Sweetwater Retreats Home Base

Last year, my fourth and youngest child graduated from high school. I could finally move away from the neighborhood I had lived in for 30 years, in a part of town that never fit me, where I had never felt truly at home. I’d lived in two houses on the same cul-de-sac, one with my first husband, and another, three doors up, with my second, the man called a sex addict. I could stand on the porch of the second house, throw a rock, and hit the porch of the first house. If I never drive down that street again, it will be too soon. What a shame, to raise four wonderful, beautiful children and to be so traumatized that you cannot look back on the place where you raised them with any fondness, even bittersweet. Maybe time will change that. Maybe I need more EMDR. Which brings me to today’s topic.

I moved about 20 miles west, back to where I grew up, Every day, I pass the same Dairy Queen where I’d stop to get my Peanut Buster Parfaits after marching band practice in high school, and I pass the Bar-b-que joint where we’d have lunch when we skipped school. When I left Powder Springs to attend UGA, I said good riddance, because this town had its own ghosts. But, like I said: Time. I’m happy here. As I wrote in my Sweetwater vs the Swamp blog post, this home suits me. Me, my dogs, and the new not-a-sex-addict man who treats me like a princess. Once we got settled in, I started strategizing about offering a healing retreat in my home. And now I’m ready. I offer a space for one woman at a time, who wants a whole weekend devoted to her recovery. The best part is that I can do several sessions of EMDR, which can profoundly reduce trauma symptoms so that you can make rational decisions about your own life.

The property is noisy. Clay Road runs right in front of the house. As I type now, I can tell you whether it’s a car or a truck passing. My dogs hate squirrels. And birds. And the falling of leaves, so they bark a little. But I have a sweet whimsical suite, with a reading porch that turns magical at night, and I’ll provide ear plugs and a great sound machine. And I live near some pretty cool stuff, like the Kennesaw Mountain battlefields, for hiking, and the Silver Comet Trail, for biking. I mean, if you’re into outdoorsy stuff. If you’re not, we do what you want. My goal is to take care of you, to feed you and therapize you and EMDR you until your head feels screwed on straighter.

I’ll give you as much attention or as much alone time between sessions as you want. If you need to talk into the wee hours, we can do that too. If you fly in, I will pick you up from the airport and take you back. I’m going to make it easy on you. Because this is what I really needed after my D-Day. It’s what I needed the night I almost drove myself to a mental hospital because I was so broken and exhausted and afraid of myself. Being a therapist, I knew that the hospital wouldn’t really give me what I needed: someone to care, to take my hand, to cover me with a blanket and let me sleep, to let me talk until I couldn’t, to bring me food when I could not bother to fix it for myself. I needed to be with someone who understood what it was like to stand in the middle of your life as it explodes.

That’s what I’m offering. Contact me if you’re interested.

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