To Remember My Childhood Homes....

Maria Magdalena Laubser (Maggie Laubser, 1886-1973), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

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When I remember my childhood home, I remember many different things:

First, I remember a red-bricked house in Mexico, 

in a neighborhood of colorful buildings, 

with a vast backyard behind heavy black gates.

I remember dust-covered shelves 

and a glass dining room table, 

an old television, plastic dolls, stuffed animals and a tricycle, 

that once belonged to me.

When I remember that house,

I remember vivid imaginings of a little girl 

with short hair and bangs 

and purple dresses with matching headbands and hair clips 

who had just started school.

And I also remember my father, 

and his unforeseeable tempers over spilled milk. 

I remember mother 

trying to not rock the boat.

I remember dusty streets, 

and gravel, 

and pavement, 

with a store next door to our house.

When I remember my grandmother’s house, 

I remember safety and security. 

I remember paper dolls, children’s books, art supplies and 

the dollhouse I got for Christmas.

And, I also remember the confusion of why 

my father was so often gone.

Now it's the grieving hole of what I lost 

when my grandmother passed on. 

When I remember our house on Gilman Drive, 

I remember eating tacos on the floor 

on our first night living there 

with neither table nor chairs. 

I remember myself as a young girl, 

so small and afraid of the world that felt so unsafe.

So loud. So vast. So big. 

Too unpredictable and too scary for the little girl that is me.

I remember tears and screams 

of a young girl feeling so lost 

and alone and scared and unsafe and overwhelmed.

Then we moved to a smaller house, 

on Boyes Boulevard 

around the corner from my school, 

surrounded by trees, with wooden floors. 

When I remember that house, 

I remember both joy and sorrow. 

Both fear and peace. Both safety and security; 

yet uncertainty and unpredictability. 

Its wooden floors, 

the green walls of my bedroom, 

the vast lawn in our backyard 

with an apple, a fig, and a towering redwood tree.

This was the home where we lived 

when my parents filed for divorce; 

soon to sign the papers that would end 

what had now failed to be.

I remember my vivid, childlike imagination 

as I saw myself, a protagonist, in my own stories 

in different times and different places; 

some that only I created. 

Great dreams; great joys; 

great imaginations; 

yet also great fears, deep sorrows, 

changes and feeling unsafe. 

To recall my childhood homes 

is to recall myself; 

a young girl - 

with great dreams and great fears. 

Deep joys and deep sorrows. 

Peaceful times and fun times, next to horrible and wrenching sufferings 

and shards of memories of 

our crumbling family home. 

Today my childhood homes only exist in my memories 

and in my thoughts and in my veins 

and in my blood and in my bones - 

for they are no longer mine to hold.

For 

I have grown up, but 

a part of me is still 

that small girl. 

To remember my childhood homes - 

as both places of joys and places of sorrows 

that will no longer 

see the sunrise of tomorrow. 

About the poem:

This poem is about the memories that I have of my childhood, specifically through the lenses of the various places where my family and I lived while I was growing up. We moved several times throughout my childhood and teenage years. For me, and I know for many, remembering our childhood home(es) can make a mix of feelings resurface. Many of us have both happy and painful memories of our childhoods through the lens of where we lived growing up regardless of what our childhoods looked like. I’m sure that many will be able to relate to this, and writing this poem was so cathartic for me, and it put a lot into perspective which was very healing to be able to look at it as something in the past, and as something outside of myself, because it is now. To be able to turn it into art through the written word is an amazing gift that I am so grateful that the Lord has blessed me, and so many with. I pray that this poem will bless you in some way. 

Prayer for Inner Healing

Dear Lord Jesus, please come and heal my wounded and troubled heart. I beg you to heal the torments that are causing anxiety in my life. I beg you, in a particular way, to heal the underlying source of my fear and doubt. I beg you to come into my life and heal the psychological harms that struck me in my childhood and from the injuries they have caused throughout my life.

Lord Jesus, you know my burdens. I lay them on your Good Shepherd’s heart. I beseech you—by the merits of the great open wound in your own heart—to heal the wounds that are in mine. Heal my memories, so that nothing that has happened to me will cause me to remain in pain and anguish, filled with anxiety, fear or guilt.

Heal, O Lord, all those wounds that have been the cause of evil that is rooted in my life. I want to forgive all those who have offended me. Look to those inner wounds that make me unable to forgive. You who came to forgive the afflicted of heart, heal my wounded and troubled heart.

Heal, O Lord Jesus, all those intimate wounds that are the root cause of my physical and emotional pain. I offer you my heart. Accept it, Lord, purify it, and give me the sentiments of your Divine Heart.

Heal me, O Lord, from the pain caused by the [separation of my parents]. Grant me to regain peace and joy in the knowledge that you are the Resurrection and the Life. Make me an authentic witness to your resurrection, your victory over sin and death, and your loving presence among all men.

Amen.

(The above prayer was slightly adapted from one found online here.)

About the author: 

Isabel Gopar Zavaleta is a young adult child of divorce in her mid twenties. She currently lives in Spain. Her parents divorced when she was eleven. She is passionate about using her writing charism to help other adult children of divorce like herself, and to serve and to build the Kingdom. Isabel is grateful to have been led to find Life-Giving Wounds, which has played a major role for her in her healing journey towards wholeness. 

Reflection Questions for Small Groups or Individuals:

1. What resonated with you in this poem? Are any parts similar to your own experiences?

2. What do you remember of your childhood home(s)?

3. If you had to move as a child, what was that experience like? 

4. Close your eyes and imagine yourself returning to your childhood home. What memories, thoughts, or feelings come up for you? What perspectives do you now have? 

5. When you remember your childhood home(s), what do you think of? What do you remember? Perhaps reflecting on, and processing this could be a step of healing for you.