From: Mark Rivera <[redacted email address]>
To: [redacted] <[redacted email address]>
Date: June 3, 2019 at 2:24 PM 
Subject: Unicorns and rainbows

I wish I didn't need to write all these updates. It seems like they just keep getting worse. But these updates are not only to keep my nearest and dearest informed, they are part of my self-care strategy. Voicing (in my case writing) what is happening to me and what is going on inside of me, I learned last year, is an important part of my survival (#notsuicidal).

My god-daughter (the mother of my accuser who is also my god-daughter), has begun to "warn" my neighbors and greater church community that she believes I molested her 10 year old girl. This has had (and will continue to have) a devastating affect on the social lives of my teenage children. 

The families of their closest friends are taking sides believing the accusations or not. I get to watch all my kids sink in the water and I can only pray that they take the hand of the Lord Jesus as he stands on the waves crashing around them. [redacted] and [redacted], no one can overcome your fear for you, you have to do this for yourselves.

I am also seeing old friends from our cathedral question (which I can understand) my innocence. Unfortunately, I am seeing others (much closer to me) do the same. Imagine, if you will, that there is an Ewok village in your heart. Remember those? They live up in the trees. Now imagine it being burnt down with little fat furry Ewoks running around helplessly screaming, swinging from one burning bridge to another trying to get away from the flames. That is what I feel like in my insecurity and when I see people suspect me.

Several weeks ago I found a gem of a shirt at the thrift store. There is a white unicorn lying on a couch, who is visibly stressed out. In a soft chair next to the unicorn, is a brown horse sitting upright with a pad of paper on his lap. The brown horse is counseling the unicorn saying, "you have to believe in yourself."

I have spent my adult life trying to overcome all of the people who told me I would amount to nothing. I was literally told this repeatedly as a child and as a teen by adults. I have been doubted my whole life by others. I intensely spent last year working on my own self doubt. I thought as I emerged from my depression that I had finally got to the light at the end of the tunnel: the pot of Puerto Rican rice at the end of the rainbow.

Instead it looks like in this season of my life I am taking my "comprehensive exams" to test if in fact I have learned to release the doubt of others, even the doubt of the closest to me. I HAVE to believe in myself because it as it turns out, only a very few will. I understand that all of you must go through your own process of what you believe about me in this situation and I don't fault you for it. Just don't burn my Ewoks!

I am a frickin unicorn! (aka Psalm 91)