If you’ve known me for a while, you know much of this story. But if you’re new to the scene, here’s a little piece of my history…
Back in 2006, when I was 28, my dad died of liver cancer. Six weeks later, my mother died from complications of Multiple Sclerosis. I won’t go into the details of how this made me feel (you can read my memoir if I ever get it finished), but what is important to this story is that I felt a deep desire to ‘do something’. I needed to try to fix something that had been broken. My dad had been my mom’s caregiver for virtually their entire marriage (not to mention the caregiver of a daughter who eventually died of Leukemia, me, his healthy and very active daughter, and various churches along the way). I was convinced that it was this sacrificial caregiving that had done my father in, and I wanted to create something that could solve or at least relieve this issue in other families.
So, I quit my job teaching middle school, and started working towards starting a non-profit that would create a retreat setting for families in a situation like ours. The Oregon Coast had always been our family’s favorite vacation spot, so when a job came up in Portland for my husband Kevin, we jumped at the chance, and I started my journey with what I called “The Beacon Project”. I started researching caregiver burnout, trying to find out if anything like this had ever been started before. I envisioned a place where a family could go, and everyone could get a break. Health care staff would be in place, food would be fresh and amazing, counseling services would be available. Families could learn how to function in a way that brought greater health to all. I gathered a board of directors and started visiting potential properties at the beach.
Just as I was rounding a corner to begin fundraising, three things happened. The first thing: I went to a conference that focused on caregiver burnout. I sat through a talk by a doctor who spoke about the direct connections between stress and disease, particularly the kind of bodily stress brought on by caregiving. After his talk, I approached the doctor and told him my ideas for what I wanted to start. He looked me right in the eye and told me, “You will take on the same kind of stress your dad took on. It would be impossible to do this kind of work without becoming a caregiver yourself.” This was not the kind of encouragement I was looking for. I walked away feeling like I’d just been slapped across the face. The second thing that happened was the great recession of 2008. This was not a great time for a massive capital campaign to build this retreat center. I had no funds of my own and would have relied completely on donations. So that was a bad sign. I remember sitting in a hipster bar in Portland across the table from Kevin, each of us with a shot of whiskey and a tall boy of cheap beer. I felt like my dream was crumbling. I didn’t know what to do. I felt like I owed this to my parents. I couldn’t save them anymore, but I thought I could save others from this hardship. Or at least help them through it. Then the third thing happened. The next morning, I took a pregnancy test. It was positive.
Making the choice to quit the thing before it even started felt like another terrible loss. This was going to be my moment of meaning-making, the redemption of so many years of struggle. But all signs pointed in the same direction, and I decided to end The Beacon Project.
To be honest, the decision came with some relief. This would have been a full-life commitment. This would have been more than a career, it would have been all-consuming. When I stopped working on The Beacon Project, I started sewing repurposed leather in my spare time, which led me into the whole next phase of my life and a business that was such a wonderful experience. Turning worn out things into usable goods was a healing experience in its own way. And working with my hands, spending hours creating something out of nothing was really the solace I needed. Funny how we often think we know what we need, but in reality, it can be the opposite.
Letting go of what we want can be really hard. I hate quitting. But as with so many things in life: timing is everything. Which is what makes this such a great story.
Fast forward to a couple of years ago, and I get a message from out of the blue from a friend in Toronto. She was telling me that a mutual college friend of ours, Annie and her family were moving out to the West Coast to start a retreat center for families who had experienced trauma. Specifically, they were moving to White Rock, which was where my parents last lived. I couldn’t believe this coincidence.
Annie and her husband Paul and their family have had their own journey with trauma, which led them to this work. In the time they have been in White Rock, we have met up several times and have chatted regularly about their progress with their project, The Grove. Thinking about The Grove has reinvigorated in me this passion around supporting families experiencing trauma. I’ve also been able to give new language to experiences my family had even outside of my dad’s caregiving role.
Trauma researcher Peter Levine says, “Trauma is perhaps the most avoided, ignored, belittled, denied, misunderstood, and untreated cause of human suffering.” Levine also says, “Trauma is not what happens to us, but what we hold inside in the absence of an empathetic witness.” I’m so thrilled to be able to support an organization whose main goal is to see people in the midst of trauma, to provide that empathetic witness, to acknowledge the deep impacts of trauma and provide a path toward healing.
A wise friend recently said to me, “Sometimes God requires that you put down your dreams so that someone else can come behind you and pick them up.” This feels a little bit like that. I’m so happy to be able to support The Grove at its very beginning, as I know from experience sometimes the first steps are the hardest.
The Grove Benefit Show is an opportunity for others to support this work. One hundred percent of the proceeds will be donated to The Grove to assist with costs involved in applying for charitable status. You can connect with The Grove by following them at www.groveretreats.com (you can sign up for their email list) and Instagram.com/groveretreats. You can also donate to their gofundme: Planting the Grove or become a Grove monthly supporter on Patreon (where you’ll also get regular updates and a more in-depth look at the process): https://www.patreon.com/groveretreats.
The show will go live online on Saturday Nov. 14 at 8am PST. There are twelve 12x12” paintings as well as 3 slots for commissions. The subject of the commissions can be something I have already painted, or another landscape of your choosing. You can contact me for further details at: nicki.lang.studio@gmail.com. Preview the show here: https://www.nickilang.com/#/grove-benefit-show-preview/.
Thank you in advance for your support in helping The Grove to launch!
