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Sacred Shadow, Sacred Ground: A Vietnam War Widow's Journey Through Unresolved Grief
After losing her husband, Bruce, Sept. 11, 1968, who was killed in Vietnam, author Glenda M. Carter spent a large portion of her life with unresolved grief. At the beginning of the new millennium, Glenda began a journey that few have faced with such courage and resolve. Sacred Shadow, Sacred Ground is a chronicle of her journey. Glenda invites you to walk with her and perhaps find resolution to your own unresolved grief or conflict.
Introduction
This brave and beautiful book affirms something I have long believed: the flag on the coffin covers only the obvious tragedy.
Every bullet, bomb, land mine, mortar round or grenade that killed an American soldier in Vietnam stopped other lives here dead in their tracks.
The life Glenda Carter thought she was going to lead and the future she thought she was going to live ended, exactly three months after she was married, on September 14, 1968 when, as she puts it, “the Vietnam war came to my doorstep,” with the unbearable news that it would take her 36 years to heal; her husband, Bruce Carter, was dead, killed by a bullet to his head on September 11, 1968.
Glenda Carter had never seen her Marine husband in his dress blues until she looked at him in his coffin. There was no face to see for the last time, no cold cheek to kiss. His head was swaddled in bandages. For decades her soul would be bound and hidden away from a world that truth be told—cared very little for women like Glenda.
Go on, get over it, you’ll be married again one day said the man who tried to talk Glenda out of buying a burial plot next to her husband. His crude, blunt honesty is why so many never heal. Grief is dismissed, diminished and discounted in our culture as if it’s just something to “get over” like a small step or a high curb.
For years, Glenda Carter felt as though she was “on a raft, drifting around a cesspool.”
Her husband was dead. But her love for him was not. “When you died, I lost not only you, I lost me,” and her heart was held hostage for years and years and years.
She was, for a time, able to put on a happy-go-lucky face. She got degrees and held jobs. She became a passionate photographer.
And then she came undone. There was depression, despair and suicide attempts. When people asked what she did for a living, she wanted to say, “I spend my time doing what it takes to survive.”
And yet, and yet, you’re holding this book in your hands. Something happened. Although at times they may have been no more than a blink apart, Glenda Carter’s will to live was stronger than her desire to die.
The writer Annie Dillard once wrote, in effect, “that pain is a terrible thing to waste.” Glenda Carter has not wasted an ounce of her grief or an atom of her agony.
She has wrestled with her dark demons and marched through those moments she never thought she could.
Healing, ultimately, is a gift that comes through grace. Glenda felt the steadfast support of therapists she turned to and she felt God’s presence alongside her in her perilous journey through grief. She, like veterans, had PTSD. Her trauma was combat-related. While it didn’t happen in Vietnam, it happened because of Vietnam. And for Glenda, as for so may veterans, “the only way over was through.”
In the end, she experienced slightly more than a decade of grief for each month of her three-month marriage as Mrs. Bruce L. Carter. But now, something beautiful has been born from Bruce and Glenda’s love. This is a book of healing, and ultimately, a book of hope and finally, courage.
We are never more courageous than when we dare to love. Rarely do we even catch a whiff of just how vulnerable we are when we love another as much, or more, than we love ourselves.
And yet, there is a love that bombs can’t shatter and bullets can’t kill. Our lives are mysteries wrapped in paradox. As Glenda separates herself from her sadness, she feels closer to Bruce than ever before.
By the end of Sacred Shadow, Sacred Ground, Glenda Carter has done more than negotiate a cease-fire with her self. She has found peace, which is always so much more than just the absence of war.
At times, healing is a lonely and treacherous journey. But what emerges from Glenda’s saga is the reminder that what is loneliest of all is to live a life barren of love.
Letting go is never easy and the outcome never sure but Glenda’s life was so blessed by Bruce’s abundant love, that in the end, there was some for you and me.
You are holding their love in your hands. Take it, use it, give it away. In this barren and beleaguered world there is always someone at our very fingertips whose life can shine more brightly through our love.
~~ Laura Palmer, author of Shrapnel in the Heart
Every bullet, bomb, land mine, mortar round or grenade that killed an American soldier in Vietnam stopped other lives here dead in their tracks.
The life Glenda Carter thought she was going to lead and the future she thought she was going to live ended, exactly three months after she was married, on September 14, 1968 when, as she puts it, “the Vietnam war came to my doorstep,” with the unbearable news that it would take her 36 years to heal; her husband, Bruce Carter, was dead, killed by a bullet to his head on September 11, 1968.
Glenda Carter had never seen her Marine husband in his dress blues until she looked at him in his coffin. There was no face to see for the last time, no cold cheek to kiss. His head was swaddled in bandages. For decades her soul would be bound and hidden away from a world that truth be told—cared very little for women like Glenda.
Go on, get over it, you’ll be married again one day said the man who tried to talk Glenda out of buying a burial plot next to her husband. His crude, blunt honesty is why so many never heal. Grief is dismissed, diminished and discounted in our culture as if it’s just something to “get over” like a small step or a high curb.
For years, Glenda Carter felt as though she was “on a raft, drifting around a cesspool.”
Her husband was dead. But her love for him was not. “When you died, I lost not only you, I lost me,” and her heart was held hostage for years and years and years.
She was, for a time, able to put on a happy-go-lucky face. She got degrees and held jobs. She became a passionate photographer.
And then she came undone. There was depression, despair and suicide attempts. When people asked what she did for a living, she wanted to say, “I spend my time doing what it takes to survive.”
And yet, and yet, you’re holding this book in your hands. Something happened. Although at times they may have been no more than a blink apart, Glenda Carter’s will to live was stronger than her desire to die.
The writer Annie Dillard once wrote, in effect, “that pain is a terrible thing to waste.” Glenda Carter has not wasted an ounce of her grief or an atom of her agony.
She has wrestled with her dark demons and marched through those moments she never thought she could.
Healing, ultimately, is a gift that comes through grace. Glenda felt the steadfast support of therapists she turned to and she felt God’s presence alongside her in her perilous journey through grief. She, like veterans, had PTSD. Her trauma was combat-related. While it didn’t happen in Vietnam, it happened because of Vietnam. And for Glenda, as for so may veterans, “the only way over was through.”
In the end, she experienced slightly more than a decade of grief for each month of her three-month marriage as Mrs. Bruce L. Carter. But now, something beautiful has been born from Bruce and Glenda’s love. This is a book of healing, and ultimately, a book of hope and finally, courage.
We are never more courageous than when we dare to love. Rarely do we even catch a whiff of just how vulnerable we are when we love another as much, or more, than we love ourselves.
And yet, there is a love that bombs can’t shatter and bullets can’t kill. Our lives are mysteries wrapped in paradox. As Glenda separates herself from her sadness, she feels closer to Bruce than ever before.
By the end of Sacred Shadow, Sacred Ground, Glenda Carter has done more than negotiate a cease-fire with her self. She has found peace, which is always so much more than just the absence of war.
At times, healing is a lonely and treacherous journey. But what emerges from Glenda’s saga is the reminder that what is loneliest of all is to live a life barren of love.
Letting go is never easy and the outcome never sure but Glenda’s life was so blessed by Bruce’s abundant love, that in the end, there was some for you and me.
You are holding their love in your hands. Take it, use it, give it away. In this barren and beleaguered world there is always someone at our very fingertips whose life can shine more brightly through our love.
~~ Laura Palmer, author of Shrapnel in the Heart