The Glow of Grace: Creating Your Best Future by Redefining Your Past

By Fianna Craine

Through personal stories that illustrate her own struggles with physical, spiritual, and emotional challenges, author Fianna Craine shares practical tools for reframing your past and creating the future you desire. In The Glow of Grace, she leads you on a healing journey from heartbreak and pain into all the blessings life offers.

She addresses topics as self-worth, guilt and shame, depression, forgiveness, pride, and discerning the truth, as well as how to cultivate empathy, hope, love, and grace. The wisdom Craine has garnered through her experiences will inspire you and give you hope for the healing available through a personal walk with God.

As you travel your own healing path, you will move from the overwhelming brokenness of your past, to a place of inner strength and acceptance, and to a level of peace, love, and grace you hardly dared dream possible. The Glow of Grace gives you the courage to fight for your life and take control of your future.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Apr 8, 2019
• ISBN: 9781982224509

Fianna Craine

Fianna Craine is a middle-aged but optimistically young woman who is an artist, poet, pug addict, and adventure-loving, Christ follower. She lives on the West Coast surrounded by her family, friends, and pets.

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Copyright © 2018 Fianna Craine.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

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The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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ISBN: 978-1-9822-2449-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-2451-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-2450-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019903481

Balboa Press rev. date: 03/25/2019

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter 1 Healing Tools

Chapter 2 Self-Worth

Chapter 3 Guilt and Shame

Chapter 4 Self-Forgiveness

Chapter 5 Discerning Truth

Chapter 6 Victim vs. Survivor

Chapter 7 Depression

Chapter 8 Empathy

Chapter 9 Pride and Humility

Chapter 10 Inner Strength

Chapter 11 Hope

Chapter 12 Love

Chapter 13 Living in Grace

About the Author

This book is for all, no matter which faith you follow or even if you have no spiritual identity as of yet, so that all may find enlightenment and be blessed through the knowing of the Divine. It is for my fellow chronic illness sufferers, for anyone who has suffered at the hands of another, and for all those searching for answers to the toughest questions in life. I hope my sparks of wisdom ignite passion in your heart and soul so you may heal your brokenness, whatever it may be, and so you may experience what God promises. I don’t have the magic pill that will mend your shattered life. Only you and God, together, can figure out exactly what you need. Trust Him. He is the Great Physician. Never give up, because one day you will be able to look at our chaotic world and see the wonder of it all. You will start seeing the connections between yourself and the rest of creation. It is an awe-inspiring experience that I pray you will achieve.

The unexamined life is not worth living.

—Socrates

Acknowledgments

T HERE ARE MANY PEOPLE WHO have been instrumental in my healing process, and I finally do believe we must rely on one another to survive and to heal. We were never meant to go it alone. I have chosen not to use any of their names to protect the privacy of those persons innocent but essential in my life. First among my cheering squad is my second husband. He was the first person to truly love me for who I am—broken parts, baggage, and all. He has been the one who held me in the middle of the night and loved me through every newly revealed heartbreak as my blocked memories returned. This book would never have been written without him first showing me that unconditional love among humans is possible.

Also, among my best supporters has been my husband’s daughter. With the age difference between me and my husband, she is more like a sister than a daughter to me. I am forever grateful for her presence in my life. She is the one who taught me that the phone and the door belong to me, and that if it stresses me out to answer either, I don’t have to.

My homeopath, a craniosacral therapist, has helped me over the past three years to mop up the remnants of the emotional scars and also to bring my body to a place where it was ready and willing to heal the physical scars from nearly a lifetime of chronic disease. It was through her guidance that I was able to improve my immune system, which brought about my healing crisis—my miracle—a nine-day fever that brought my Lyme disease into check.

I also wish to thank my children and my closest friends, for without their love and support, I might not have been brave enough to share my story and the resultant wisdom that came from my healing journey.

Though I mention none of you by name, you know who you are, and I will be forever grateful for the parts you all played in my healing. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Glory be to God, for He alone chose to open my eyes in this way and also to give me the gift of writing so I may share my triumphs with you.

Introduction

I HAVE CHOSEN TO WRITE THIS book from a Christian perspective because that is the faith I personally follow. As such, I will occasionally include Bible verses, mostly from the New International Version, that resonate with my soul and have helped me to heal. I encourage you to search your own chosen religious text for passages that resonate with your own soul.

I may be a different kind of Christian, however, in that in writing this, it is not my intention to persuade you to become a Christian also. In my heart, I believe that there is only one true God, yes, but I also believe that my God goes by many different names. In learning about other religions, I can see that many of the ancient stories are similar. Several ancient texts speak of a great flood. Many, if not all, have some name for what I call the devil, whether it be Trickster, Loki, or the evil one. I am not here to change your beliefs about the Omnipotent One and His angels and saints. My purpose is to help you heal your wounds from the past by becoming closer to your version of God. When I mention God, Jesus, Lord, or the Holy Spirit, please feel free to substitute the name you know Him by, whether it be Allah, Yahweh, Goddess, or any of His many other names. I use the masculine only because that is what I grew up with. I believe God to be neither specifically male nor female.

God and spirituality are more significant than any man-made religion. Before being written down, all inspired messages passed through human filters; therefore, religious texts are flavored by human experiences. As such, they are good for reference, but we need to discover the Divine on our own terms. We can learn the words of a language by reading a dictionary, but we will not truly learn to speak that language without conversation with others. The Bible taught me the words, but prayer, communication with God, made the messages intimate and useful in my life. Spirituality is personal—the most personal thing you can cultivate in your life. It helps us find purpose, meaning, and peace in an otherwise chaotic world.

Eleven years ago, I had what I have since called a spontaneous remission. I was in remission (not that I even knew that I had Lyme disease yet), and I was feeling no pain for the first time in as long as I could remember. I was really happy for what seemed the first time in my life as well. With my newfound life, shall we say, I got a job working at a call center, which I actually enjoyed, despite the belief of many that call centers are among the worst places to work. I had made my peace with the office drama and politics and chose to do my job with joy.

I was living life without even a whisper of the depression, anxiety, or panic that had plagued me during most of my life. I was physically active without a pain or a care, and I was hiking, gardening, and doing every other thing I have always enjoyed but had had to give up because of pain and fatigue.

About six months after my spontaneous remission, I began to suffer many health crises and losses. First I experienced a significant chemical exposure at work in late November 2007, which triggered MCS, multiple chemical sensitivities, and made my immune system crash lower than it had ever been. They had cleaned the carpets and left them very soggy with cleaning solution. We employees had wanted to open the doors to air the place out, but we were told that we could not open the doors for security reasons. Furthermore, we were also told that if we left work, we would be fired. Obedient as ever, I stayed despite the risk to my health.

Then, on December 21, 2007, I came down with what felt like the flu from hell, and the flu feeling hung on for years. That is the normal Lyme experience. I remember the date so well because that was the evening my husband took me to see the Nutcracker. Our seats were center orchestra. It could not have been a more magnificent evening unless I had actually been feeling well.

I struggled to keep working, even though there were days when I barely had strength enough to cross from my desk to the bathroom. By the next spring, I was still struggling, but I had yet to discover the real reason behind my failing health. In my early years, I always knew something wasn’t right, but my symptoms had been on the mild end of the Lyme spectrum.

I did my best to keep up with all my extracurricular and family activities as well as work. I called my mom daily and visited her every weekend without fail. On a particularly beautiful Saturday in March 2008, I went with my mom to the annual home and garden show. Afterward, as I prepared to leave, I bent over to throw my things in the front seat of my car, and I hit my forehead on the roof’s edge. I smacked it so hard that I saw stars. Mom asked if I was okay. I can remember laughing and rubbing my head, saying that I was fine, when in all actuality, I was definitely not okay. I drove myself home, although now I do not know how I managed to arrive in one piece.

My husband and I both had the next day off, and we had planned on buying a new bed, so off to the mattress store we went. He chose our mattress while I wandered around, looking for a new one for my son. I chose a cushiony pillow-top mattress for him by falling asleep on it. I vaguely remember my husband rousting me and leading me over to do paperwork. By all rights, I had no business signing loan papers, considering that I was in such a daze from my concussion that I was merely doing what he told me to do. I trusted him, and he said to sign. That’s all I needed to know. At that moment, however, my twenty-month-long migraine had yet to begin. After finishing at the mattress store, I remember going home and standing in the kitchen as my husband prepared dinner. Then, approximately twenty-four hours after I suffered my concussion, I felt a thunderclap in my head and fell to the floor. I do not remember what happened after that. I do not even remember whether my husband took me to the hospital.

That migraine lasted twenty excruciatingly long months. My brain has never been the same since. Although I can keep up in conversations once again, I still have lingering signs of the damage. For a very long time, I had difficulty learning new things. I no longer have a photographic memory; my prideful secret weapon is gone. Although I took two years of Spanish in high school and spoke it occasionally with my husband, I lost the ability to speak Spanish thanks to the brain damage. I still get confused at times. When I am tired, I have trouble finding my words in conversation, and I will occasionally say the opposite of what I mean when I get flustered.

Right after the concussion, I tried to return to work at the call center, but what I once so easily explained to others would no longer come to me even through struggle. I lost my job. Failing work, I tried to keep up with what my husband and my children needed, but I failed at that too. I believed that I failed my daughter especially, but that’s a whole other story.

As we were trying to figure out my illness with my concussed brain, God was kind enough to keep giving us the same result no matter which constellation of symptoms we entered into the search box—Lyme disease—but when we reported that to my doctor, he told me to go have my God heal me and labeled me a hypochondriac.

In early October 2008, I managed to secure an order for a western blot and had my blood drawn at a naturopathic college’s lab. Then, at the end of October 2008, my mom suddenly passed away. I was in the shower when my brother called. After hearing the news, I dropped the phone to the shower floor and stood there, naked