I began the new year recovering from a violent stomach bug. It started early that Sunday morning and my friend Kelly had graciously offered to bring me supplies that afternoon, particularly electrolyte water, which I have learned usually prevents these viruses from getting the better of me. Sadly, the virus beat her to me. Around mid-morning, while being sick, I blacked out, hit my nose and under the bones under my right eye on the metal trash can and my head on some wall brackets, and ended up with a swollen nose, three stitches above my right eyebrow, and a head CT. Thankfully, the CT of my head and facial bones came back perfectly clear, but two weeks later my face is still tender and, in some places, numb and swollen.

Though slowly, my wounds and bruising are healing. The thing about healing wounds, though, is they itch, tingle, and throb. These sensations began as soon as the stitches were in place—even the bruised and numb areas where the skin was never broken sometimes tingle a bit. And it’s maddening. I want to respond, to bring relief by touching the bruised and broken places calling out for it. But it hurts. A lot! And I wonder if that isn’t really the point. The skin is knitting back together and nerve endings are healing, and they need to be touched and stimulated to continue their journey back to wholeness, to ensure the scarred tissue and nerves are integrated into and communicating with the rest of the body they belong to.

Those sensations are the body becoming one again. And maybe it is the same with the healing of our hearts and souls. The emotions and spiritual wounds we carry may remain hidden for a time, but at some point, they demand attention, demand to be touched, explored, named, known. It is painful, but it is how those broken nerves, muscle, and tissue learn to feel again, how they learn to communicate well with the rest of our being. It’s how we become. One. Whole. Self.

The tenderness and pain are intense and deep at the site of the wounds and bruising, so I touch around them, softly, gingerly. I slowly get as close as I can without hurting myself more; I don’t want to hinder healing, but some care and soothing are needed, some acknowledgment that the wounds are there, that healing is happening, that the rest of the body is available to meet the healing needs. Or to simply hold vigil. To watch and wait. Alert. Attentive. Ready to be united and whole once again, free from pain, relaxing back into full function and feeling, protective reflexes finally at rest.

2018 was a year of painful tingling and throbbing. It manifested in my body, mostly, as though the last four years of soul work had cleared enough space at the table for the body memory of trauma to finally find purchase and a voice. One thing after another—a cancer scare in January; physical therapy all summer for a bicep tendon that has been pinched for over a year and refuses to resolve itself; my hair falling out in the summer and pricey supplements all autumn and winter to resolve adrenal fatigue, nutrient deficiencies, hypoglycemia (that was news to me!), and low thyroid; the loss of my singing voice; sexual abuse wounds finally bubbling up to the surface; concerns during the holidays over the integrity of my vertebral arteries and the outside chance of an aneurysm (we think I’m fine!); and finally lying on the bathroom floor unconscious and covered in blood as the year teetered to its close.

All. Year. Long.

I suppose this means that progress has been made internally. There is space in my internal landscape for my body to receive its due attention as it seeks to recover from the stress and trauma it has endured for so long. But it is still frightening. And wearying.

The injury to my face seems merely a physical manifestation of my internal experience all year, as though 2018 felt the need for a true kick to the face just to add some flare to its finish. As though it wanted to make sure I would NEVER forget this year and the intensity with which my body began to demand synchronization with the rest of my healing. “DO NOT LEAVE ME BEHIND ANY LONGER,” it screamed. “It is MY turn and I will NOT be ignored any more!”

Trust me, I couldn’t have ignored it if I’d wanted to.

But now comes the task of listening. Of identifying the painful gashes and bruises. Of administering the salves, or cleaning out the infections. Of stitching up the holes until they begin to knit themselves back together again. Of acknowledging the returning sensation, testing it, soothing it. Of integrating the self.

Of embodying incarnate healing.

I don’t know what that will look like, and I feel wary of what else may be lurking around the bend and under these already painful layers. There is no map for this journey. It’s a bushwhack all the way, hard, tedious, slow progressing toward a destination only vaguely defined. A destination about which we might say, “You’ll know it when you get there.”

But will I? I suppose that’s a matter of faith, of trusting that the ability to recognize it will be there when I need it. In truth, that is the crux of faith in general: believing I will have what I need when I need it, whether it’s the ability to recognize the evidence of wounds or having the resources to address them or finding the strength to keep moving, even if at a crawl.

So I have entered 2019 wounded and weary in every sense, cautious, protective, but open. I think. I hope. I am at least aware that I’m in the thick of something and my radar is running. Whether or not it’s working well remains to be seen, but it is at least scanning.

I wasn’t able to write much last year, and I am not pressuring myself to do much this year. But I want to try, at least. To exercise what little language and voice I have, to acknowledge the existence of the wounds and of their healing. To sooth the throbbing places and let them know that I am keeping vigil, that I watch and wait, that I am here.