Still bleeding from his wounds
he returns to me…
He reveals the depth of his pain –
and I am lost in the torrent, lost
in the extent of the damage.
How can one, so wounded, still live?
He is a road-map of scars,
a patch-work of bruises;
and in my hand the mace.
I feel like I am in prison. Trapped between two lives. The life I have always lived, the life that kept me safe growing up … the life that keeps my head down and keeps me busy with things, that keeps every emotion under tight control…. and the life I long for. This life would be free… it would be an emotional roller-coaster and it frankly frightens me. I am afraid that if I embrace this life – if I just allow myself to feel what-ever I feel in the moment that I will sometimes be cruel, that I will sometimes be snappy and inconsiderate… I am afraid that I will make mistakes while I am learning how to live outside my own head and alienate people. Playing it safe is getting me nowhere…but it is the only thing I have ever known. The only time I wore my emotions on my skin was a time when I did not really care what anyone else thought – they could just take me or leave me just as I am. I was arrogant and terrified at the same time. I don’t know how to find that peace inside. I don’t know how to be what I am supposed to be.
I am a dead girl. I died a long time ago. I died when you raped me and what-ever it was deep inside me that made me “me” is gone. I don’t know how I am still walking around most days. I suppose I do it because I am on auto-pilot and the other me is at the controls, making sure I smile in the appropriate places and say the right things and hold my body posture and facial expressions in the right way so that no one will know they are talking to a zombie.
How do you bring a dead girl back to life? How do you convince her that she is safe when she doesn’t even know what “safe” means? How do you get her to trust you when you have despised her – hated her all these years. How, now, do I draw her out and show her compassion and delight. How do I warm her cold body and tell her that even though it was not ok what happened to her that it SHE will be ok… at least she will be one day.
How do I figure out how to forgive myself? I can forgive others. I have… my abusers – I forgive them all – I release them to God. I pray for them… but myself??!? I feel utterly lost here.
The dead girl… maybe I don’t bring her back to life… maybe I bury her and the robot and find out who I am without either of them helping me through life. Maybe there is another me in here … that super-secret special me who loves fresh picked flowers, slow dances, warm embraces, laughter… she loves the way long dresses feels brushing against her legs, she loves to twirl and blow dandelions to make wishes. She loves to be held and rocked and have her hair brushed… she loves surprises and presents and the smell of fresh-baked bread. She cries at the sad parts of books and movies (even if she has read/seen them a hundred times). She loves to paint and sing and take long bubble baths. She is very tenderhearted and her feelings are easily hurt. She is fierce and protective and makes lots of mistakes.
How do I do this? How do I move on from what I had to become to what I truly am? This feels impossible and I feel so lost and alone and afraid. I pray for help…God, please help me…
It is one of those rare evenings when I am alone at home… My husband is out camping with a buddy of his and the house is so quiet. It is surprising how empty a house can feel when the one you love is not there with you. I know it’s silly… but I like to watch scary movies or tv shows when I am alone. They are so much better and so much more frightening when you are alone in the dark! One problem…when the movie is over– all I want to do is cuddle and hear that everything is ok.
(Warning: Contents may be triggering and not appropriate for all readers)
Fear threatens to consume me again… just when I think I have a handle on things I feel that familiar threat rising up to consume me… I feel that self-doubt… that heart-pounding… that palm sweating… I feel intensely aware of my weaknesses and short-comings. I feel wholly inadequate. I feel so insecure and I avert my eyes in the mirror – too ashamed to meet my gaze. I hate this so much. I feel my heart break…
I was thinking the other day about one particular instance in my child-hood. I was forced by my father to kill my pet rabbits. In his mind I was not feeding them enough… or feeding them often enough… so he decided that since I was (supposedly) starving them that I should just have to kill them. He made me get them out of their hutch one at a time and hit them in the head with a piece of two-by-four and then skin them. There are not words to express how horrifying it was to do this… to hold something in your hands that you love and kill it. To be so ruled by fear that you obey without question. One of the rabbits came back to consciousness in my hands as it was being skinned and twitched and screamed… I can hear it to this day and I will never forget the terror in its eyes. My heart aches to recall it and I feel this terror and this shame rise up in me… I felt like a monster doing this… and that feeling lingers and sometimes I am afraid that I became a monster all those years ago. I don’t know how to forgive myself. I don’t know how to absolve this guilt or assuage this fear. I don’t want to go the rest of my life hating myself for this but I honestly don’t know how to ease this dark ache in my chest… this pit that opens up every time I remember.
I hate anxiety…. I know, I know… everyone hates anxiety… That is nothing new… but I must say – that hard to breathe, bees in your chest feeling is nearly the worst thing I have ever felt. I feel sometimes like I am drowning in all of the pain from my past, the pain from my present and the uncertainty of my future. I want to find some balance between work and rest… between where I am and where I want to be… between striving and arriving… I don’t want to be stuck here where I am… I don’t want to be stuck at just ok… at just surviving… I want to move on to be fully alive…to be fully passionate and aware… fully at rest and feeling safe in my own skin… I want to speak without over-thinking everything… I want to say (and type) whatever is on my mind and heart without censure, without worrying about every thought – every syllable. I don’t want to worry about my words and facial expressions. I want to be able to express how I feel without even trying. I want it to be natural…I don’t want to be locked away in my head surrounded by coping mechanisms, walls and defense mechanisms… I want to live out in the sun – feeling the warmth kiss my skin and the breeze ruffle my hair.
There is something about hiking in the mountains that makes me come alive. No matter how much I enjoy kayaking in the wetlands or hiking in the forest – nothing comes close to the feeling I get when surrounded by mountains. I thought I would share some of my favorite shots from our recent weekend getaway … I hope you enjoy!
I’ve got that feeling again… the buzzing of angry bees in my chest. I wonder sometimes how long this struggle with anxiety will last? Will I carry this with me always? Will I ever get to the place where I can feel safe and at home in my own skin? What battle am I fighting today that I feel this way? When do I get to rest? I feel like I have been fighting one battle or another since the day I was born. I guess we all are in some form or fashion. I long for peace. I long for comfort… I long to feel. I have been numb for far too long. I guess I am finally learning where the bees come from… those angry bees that swarm in my chest and make it hard to breathe. I think they are all the emotions I have refused to let myself feel. Now to loose the bees and regain some measure of peace I am choosing to feel all the painful things that I would not (or could not) feel. I am crying and raging and curling up in a ball and allowing myself to feel small and vulnerable… I am fighting for me. I will win.
captivatingbitter 