Now Everybody's Going to Know

Before long, I'm going to stand naked in front of a whole lot of people.

Not literally, thank goodness. Nobody needs that kind of surprise.

But my dear friend Ali and I are about to publish Her Wings Appeared, a book filled with women's stories about courage, love, loss, and becoming. And I've put some pretty personal pieces of my life into those pages. Things I once kept tucked away, shared only with people I trusted, if I shared them at all.

And now we're putting them out in a book for anyone to see, for heaven's sake. What was I thinking?

I've written about leaving a husband I dearly loved but could no longer live with. About moving my children into a miserable old trailer near a busy highway, working three jobs to pay the bills, and trying to figure out how we were going to make it. About becoming a teacher, raising my children largely on my own, and the years when one loss after another left me struggling to find my footing.

I've written about some of my proudest moments, too. But those aren't the ones that make me squirm when I think about strangers turning the pages.

It's the other stuff. The mistakes, the poor decisions, the insecurities, the things I'm not particularly proud of. The parts of my life that aren't quite so pretty when you put them down on paper. I've honestly had moments of terror thinking of disclosing some of this to strangers, much less people I know.

I've spent years examining those experiences, trying to understand why I did what I did, and learning to have some compassion for the woman who was doing the best she knew how at the time.

And I have made peace with a great deal of it.

I'm learning that making peace with my past and inviting the entire world to read about it are two different things.

One unexpected gift of working on this book has been what I've discovered about myself. I've read and reread my stories, edited them, rearranged them, and occasionally wondered whether I really wanted to tell that much.

I began recognizing patterns that had followed me through much of my life. Especially my old companions, rejection and abandonment. I could see how often those fears had influenced my choices, sometimes without my even realizing it.

That was quite an education.

There's something incredible about finally recognizing a pattern you've been repeating for years. Once you see it clearly, it's much harder for it to sneak up on you. I still have those feelings occasionally, but now I recognize what's happening and can decide what to do about it.

I've also learned to accept something I once struggled with terribly. I have darkness in me, just as I have light. I've made mistakes. I've hurt people. I've been hurt. I've done things I'm proud of and things I'd rather not revisit.

And all of it belongs to me.

There was a time when I was going through some particularly painful experiences, and people judged me harshly. Some of that judgment still stings a little when I remember it. I'd be lying if I said I no longer cared what anyone thought of me.

Of course I care sometimes.

But I know myself now in ways I didn't back then. Someone else's opinion, however unkind or uninformed, doesn't change what I know to be true about who I am.

And that's a very good place to be.

What makes this whole experience even more extraordinary is that I'm not the only woman standing here feeling a little exposed.

Twenty other women have entrusted my co-writer, Ali, and me with stories from their lives. Stories about losing people they loved, facing frightening illnesses, struggling with relationships, finding their voices, questioning their worth, and making decisions they never imagined they'd have to make.

Some of those experiences changed their lives forever. Some are still finding their way through the aftermath.

None of us has everything figured out. We're not all completely healed, and I doubt any of us would claim to be. We're women who've lived long enough to know that life can be breathtakingly beautiful and terribly difficult.

And we've decided to tell the truth as we wrote some of our stories.

The early readers have been sending us messages that have touched me deeply. They recognize themselves in these stories. They understand feelings they've struggled to explain. They tell us how much they relate to the women whose lives they've been reading about.

That's exactly what Ali and I hoped would happen.

I know what it feels like to read another woman's story and think, Oh, thank goodness. It's not just me.

Sometimes that's all we need to begin looking at our own lives a little differently...with a little more compassion.

So yes, I'm feeling vulnerable as publication day approaches. There are moments when I wonder what people will think, what they'll recognize about me, and whether I'll wish I'd kept a few things to myself.

But then I remember the women who've trusted us with their stories, the readers who've already found themselves in these pages, and the younger versions of myself who worked so hard to get me here.

I have a great deal of affection for those women I used to be, even the ones who made some spectacularly questionable decisions.

Especially them, perhaps.

So here I am, about to put some of my most personal stories into the hands of people I've never met.

Feeling a little naked.

And going ahead with it anyway. Because maybe somewhere out there is a woman who needs to know that somebody else has been where she is.

And I'd be awfully glad if one of our stories found its way to her.

Love is ALL there is.

Diana