Wound

Content warning for photos and descriptions of Wounds, Cancer and Scars.

Only the wounded physician heals. 

—C. G. Jung

Wounding involves the breaking or penetration or opening into the human flesh or soul by a force or power or energy coming from beyond our ordinary recognized boundaries.

Sacred Wound- Jean Houston- The Search for the Beloved

This post is published on Sept 11, 2024, the 16th birthday of Web of Life Animist Church. The alignment of timelines of multiple events described below certainly catches my attention, and tells me that the story being acted out through them is bigger than me. So I share with you.

10 years ago (2014) I had a large (8×20 cm) malignant liposarcoma growing in my inner right thigh. A couple months ago (2024), I began having sensations in the area that concerned me, and two weeks ago I had surgery to remove the regrowth that had begun. As I lay around healing from the surgery, I am contemplating the role of “wounds” in my life. This post is about the wounds I have experienced in this life, and how I honor the teachings that have come from them. I am not writing about them to be “gross”, but rather, to acknowledge the roles that wounds, have had in my life. Maybe this post will prompt the reader to contemplate the wounds that have shaped you.

Contemplating my Wounds

soul wounds- I have contemplated and worked with many soul wounds from my own life, which has become the basis of my work in this life as an Animist Minister and Spirit Bridge practitioner. Trauma, fear, and lack of confidence have been my teachers and healers since I was in my early 20s. See my books for more details about various wounds I have worked on in my life.

generational wounds- My personal soul healing has opened many doors for me to contemplate and hold space for the soul wounds of my ancestors. I have grown to see how these inherited wounds have been passed through many generations and have been the reason for addiction, numbing of feelings, and internal pain. I am grateful for the opportunity to understand more about how toxic systems of patriarchy, colonization, wars and religion have negatively impacted my family lineages. Only then have I been able to look at them directly and call in the support for tending them.

physical wounds- I am grateful to have had so few physical wounds occur in my life, knowing that so many have so many wounds to heal physically and emotionally. That being said, there are wounds that are important markers in my soul and life development, which I would like to share here.

Born through a Wound.

C-section birth- I was two weeks* overdue, and over 11 pounds. I was my mother’s first child, and I was too big to come out naturally, so I was born through the wound of a c-section. I never thought of my birth experience in the category of “wound” before, but now, I see how being born through this profound wound created in my mother, allowed me this life. I am grateful.

*When my mother read this post she corrected the story. “You were 3 weeks overdue actually. That’s the most he would let it go. Then he induced labor. After all day and I was getting nowhere he did a c-section at 11:05pm.”

Initiatory Wounds

“Life Calling” Wounds- This month, September, it has been 31 years since I was “hit on the head” in my bed at night, the wounds that began my life as an OOlah, Spirit Bridge and Animist. In 1995 I woke up out of sleep bleeding from multiple places, and feeling like I could not remember a dream I just had.

My roommate asked “should I take you to the hospital?” “No” I said “just call 911″.  I went into the bathroom, dumped the comforter on the ground and sat on the toilet.  Sitting there naked, I could finally see my lower body and I was shocked to see drying streaked blood all over my legs.  I could feel something dripping from my face so I tried to find the source. I felt one bleeding place, which was the left side of my forehead, then another, right across the bridge of my nose.  Both hands settled on these wounds as I tried to stop the bleeding.  Then I felt another drip. This time my hand told me that my right nostril was bleeding.

excerpt from my telling of my “calling’ story (see link to full story below)

Check out the complete story here

Below are two photos I have that were taken closest to the wounding event shared above. The first (left) is a few months after getting hit on the head, when I was incredibly exuberant due to the experience. This pic is from a sort of “coming out” party I hosted. The second is a few months after the party, when I had packed up my life, cut my hair short for the first time, and left in my car to find “my destiny”. Dylan was my dog friend at the time, who was home when I was hit on the head (and he did not bark). My life had been changed by the cracking open I had received from my wounds.

Tattoos– I got my first tattoo (bear claw) after having a dream about Bear claiming me before I got hit on the head. At various phases during my life, I have gotten new symbols. So far, 8 in all. Each tattoo makes us bleed, leaving its marks upon us.

Cancer– Before I dealt with Cancer as a 46 year old, I had never had a significant physical issue before. To that point in my adult life I had focused my energy on “soul wounds” because that is what I had, and what I was guided to tend. Experiencing a potentially life ending physical illness opened my eyes to many things about myself, and changed/deepened me in many important ways regarding compassion, empathy and my ability to hold difficult space for others.

Here is a quote from a blog post I wrote as I was dealing with cancer in 2014

“When i was going into my appointment to hear my test results (I was about to be told I had a Cancer problem), I looked down and noticed a bumper sticker on someone’s car “Life is but a Dream”. I smiled because I had created that sticker 15 years earlier. I took it as a sign then, and i still remind myself this regularly. “Life is but a Dream”. I am telling myself a couple others too…”Things are not what they appear” and “Just because I think it, doesn’t mean it is True.”

Blog posts from the experience:

Healer, Heal Thyself

Remembering What is Important

Forget me Knot

Beautiful Healing Words Shared

On the day of my appointment with the radiation doctor I was nervous about what she would say.  I knew that I would say no to the “treatment”, yet there was a part of me that didn’t want to have to fight her about it.  I quietly cried all the way to the appointment…energy release I suppose.  I met with the young female doctor and after asking me a number of questions regarding the tumor growth, and looking at the images, she told me that she recommends one more image, post operation, to make sure that no part of the tumor was left in my leg, and assuming that there is none… she wants to be conservative and “Wait and See”.  In 6 months have another test and see what it shows.  She said that if/when, at some point in the future, the tumor cells regrow, then we cut it out again. She also said that she had just consulted that morning with the oncologist that I had seen, and they both agreed on this approach. I was shocked. This man who was so sure, had somehow changed his tune and was now ok with “Wait and See”? Funny how reality changes!  I was very relieved that my gut feeling ended up also being the recommended approach of the “experts”.  I told her that instead of living in a radiation world for 7 weeks, I wanted to focus my healing on creative manifestation.  She thought that was a good plan. As we parted, she shook my hand she told me with a smile “I hope I never see you again.” I agreed.

from https://quynn.com/new-life-era-is-upon-me/

Hysterectomy– The day before the surgery to resect the tumor from my leg in 2014 I had a scan that lit up one of my ovaries, which indicated that there might be cancer present. Sigh… Through a series of events, it was decided that the best course of action was for me to have an almost complete hysterectomy, and my ovary in question would be tested. This need brought up much for me, and gave me a lot to process, as described in the two blog posts below from the time. The surgery was done with robotics, and it went well, but it was not easy to heal from this one. Healing generally is not easy, yet I am grateful for the technology, and the opportunity to have the health care to support my wellness. The pic below is from a ceremony I called for right before the surgery that would make me an elder.

Blog posts from the experience:

Ceremony for Hysterectomy

A Year Later

Another side of being Wounded-Tending Cat Wounds
Just before the cancer experience started in 2014, an orange tabby cat showed up in my yard, and decided that our place was to be his safe place. He was not wild, but definitely feisty. He would accept petting, but would bite and scratch easily. What bonded us over time was because he found himself in many cat fights over the years, ending up with many wounds that were serious, and almost ended his life. Wounds to the head, mouth, neck and genitals almost killed him again and again. I nursed him through all of them, and he became more open and cuddly over time. I named him Henri, because it sounds like “Ornery”, as in “disagreeable and contrary”, because he certainly could be. Henri also has been with me through my wounds of the past 10 years, and I am grateful for him.

It is essential that we ask the unavoidable questions. Where and by whom have I been wounded? and What or who is trying to be born in me from that wound? In engaging these questions, we may find the gestations of our own possibilities.

Sacred Wound- Jean Houston- The Search for the Beloved

Teachings from these Wounds

Rewriting my Birth Story- For many decades of my life I have felt a physical sense of “I can’t”, after having an idea or desire…such as “I want to start a business!”, and then a feeling of “I can’t do that” in a deflating way. I taught myself how to push through this feeling most of the time, but I always felt it. I analyzed it many times over the decades, trying to figure out where it came from and how to untangle it. In my late 40s I began to sense a link between this feeling and my birth story.

I was two weeks overdue, and I had grown to be over 11 pounds. In the hours before the procedure to pull me out, I tried my best to be born. I tried, but I couldn’t. I began to sense my unborn self in that trying. “I want to!!!”, and then “I can’t” because of a force much bigger than me. My realization was helpful but the sense did not change until I communed with a plant teacher.

In 2018 or so, I had the opportunity to sit with a dose of a powerful cactus plant teacher. I felt the presence as male. As I started to feel him, he addressed my concern about my birth right away. He said “You have a story in your body about how your birth inhibited you, but here is another way to look at it… You were able to be born in a time and place when and where you could have access to the medical care to birth you in a way that went around the block. You could think of your story in a new way, that you were not ‘blocked’, but that you were able to create a “work around” to a problem.” My mind clicked and my gut released a bit. I had never thought of it that way, so I sat with the idea. “Yes” I said. And the story had changed in my body. The wound that became available to me gave me the work around I needed to be born in this world.

The Life I Continue to be Able to Live- In writing this post, I have gone through many pieces of info, and many of the details I have forgotten, until today when my new wound prompted me to revisit them to see what to include here. Regarding the future, being “healed” and my state of mind (which people keep asking me about…”Are you ok?”), I found this paragraph in the post about a month after my hysterectomy in 2014. I will leave it here, the words of myself back then…

“Am I “Healed”?  Here is the thing with that question… while my body is healing from surgery, I am Changed. Not just because my body looks and feels different. I am Changed because I have gone through a life shifting experience and I now have the awareness that, medically speaking, the “odds” are that some version of the tumor will regrow.  This is an interesting feeling for anyone who is a cancer “survivor” (the common way to describe anyone who has had a cancer experience).  After “successful treatment” it is said that one is in “remission”, which means that the symptoms and signs have waned, or in my case, the tumor was removed, but now we have a companion of a strange sort.  It is said that our Death is our constant companion, and a loving one at that, and for anyone who has gone through an experience with cancer, it is a bit the same. A feeling, a pain, a negative thought… can lead one to wonder “will It come back?”  I know logically that this is a futile mental endeavor, and the best thing to do is to walk the path of a healed life…yet intuitively knowing that this manifested watcher is always potentially somewhere.  My job now is to do my best to stay true to myself and not let anything sway me from my center, especially worry or fear…about anything.”

I am grateful to still be here, to learn and share.

Giving in to my Raven Nature of Thrifting

How does thrifting relate to my wounds? I began thrifting when I was in high school, and in my mid 20s I sold thrifted clothes a booth at an outdoor market and I even a thrift shoppe for a brief period. When I was hit on the head, the act that changed my life, I was running my booth and shoppe (pic below). Within a year of that experience, I had a dream that I needed to choose my life, and I decided to close my shoppe and leave my birth town to follow my new life. So I did. I left my thrifting self, but consistently included a few thrifted items in the spaces I created over the following 3 decades.

As I created and grew Web of Life Animists over the years there were often thrifted items available in the spaces we have had. After Web of Life became a legal Animist church in 2008, we incorporated a thrift store into our church spaces. Including a thrift store in Web of Life church is a meaningful way to recycle used items, and find them new homes, which supports the church mission of sustainability. Helping people find a new-to-them spiritual tool or piece of clothing pleases me, and the lovely items I find and collect, make shoppers happy too.

Feeding the Raven-Emerging New Birth

The same month that I noticed sensations in my leg recently, I became intrigued with the ability to do live online selling through new technology. As I am healing from surgery, I am also moving through the onboarding process of whatnot.com . My first Raven tattoo on my arm on my 55th birthday in November 2023, and the second one was completed a couple weeks before the test that showed the regrowth in my leg. My partner noticed this connection and told me “You need to feed your Raven now”. Yes I do.

As I heal I remind myself that a key to “feeding my Raven” is that I must continue to look for ways to support my continued unfolding of my authentic self. In case I forgot, I acknowledge that an important part of me is ready to give in to the continued inclination to find, share and rehome beautiful thrifted and donated spiritual tools, unique clothes and animist items with fellow Animists on behalf of Web of Life Animists. My first live show is around the time of Autumn Equinox of 2024. Interestingly, this time of September is the same time of year that I was hit on the head 31 years later. I give in to the need to feed my Raven in ways that please him, and me.

If anyone would like to join a show of Raven Found Thrift, or soon shop in my store there, you can sign up and follow me in whatnot to explore this new world with me. https://whatnot.com/invite/ravenfoundthrift I have learned that one must follow the energy of one’s life, even if/when we don’t know where it will take us. When we can muster up gratitude and ask for guidance, worlds of support can open up.

Many blessings of wellness in the ways you have it, and learning what your body and soul are sharing with you, wherever it leads.

Post Note: The final week of September:

Healing adventures create art:
Last week I had a visitor I was not expecting, and was not happy to see… the start of infection in my healing leg wound.
As I tended it gratefully with help, I started feeling my past ancestors, and people now, who do/did not have adequate care for this deadly wound visitor. What came was this poem. I am ok, and healing well. Thanks to all who have been supportive, sending me healing and to those who actively assisted me at any point.

Infection Autumn 2024

Seeping, weeping, is this wound of mine,
Makes me think of my ancestors who did not die
From the wound itself, but from infection.

Too, too many slowly die
From a colonizer of a different kind.

As I lay with leg wound high,
I say grace for access to care,
A privilege I am well aware
In my current place and time.

How many right now are suffering dire
from war wounds, an oops, or burns from fire
Breeding infection that
Causes a health quagmire?

Blades, gunshots and bombs, bad enough,
But the bacterial invasion to beat is tough.

This challenge, not only for humans,
Bacteria reigns supreme
Needed in the physical world,
Yet deadly when in bloodstream.

Micro is Macro, colonized culture inflamed,
With soul infections of hatred and pain
Resistant to care, again and again,
For the festering wounds of generational vain.

I cry for all whose wounds do weep,
Causing fear and worry which run so deep,
While praying for the care they need,
To regain their health and remain embodied.