is not.

The Wink

By: redtentwomen December 10, 2015December 11, 2015

Day to Day, TravelDeath, Final Judgement, Freedom, Fugitive, Jan Meyers Proett, Jesus, Parking Ticket, Shame2 Comments

Today, I ran the vacuum cleaner close to where my nephew Andrew was reading, in my own house, at mid-day. I had every right to clean, but what tumbled reflexively from my core was, “Oh, I am so sorry.”