These runes represent change through Shadow Work and wisdom through enduring.

Mordgud and Heimdalls Aett

Well, the period of time and rest before journeying with the second Aett of my rune journey was all of winter and most of spring apparently. I had the most fruitful winter, actually. I healed, slept, and let go of a lot of the weight I had been carrying. I emerged at spring reborn, but it took a while to shake off the clutches of winter. I waited for motivation to return, leaning into acceptance of slow waking.

My beloved Mysterious Marvellous Mad Madame Mim passed. A very fast infection took her, Fezzick’s watch had ended and he returned to his original home. I have been keeping ferrets for 12 years to ground me and support my mental health because I work too much to keep a dog happy. They did a great job. This transition was one I had planned for, but of course, it was still a painful one. However, not having dependant small furries freed me up to travel. I was invited to a gathering of other wild women almost immediately. Something I wouldn’t have felt I could access before. Here it was, the light in the dark.

The keepers of the second Aett are Mordgud and Heimdall. Both bridge guardians. The first of dark to Hel, and the second of light the rainbow bridge to Asgard. I haven’t worked with these named energies before, but of course, we have all crossed many bridges, some dark and some light. I thought I was comfortable with it. Yet, it took me this long to come back to my rune journey because I am aware of the journey of destruction and ascension, overcoming hardships and being shaped by challenge that this leg of my journey brings and I was focused on rest and healing it didn’t feel the right time. So I didn’t. I also beat myself up about this, I felt I was dragging my feet due to fear. Now I see it as intuition.

When I returned from the witches gathering (more on this to come), I felt reborn and enlivened beyond what I could have asked for. The motivation/ executive function returned. And I prepared the rest of the runes. Did my rituals and began once more. Emboldened by my now even deeper self understanding.

Hagalaz

Starting strong on challenging my resolve comes Hagalaz. Hail. The destructive force of having frozen rain pelted at you. Brief moments of destruction seemingly out of nowhere. Deep breaths Kate, you’ve done the work, have faith. How bad could it be?

My laptop died, not ideal. I have big plans launching my new business come summer. I do really need a laptop to do that smoothly, I’ve been building the website etc, filling in forms. So I panicked, pleaded with it, and then tried to find acceptance. The biggest obstacle for me is often financial. I live close to the bread line. Self-employed nannies and witches who work for carrots are wealthy in many ways, but I don’t have much in terms of cash. OK, I told myself. We have been worse off. You will just have to tighten your belt a little and make it work. No need to panic.

One of the messages of Hagalaz is that when you look deeper at this bringer of destruction, you see that it is just water. Water is life though. And feelings. Feelings for me can be completely overwhelming. I’ve been learning to see it is a gift, panic about financial destitution doesn’t feel like much of a gift, but on the other hand, finding peace in trusting you are on the right path and you have always managed to scrape enough together perhaps is. The gift of perspective, of knowing you are held and not being destroyed by things that used to consume you, is a relief. The pelting ice melts away to water, which drips away to where it returned. Or perhaps absorbed to nourish a different story for me.

During this journey with Hagalaz, I also had a friend date to catch up and address some challenges we’d been experiencing that had created distance between us. We talked of ‘spiralling’ and how anxiety and avoidant tendencies can snowball (hailball?) to make the situation feel so much worse. Again, when we looked at what felt destructive and saw it melt away, the feelings of love and understanding between us is what we were watered with. We committed to acceptance of the reality that some situations are uncomfortable, and you can’t save yourself or others from it by trying to hide from that discomfort. Only hold through it, acknowledge it, shine a light on it, feel it and let it wash away. Maybe there is rebuilding, maybe acceptance or lessons recieved. Like the destruction after a hailstorm we are given opportunity to build something stronger.

Already, I am reminded why this journey is important to me.

Nauthiz

Nauthiz is the needfire. An important necessity for our ancestors to be warm, have light and to cook upon. I use needfires in my practice and the only source of warmth in my home is my woodburner so it is something I felt I already respected. However, Nauthiz highlights our needs, where they might be lacking or where we are confusing want with need. My personal journey this week brought to light the ways my fire wasn’t tended in my early years by those who’s job it was. So I had to learn to do it myself. I always had support from the gods though. I was watched over in their way. This weeks journey began with honouring that, or intending to. I have a tattoo of Lilith on my thigh that had remained unfinished for years.

The original artist doesn’t tattoo anymore and my standards have expanded ( no hate, they’re old school and the tattoo scene has changed a lot in the last 10 years). I booked in with a local artist to have it sorted. I have been working closer with Mother Lilith of late as my witch work called for it. In amongst this I was made painfully aware of the dysfunctionality between my biological mother and I. I’ve had to distance myself for the sake of my own well-being which wounds me deeply but it is not my responsibility to hold her wounds and I can’t do it anymore. It brought to light how much I had to mother myself in life, and still do which was obviously triggering AF. The day I had my tattoo finished I had a big run in with my mother and a massive emotional release after. My inner child needed soothing and holding. I needed someone else to tend the flame so it wouldn’t go out. I am tired of being the one to hold myself all the time.

Gratefully, I have a Sarah. My oldest friend, my ride or die. We take it in turns to embody Mother, Father, supporting grandparent for each other as the need arises. She is always there to hold space for my inner child. To say the things my inner child needs to hear. It still hurts that I didn’t get parented but in my time of need, Sarah holds the flame safe for me, she brings wood to tend it and words to contain it from engulfing me, and I her. We didn’t receive parents like that but we do have each other and that is a beautiful thing.

Nauthiz brought to light my need for other humans to keep me going. I moved through the despair or lack, to seeing what I did have only to have it really waved around in my face, or crawling towards it. I walked back from my sanctuary on the land feeling raw but cared for. It is still chilly in the evening so I chopped wood and kindling to light the wood burner. Enjoying seeing the connection of needfire and how I can do that for myself. I opened the door to my burner and a MASSIVE FUCKING HORNET crawled out of it towards me. I have never been great with stinging creatures, I was stung on my face and hands as a child at a dutch theme park and it left me with a phobia like response. I’ve worked on it and I can just about handle it outside but I am not comfortable being trapped in a room.

In my raw vulnerable state I didn’t even try and face it. I ran to my landlords house barefoot and announced “help, I need an adult”. My landlords are also good friends and unlike my birth family, didn’t even tease me. One helped the hornet and the other supported me emotionally while he did so. I got in my tiny house safe. shut the door and window, laughed at how loudly needfire was speaking to me and cried some more. I didn’t have the things a child needs to feel safe and cared for quite the opposite. But I do now and perhaps I feel the warmth and importance of that, more so, after spending so long in the cold and dark without it. My needfire is chosen/given family. This was only day one by the way my Darlings.

As the week progressed and I already had such a resounding start I was able to see the other areas need and want were present. My laptop still in the repair shop, I couldn’t progress with what felt like I needed to. Was it need or want? I mentioned i’d struggled to find motivation after winter. Now it was here, I even had the executive function but I would have to direct it elsewhere for now. The thing about spicy brains like mine is the alignment of things required to achieve your aims feels out of your control. Through this experience with Nauthiz I was reminded that momentum is power. To let the fire of creativity, passion and action burn in the way it is want to. To feed it with what I have and not lament to much about what is not there. It ties to my energy. This week what I needed to put that energy into was not what I had wanted for myself but of course, the gods and the runes know better than I about what I need.

Isa

When reading about Isa before my journey I had that sinking feeling of apprehension. Isa is Ice. Cold treacherous, slippery. A warning. I’ve got a lot on the table currently and until it’s born into the world and tangible, I’m nervous of its fragility. However, the runes have given me all I needed. I am finding more trust in them. Like a lot of the more seemingly worrying tarot cards (swords anyone?), I know it often isn’t as bad as you think it’s going to be. It was fucking hard though.

I got my laptop back, that means it’s time to get a lot done smash through some boundaries. starting with the forms for my ADHD assessment. I think getting through the process might be the assessment to be honest. It triggered a lot. leaning into Isa I was reminded, like hail that these boundaries of ice, are made of water. One of the forms is to be filled in by someone who knew you when you were small. I grew up in the RAF, I moved a lot and there isn’t anyone outside of family. I mentioned the distance between my mother and I currently. I felt big resistance to involving her. She’s on her own journey with ADHD and we don’t have a safe container ( for me to feel held) yet to discuss these things.

So, instead I asked my eldest brother. 9 years older than me, he was the closest thing I have had to a loving father figure. Something I often feel sad about for him too. It shouldn’t have fallen to him, and now it does again. We went through the form together. I could tell it was hurting him, not to do it for me but because it meant he had to revisit that time in his story. A painful thing for him. He has blocked a lot of it out. We acknowledged it and got it done between us. We spoke of the Neurodivergence in our family, how we feel about it, how we see a better future for his (hella spicy) children. I shared with him my intentions for this year, my CIC- Rewylding, and what is at the heart of it. Connecting humans with nature, supporting mental health, building community, gift economy and bringing back the old ways. He told me he was proud of me and I actually felt it!

Going back to my journey with Wunjo, I don’t often feel pride in myself. It doesn’t really land when people tell me they are proud of me. I know I’m doing big brave shit, I’ve worked hard to get here from where I was. I’ve spoken before to the physical abuse I suffered as a child from my step-father and the emotional neglect I received. So somewhere along the way I didn’t trust, or then care, if people were proud or not because it didn’t equate or mean anything to me. Always wary of the other shoe dropping, or rejecting the sentiment because it’s coming from the same people who hurt me. It actually usually makes me uncomfortable. But when My brother told me he was proud of me, I felt it. It touched a part of me that had been hungering to be seen. An inner child need to be seen for who I am, truly seen. Maybe it is only my sibling, who does know what I went through to get here, who can really see it.

I fell apart, went to my sanctuary on the land. To be held once more by the guardian spirit, who often brings that masculine, holding energy I need. I cried for nearly half an hour, letting out the pain of a little girl that has been trapped in my system all this time. My story isn’t a pretty one. Yes it made me who I am today, It shaped everything. But what happened to little me and my family wasn’t ok. I needed to say it out loud to little me. It wasn’t ok and I don’t have to tell myself it was necessary to shape me. It wasn’t ok and it still isn’t.

What does this have to do with Isa Kate? It hit me like a wave as I sat there holding myself. The reflection in ice. There is constant reflection in my way of being, but I was reminded that in order to move forwards, I needed to look again. To crack through this icy blockage and see the depths below. Ice is also a bridge. Allowing one to cross an area the previously couldn’t be, but only at certain times. This big emotional release, something I didn’t want to drown in. Now I have a way to cross it.

Ice as a boundary, a wall, a bridge, a mirror. Damning a flow, melting or broken away to allow for move again. And things are flowing fast. I was given some support in terms of physical labour from a friend to make some headway in the nettle garden. It shifted everything. It’s coming together but at the moment it feels like its trickling in from multiple sources. gaining momentum. Like a thawing winter.

Jera/Ar

Jera is ‘year’ and ‘harvest’ to me it speaks of the turning of the wheel. One season coming to a close and moving into another. I have often noticed that I feel these tween times in the overlap. Spring growing into Summer. It’s not a singular step like one is done, lets move on to what is next. One flows and builds into the other. The work done in the first, shaping what is to come in the second. And it’s all work when you are mindful and move with intention.

I’m feeling that momentum building. Each choice I make, with my heart set on what I am growing adds to it. Even if it feels indirect at the time. This week I held the Nourished AF retreat I love so much, still under The Witch Wench. We had a great turn out, lit fires, crafted nettle cordage, bath salt potions and cense sticks. we chatted and shared delicious food grown by Mel on her land. The intended offering at these sessions is to let people just be. There is no pressure to join in with the craft activities and there is definitely no pressure to be good at it. It’s a chance to play at something. The conversations always lead to sharing stories and laughter, some vulnerability. Every time I hold these sessions my heart expands a little more, especially when I can offer free and concessional spaces to those who really need it. This time embodied by one of my oldest friends and co-director of our upcoming business, Cara. We’ve seen, loved and supported each other for 13 or so years of ups and downs. I am her children’s Nanny 2 days a week, which is such a beautiful gift to share. To create a moment she can take a breath from everything she’s got going on, is exactly why I feel called to do this. She now has first hand experience of what I was asking her to see and be part of. Another interlinked cycle growing into the next season for us. I cried some more. This time with relief, joy and overwhelming love. I find it has overwhelming to hold joy as I do grief.

This week also marks a year of living in my Tiny Dream House. There has been a lot of reflection on how transformative and dramatic all of that felt. The fear of homelessness, being offered everything I’d wanted but out of a place of desperation not security. If you were here for that part of my journey, I thank you. Especially of you donated to my crowdfund and made it possible. This was a real moment of pause for me. Seeing how all of that needed to happen. The personal growth and work I had to put into receiving and rewiring my brain away from hyper independence. Moving to what I’m going to be offering I understand how hard it can be to accept and receive help. I will carry this into what I’m doing. This week also brought to mind how hard that winter was. That this is the summer I was looking ahead to get me through it, well the first of many. I had to rest and heal from what felt like my entire 36 years. To create space for what is coming in now. It was a lot, and here I am, here you are, here we fucking go. The wheel turns once more, this time into entirely new spaces. Spaces where I am not hurting in the ways I was. I am filled with gratitude and inspiration.

This weeks journey also brought me an experience. A slightly weighted one. I’ve wanted to connect more with my Norse Pagan roots. I find the culturally appropriated elements in modern witchcraft icky. I understand that the erasure of our own culture left a hole, so we filled it with what we could find. Words like ‘shaman’ for example and ‘smudging’, being used without consideration of the people these practices were stolen from. We’ve got a lot of deconstructing to do still. But rather than shame people, I believe a better path as to show people that they do have access to better fitting practices and language. This work begins with me finding it for myself. I said this to myself, and asked to be shown a path.

Low and behold, A tattoo artist of Norse heritage is doing a pop-up at my favourite witchy shop in town, Stagseer.com. I’ve wanted more work on my hands for a long time. I’ve wanted a more ritualistic experience. Something I’ve been able to add subtly into previous sessions for myself, but never held by another. Now, the tricky part is. One of the families I work with was away, which means half the income that week. As I said,I live close to the breadline. I haven’t been able to build up my savings yet. Still dealing with fall out of last years transitions and setting myself up for what’s to come. With this in mind I thought, “I’ll reach out and see what the situation is, If it’s meant to happen it will”. It was a bit of a ride emotionally. Yes, there are payment plans but no spaces that aligned with the time off I had. So I left it. Disappointing but I didn’t feel bad about it. I trusted Jera it will happen when it’s meant to. Then, I received a message saying there was a space that would work for me. I could go ahead but I’d have to be mindful of my budget. It’s a risk financially, it only takes myself or the children to be ill and I may have to tighten my already tight belt, further. Rather than dismiss it as unattainable, I’ll take the gamble.

Eihwaz

Eihwaz is ‘Yew’ the sacred tree of death and life. As I began this weeks journey I was reminded of the yew tree in the graveyard behind my old house. Sharing space with an Elder their branches intertwined. I connected with them both often throughout the seasons. As I meditated on yew, I realised there was a familiar sadness in missing that tree. As if I was so far from it now. This brought up an intensity of feeling that didn’t feel fitting for where I am now. Perhaps one of the patterns from being moved around so much as a child. Never returning to my places of sanctuary. Leaving behind friends and kin with sadness. There is a bitterness in me still about not having choices but rather having them put upon me. I leant into this space and felt grief, disempowerment and frustration that once again I was going to have to leave my place of comfort and find a way to make hard things bare able, with no guidance or support. Though some of this felt familiar, it isn’t the same. Alright, the final weeks of my move felt unnecessarily dramatic and challenging. I laugh now at sheer ridiculousness of it. Like the death was pantomime, I was already willing and heading to my next path. I didn’t need it to be painful to motivate me. I am working on having a life of ease and softness. Perhaps the lesson was to help me see it as ridiculous, so in future I will make choices that don’t allow for the pantomime. My rebirth into a life of quiet hermeticism and solitude, gentleness, healing and ease required far less input from other humans and their nonsense.

My personal cycle at this point was giving hardcore luteal phase ( you can learn more about these cycles here), the autumn time of harvest and dying. I felt grumpy and butthurt when I looked back on that part of last years story, it brought up all of the other moments form my life that felt the same. I felt like I was always being asked to tolerate more, build more resilience. Living out here is harder in terms of effort and Isolation. I am not able to socialise as much, that’s just a fact but in this moment I realised I’d been feeling very ‘out of sight out of mind’ from important friends. Valid, we are all busy myself included. Without a support network in close proximity, the (old) feelings of abandonment pipe up , which triggers the old stories of low self worth. Don’t you just love hormones.

I asked Yew to show me more and did some more reading. I was reminded of Yew being used for bow making and let that speak to me. I have a tattoo of an arrow on my ribs. It’s a cover up of one I shared with 2 people whom I loved, and was betrayed by. A story I don’t need, nor want, to go into. I will say that the butthurt feeling was the same. It felt that way for a long time. In the same breath, it only took a few years for me to see it another way. That it needed to happen. That I was propelled away from them. This was the first moment in my life I attempted to become more self aware (this was around 9 years ago). The arrow tattoo came to me to remind me that I am the arrow, the feather, the wind, the bow and the hunter. I lay in the grass. Put my hand on my heart and reminded myself of this. Calling to mind who I was then. It feels strange that I no longer feel connected to that version of myself now.

Eihwaz spoke to me of that death and rebirth cycle, how it has been present in my life. How it has shaped me. How I have let myself die and be reborn so many times that what felt like a huge loss at the time, was in my best interests. It lead me back to myself. Just as other moments since then have. Each time deepening in, bringing me closer to my authentic self. Just as this transition will show further down the line. I found comfort in Eihwaz. Just another death, this time from a place of awareness. I can be gentle it doesn’t have to feed that old narrative. In fact, better to let that narrative die too. And let another one be born from it.

The tree of life is a Yew. Odin hung from it and suffered so as to gain the wisdom of the runes. It did not pass me by that in my personal journey in seeking the same, I was having to do a teensy bit of the same. However, the suffering I was perceiving was old. Rooted in something else. I don’t have to let it rule me now. Just as I learnt to act rather than react back then. I can observe with compassion and curiosity now. My we have come a long way.

Pertho

Oh look, the rune of gambling. Brace yourselves darlings, A lot happened this week.

When reading up on Pertho, I found it interesting how some sources seemed to deem it mysterious in its meaning as ‘cup’ relating to a game of chance perhaps and then others relating to ‘cup’ and ‘rock’. When I sat with this in my meditation I found a sense of gnosis which felt pertinent.

So, cup is also vessel to me. One source I have: Runes by Kim Farnell, spoke to the feminine aspect of Pertho relating to Freya and Birth. Cup and vessel, sings of the gifts of the Biologically female body and all of that goddess, creating life, intuitive sacred womb bowl. I’ve worked so much with this energy through my many winters, personal cycle, feminine awakenings and tower moments. I could write about it for days (perhaps another post on this later will emerge, or if you ask I’ll go into it over a brew/pint).

Through this lense, I could see how the suggested meanings also pointed to fate, risk taking and transitions. When we follow our intuition we are tapping into what is fated. When we create, labour and birth things into this world, be it children, projects or new versions of ourselves; we are taking a gamble. It also, transforms us in many ways. The crossing of maiden into mother/lover/huntress is present in all of these ways of birthing. This is creation. Seeded and nourished in darkness first. When brought into the tangible, earthly world, it brings another transformative process.

Which brought me to thinking of ‘rock’. A vessel made of rock. Bones as rock, wells and pools carved by hand or by water itself are powerful sacred place steeped in the history of our lands. If you know the stories of the well keepers, you may resonate with this more. These vessels are containers for holding life, they are items and places to bring and connect with water. Chalices and wells also speak to this feminine element. To make it accessible, holdable, directable, transferable and consumable. The phrase ‘to drink from the cup’ came through for me. Cups of wisdom, and pleasure, another journey I have had to make in connecting with my body as sexual and learning to listen and hear what she enjoys. To follow pleasure and joy is to let fate lead you. My meditation also brought this back to women, women’s bodies as divine and sexual and the power in this. (I am pansexual and my sapphic experiences always feel holy to me).

My gnosis told me ‘ rock remembers. Our bones remember.’ What is my human body in this? A vessel made of earth ( and all other elements), bones, water, and my womb and yoni. Sacred. Powerful. And, it remembers. It knows things I don’t. I must remember to honour that and listen. I am not using it to birth a human child. I’m birthing something else. Rewylding. I am the well, the water and the keeper of it in this moment. What I’ve been feeling called to create feels divine in its own right. It feels like my journey, hard as it was, was shaping me for exactly this and now I am transitioning once more. I began this week, with this new outlook. Feeling motivated and with some space to get to work I was keen to get going.

This was day 1, Also on Day 1, I had my tattoo appointment. Going in with an open mind and complete trust this is what I was meant to be doing I gifted the afternoon to myself and Pertho. I went into town, ate good food and met my dear friend and collaborator for a catch up. I grounded myself in his garden before going to my appointment. Where I was greeted by Anders aka Ullrsblod.

We sat in circle. I’d given Ander’s no brief as to a design apart from the shape (a circle, spanning my hands) and the runes I wanted to include to represent my journey from there to here, and where I am headed. I jumbled out my timeline, story and my reasons for taking up this opportunity. . He showed my the design I hadn’t seen yet with a glint in his saying, “After all you’ve told me it makes so much sense now, that this design came through. I think you’re going to love it”. Of course it blew me away. So much of my story present from this person who didn’t know it when he drew it. I had to options in terms of use of light and dark and negative space for the tattoo. The latter choice taking longer and costing more. I knew this is what I wanted and rather than compromise I had to take a risk. So did Ander’s, in trusting that I would repay him as promised. Obviously I know I’m good for my word but scarcity mindset still proves a challenge. I took some breaths and told myself. ‘I trust that this is the right choice, the money will come if I trust my energy and intuition’.

Anders’ tattoo ritual was so fucking powerful. We had discussed my intention, ‘Show me how to best hold the flame’ Referring to my connection with Kennaz. I have a torch to hold for others, but it’s scary. There is part of me that believes she doesn’t know how to do that safely, that it will slip away or burn it down. I won’t go into the entirety of my experience in this journey. Maybe that is something I will share in future. The ritual involved me entering trance state, guided by drumming to what I was asking to be shared. When you do these, journeys you never know what you are going to see or receive. As I breathed and began my journey. The dot work tattoo on my right hand began. What I saw, was part of, and learnt gave me more than I could have ever imagined. The shorthand version, is that I journeyed to meet myself, I learnt many things and I did find what I’d asked to be shown. I emerged wiser, more trusting and resolute. I feel genuinely changed. Lighter. Safer now I have that wisdom to fall back on if I feel stuck again. The second half our session, my other hand Anders and I talked and shared about our beliefs practices and experiences in life. What we wish for each others journey, including reconnecting in the autumn.

This tattoo feels full of story and symbolism too, a circle, the wheel, the sun and the moon, the light in the darkness, the wisdom won through suffering, my journey, crossing the threshold into where I am heading, fed and nourished by all that came before. Especially the suffering parts I have had to endure, overcome and heal. This next bit will still be work, but it’s the work I feel in my bones I am meant to do. This understanding freed me from a lot of that fear. I feel more sure footed now. Onwards Kate. When I hold, up my hands so as to see the whole piece, It is the vessel of bones, my cupped hands. To hold the fire, To remember, to be a light for others. Mind. Fucking. Blown.

So, with my new found sense of self I was immediately challenged with more gambling, of course. My beloved crack-head of a cat came in in the morning as she does. Yowled and then collapsed. She’d had a tick head buried in her for a week or so. I was keeping an eye. I’d made a salve to draw it out and had told myself if there were any signs of sepsis, off to the vet we would go. I chose this path because it seemed kinder to her and myself. She hates the vets, it stresses her out. I often drug her for routine examinations. No time for that today. I took her straight in. Tried to breath through the fear of expense and destitution. I had one of the top 3 worst experiences with a Vet I have ever had. It left Dora and I both shaken. I don’t always advocate for myself well in stressful situations and the process I was being told I had to follow felt backward and dangerous. I remedied it but had to really hold my ground. I could go on here about capitalism, vet bills and lack of humanity but you get the gist. The takeaway was that, although it was dramatic, I handled it. The cat is ok and financially I will also be ok. I also learnt more about my self and how to better support myself in future. It left me feeling very raw. Not to mention the actual rawness of my hands having had 7 hours of tattooing on them 2 days before.

The final gamble of this week was in trying to continue a relationship with my mother. I’d drawn boundaries and thought I had found some acceptance around having a new and different dynamic. She clearly didn’t get that message and a nail in the coffin was struck. It feels like there is a portcullis coming down on our relationship, every time she crosses a boundary, hurts me or fails to see me it comes down a little more. I don’t want to close the door, I don’t even feel like I can stop it because I know I cannot keep letting someone hurt me. It costs me too much when I have all of these other things to put my energy into.

Finding acceptance that she can’t give me what I need feels like giving up hope. It leaves me with a sense of aloneness in this world I don’t want for myself. If you have a copy of ‘Women who run with wolves’ (and if you don’t I can not recommend it enough), the ugly duckling story is exactly where I am at. I went to the meadow to be held by the guardian spirit and ugly cry for my inner child. Again, grateful for his presence, the land, the ways I was parented by the wild but still grieving what my mother is unable to give me. The vessel for bringing me into this world but unable to nourish me in the ways I needed.

I said out loud “I don’t know how to process this” to which I was reminded. “yes you do” and he was right. I do. I need to write in my journal, the letter I will never send to get it all out and I booked a session with my therapist. I told Him and my ancestors, I am not ready to give up yet but I need time to gather myself. I stood up from the ground where I had been kneeling and set to walking back when said guardian spirit said “Kate, wait! with urgency. I stopped. “what is it?” he told me to turn around and before I had even begun to turn I knew it would be a deer. Brother deer stood face to face with me. So close I could have touched him, I didn’t of course, I barely breathed. He looked deep into my eyes before bounding off. I cried again as I was reminded “you were never and will never be alone”.

In my reflections afterwards, I found myself questioning if this is the exchange. If I am the vessel because I was shaped by what I was and wasn’t given in life, how much I feel, nature over nurture when a child wasn’t nurtured in the usual ways but by nature in the ways it could. Perhaps my path feels otherly for a reason. Fated? Pertho gave me much to ponder.

Algiz

Algiz or Yr is the rune of protection and growth. Often related to sedge grass or elm. After the trials of the week before I felt pretty raw (my hands still were) and welcomed a feeling of being protected. I was not disappointed. I had put the things in place I needed to tide me over. Therapy booked a plan in place. I gifted myself rest, grace and some breathing room. I made sure to lean into the tools I have already to protect my wellbeing. I connected with the land and it’s gift, crafting cense sticks sat in the meadow. One of my partners was taking part in a downhill race in cornwall with his bestie. They always have the most amazing adventures together and I was able to enjoy this summer tradition of watching nutters come down a big hill in homemade carts, plied with good cider (if your local to the UK, Haywood cider farm has the best community vibes).

Usually my social anxiety would have been high in these situations, or my ability to immerse myself in it jaded by my hurts. I had prepared myself for this, and yet it wasn’t present. I spent a lot of the day among kindly strangers, stood on a trailer so I could film. One participant came to the finish line as I was congratulating bestie-by-proxy on their run. This guy was in a bad way and required first aid. Hoping someone else would appear it fell to me apparently. So I took care of him until someone with a kit and higher training than myself arrived. I noticed a pentagram around her neck. Another witch, a more sober, capable one.

I was delivered home in lighter spirits and sat with Algiz to reflect. In my meditation I was reminded again of the white stag story that has often followed me. Of the antlers and how they grow. In pagan stories and imagery, beings are depicted with antlers are seen is divinely gifted. It is why we wear them as part of our regalia. There is also a connection with the cycles of death and rebirth. The shedding of antler once the rutting season is over, to grow them again once more the following spring. The ebb and flow of virile energy. Of antler as protection to the stag and how we cherish them in magical workings especially for protection. I am protected by the work of my past self, by my spiritual practices, ancestors, gods and more than human kin.

This week I was also reminded I am protected by my chosen family. I knew I needed to lean on them or at the very least talk to some of them about what was happening with my mother. How those wounds had been opened and how I was grieving. Each of them took time to remind me why we have chosen family. How loved and supported I am by these beautiful humans, other ugly ducklings now swans together. The power of chosen family protects, I just need to remind myself so that I can ask to be held.

Sowilo

How aligned that my journey with the Sun rune falls on summer Solstice. I had unknowingly created expectations around this rune as I have worked a lot with Solar energy of victory, virility, banishing darkness and acknowledging how one shines in the world. As usual I was given more insight to consider.

I had plans for solstice celebrations. The DG and I were to make a trip to maker, one of his favourite places. To watch some music, camp and get our midsummer party on. I had in mind some delicious explorations of summer sexiness. Alas, my body had other plans. I have mentioned before that I am herpes positive. You’d be surprised how many people are. I talk openly about it because I want to remove the stigma. I’ve had it a long time so flare ups are infrequent, years apart. They do happen when you are under stress though. And yes, obviously, I have been stressed the last few weeks (most of my life). I have lots of positive things happening of course but that doesn’t actually remove the stress. Trying to push through so you can have a good time in spite of it, is also pretty taxing on my body as she was clearly telling me.

So, there go the sexy plans. I was disappointed. Some old shame arose. Not specifically because I have herpes but that I was ruining things. Me being me and having herpes was ruining the plans. An old voice in my head arose. It told me ‘you are the reason we can’t have nice things’. Something that was said to me often as a child. A story I continued to tell myself when my dyspraxia/adhd did it’s thing and I broke or lost something. It hurt to believe it. To have it come through now. I paused. Was this the story I was going to continue? No. I sat with Sowilo, put my hand on my heart and had a word with myself about my value and the things I know to be true. How I ‘shine’, what is shiny about me. I reminded myself how I have alchemized so much hurt and darkness into light for myself and others. This is not arrogance. There is evidence. Evidence = confidence.

When I disclosed to both of my partners about the flare up, they, of course, were totally understanding and reassured me that I am loved, chosen and accepted for who I am not what my body offers. This moment broke me open a little. It conflicts with a lot of the previous messaging I was given by men folk and here are two of them showering me with love and celebration. Sometimes the joy you find is in these unpredictable, seemingly smaller moments. The joy and light I was given here perhaps more beautiful than what I had planned because it was affirming a different story. We partied, laughed, danced, had some after party with the band shenanigans. I was reminded of who I am and how I shine.

This also triggered some very intense dreaming. I am a lucid dreamer naturally. I don’t always want to be. It’s intense so I often medicate to dull it, ensuring I get some decent sleep. This sometimes creates a dreamscape situation where I am aware but not actively controlling the narrative. These dreams were a purging of old stories. The old narratives looking like they were to be played out and dream me shattering them with my new found sense of self. Able to replace the stories in my subconscious I brought light to the shadows other people had cast. I banished them unconsciously and awoke sweating as though I had broken a fever.

Sowilo brought light to the fact that a lot of the hurtful thing I did believe about myself were put other by other people. The thing I’ve learnt about being raised the way I was is that it distorts one’s idea of what a loving, healthy relationship is. In my past I settled for scraps from people who also had a distorted idea of what love is. There’s a phrase that has lingered with me for years: When you are not fed love from a silver spoon, you learn to lick it off knives. I am not in that place anymore. Love is now offered to me from cupped hands. I can choose to let it in. I can be lit up by it, add it to my own late and chase those shadows out for good. And gods does it feel good to be free of them.

The final part of this journey brought me a visit from an old friend I don’t get to see very often. We went for dinner and caught up. We talked of all we’ve been through together and apart and it was clear how much we each have grown. I shared some of where I feel I am in life and she was curious as to how I had done it. As I explained I realised myself that I understood more than even I knew. Sometimes that’s when you know what you know, when you are able to explain it well to another.

Once again this post is coming to you months after I intended but that is the journey I am on at the moment. I am grateful to share it with you.

Thanks for being here,

Love Kate

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