"Genuine grieving for our childhood ends our morbid fascination with the past and lets us return to the present, free to live as adults. Confronting years of pain and loss at first seems overwhelming." BRB p. 83

We may have been going to meetings for many years, lamenting the slings and arrows of our recovery life. Perhaps we thought we were "Living life on life's terms," - doing the best we could.

But often progress seemed to come in dribs and drabs. This left us with a sense of frustration at the little spiritual progress we had made, despite our best efforts.

But what may have been missing was the willingness to genuinely grieve for our lost childhoods. Grief work is not about just learning to tell our story, but about starting to discover and express the underlying trauma and emotions. Doing this level of work is the true path to freeing ourselves.

When we are no longer held in place by the disembodied stories and the undercurrent of repressed feelings, we can begin to take positive action, change our life's terms, find joy in the present, and feel alive for possibly the first time.

On this day I will tell the real story of my childhood trauma. In doing so, I will free my True Self and enjoy this day my Higher Power has given me.