I Want to Forgive: The Story of How I Released Places of Hurt

Hello Reader,

This is one of the most vulnerable (and real) posts I have ever written.

Hope we are all able to forgive and release.

If you prefer the audio version, listen to the video below. The written version follows.

With love,

Olivia

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I was bitter. And as is often the case when one goes sour on life, I was the last one to know.

We’ve all had that one relative or friend who has let hurt fester so long it becomes another appendix–like an arm or leg ready to catch them when reminded of the fall. 

Suddenly in a simple conversation over a croissant at a coffee shop, they’re reminded of the person who hurt them. Between sips of tea they recount the story of the girlfriend, the school, the job that “did them wrong” and believe, deep in their souls, that it’s the first time you’ve heard it. 

But, it’s not. It’s the third, or the fifth, or the tenth. They don’t mean to be repetitive, but that’s what happens when a story has been rehashed so many times deep inside, the pain relived, until it becomes a part of you that everyone must know.

And it’s not their fault. A simple offense locks into years of similar pain. And brick upon brick, of real hurt and hurtful people, a pillar of beliefs is formed. 

After living in Estonia for nine years, and setting up house on a nice street in Saint Paul, Minnesota, I had digested the same painful stories too many times. They’d left a permanent taste in my psyche–bitterness.

Like the way my 19-year-old son still has five scars on his hands–permanent marks left from the way he pinched himself when his Estonian teacher would yell at him, shame him, make him sit alone in a wide, open hallway because of his struggle with ADHD–something the elite school and teachers had no training or tools to deal with. He wanted to cause himself pain; hoping it would heal him, make him stop losing focus. 

He’s needed therapy for that.

Like the way one of my daughter’s Estonian kindergarten teachers pulled me aside in another wide, empty hallway to tell me I needed to do something. She felt that her co-teacher had been abusive towards my little, blonde girl for years and finally had the courage to say something. My daughter’s daily preschool morning routine suddenly made sense–rolled up on the floor, wearing pink, and crying: “Don’t make me go back there. I don’t need to learn Estonian any more. No one likes me. They hate me there.” 

Wish I would have believed her. She’s fifteen now and is still trying to prove that teacher, and the world, that she was made good. 

She’s gonna need therapy for that. 

Like the way I walked into Reval Cafe on the first day of Oliver’s seventh grade year. I was alone, but in the corner, nestled around tables against old limestone walls, I saw all the Estonian mothers from Oliver’s class gathered for a first-day-of-school coffee. I’d spent seven years inviting the kids and parents to my home for every holiday or event possible. Seven years trying to teach my mouth to make the ö’s and õ’s of their language. Seven years praying for them; inviting them into my life. And still, it was not enough. 

That day I stopped speaking Estonian. 

I’ve often told myself I should have been better; could have brushed off their oversight to invite me; embraced my role as a foreigner, counted all my other blessings and rebounded.

But, I didn’t. 

In many ways, I couldn’t. 

I see that now.

That day, a long suspected point was proven–that somehow I’m not enough. That eventually, people will reject and cause me the sort of pain my system is never able to metabolize. 

My therapist says that when, in life, we incur deep pain we look for that same rejection everywhere. These hurtful experiences, brick by brick, fit together like puzzle pieces to build a pillar inside. 

And on that day, in Reval Cafe, the real pain and grudges added up and grew an appendage on my soul. And, honestly, the whole lot of Estonian people, to me, grew cold. 

A few months ago, I returned to Estonia for one final work trip. We purposely brought our kids so that we could all say goodbye to the place they grew up. Goodbye to the Baltic Sea. Goodbye to the church we started. Goodbye to saunas and evergreen forests with bogs. 

I also knew I needed to say goodbye to the pain. To the bitterness. To repeating the same stories over and over again outwardly and inwardly.

We needed to take all that pain that was caught, and release it. Wish it well. 

At least one of my kids outwardly rolled their eyes (the other, more compliant one, probably rolled his eyes inwardly) as I made us revisit physical places where we incurred hurt.

We stood outside Oliver’s old Estonian school. It was empty in July. The six-foot-tall, hand carved doors were locked. It’s frozen in time–the same wooden door embedded  in color through nine years of first-day-of-school pics. In those shots, Oliver smiles, wears a dark blue and burgundy velvet hat embroidered with the logo of one of Estonia’s top schools. The scars on his hands are not visible.

Built on the corner of one of the busiest streets in Tallinn, people stared at us–an American family standing in a circle, eyes closed and whispering prayers. We thanked God for this school and how it prepared Oliver well; allowed him to get into a dream school to study aerospace engineering. Amid the sound of bus doors opening and closing and trolly bells, we spoke aloud words of forgiveness for the hurt caused; the scars formed. 

We release you.

From Oliver’s school, it was a five minute walk uphill to Ava’s old Lutheran kindergarten. The school stood in the shadow of a large church building built of brick and stained glass; its windows decorated with paper suns created by toddler hands.

Eyes closed, we prayed. Thank you for the many naps Ava took in this place, the songs she learned to sing in fluent Estonian, for the afternoons spent wearing snow pants and reflective vests in nearby playgrounds. 

We forgave the teacher who likely thought the pain she created helped Ava rather than destroy her. We asked that God would make those crooked beliefs, embedded in Ava from the time she was 3 years old, straight. 

We release you. 

There were also stories that were only mine to forgive, and I traveled to those sites alone. 

I laid my hands on the brown stucco exterior of the apartment building on Raua street–the site where Nick and I had our most intense fights. These were loud and could not be kept private in an apartment made of small spaces. Young Oliver hid in his bedroom’s corner and cried as another argument ricocheted off bedroom walls. 

I asked God to forgive me for adding new scars to Oliver’s soul. I forgave Nick. I forgave myself. I forgave the pressure that caused the explosions. I again asked God to make crooked ways straight.

I release you. 

I sat outside the entrance of a fitness club on the top floor of a mall I no longer pay the monthly membership fee to enter. The gym has been remodeled into some version that is even more Scandinavian–more white, with even more black and red accents. 

And there, I had only myself to forgive. I’d let myself down. I’d hurt people I used to work out with. I’d made myself walk through snow, ice and complete darkness to attend a 7 am class because I’ve hated my body for years; punishing it to perfection. 

Forgive me. At that time, I was not wise or kind enough. My pain had grown an arm on my soul, and reached out for help in the wrong direction. 

Forgiving myself is always the hardest of all. 

I release you, Olivia. 

I never made it to the cafe where I stopped speaking Estonian. Maybe I was not ready to forgive. Or maybe I knew prayers uttered would be for show, still floating above a sea of pain. 

There are parts of me that are still waiting for this story to repeat in Saint Paul, Minnesota; to prove the past true over and over again. 

But, I’m done being bitter or scared. 

I need therapy for that.

This week, I saw my counselor and spoke out the memory at Reval Cafe for the first time. I saw myself entering that cafe, full of all the class mothers except me, and …

I’m embarrassed to say it…

One of those ugly, moans of a cry emerged and halted my voice. 

I cut the story short and finished with: “I wish I could have been stronger–kept speaking Estonian, kept wanting to stay. I know they did not mean to hurt me. I just didn’t belong.” 

My therapist looked me in the eye and said: “Olivia, I would have cried too. You’d given up everything to be there and serve. It makes complete sense.”

Suddenly, I was no longer alone with the whip I use to make myself a better person. 

We made a plan. I’m going to start trauma therapy around all the stories that accumulated throughout the years and were capped off by one simple morning at Reval Cafe. 

Real pain intermixed with real lies. I allow God in the space between.

I want to release you.

And maybe when I go back to Estonia next summer, you’ll find me seated alone in the Reval Cafe across the street from Oliver’s old school.

I’ll sip a chai latte in that same corner where the moms gathered, and pray. 

I’m not the same. 

The sea of pain is waning. 

I release you. 

Olivia PucciniComment