Sometimes that times i have the most to say are the most difficult times to write. I feel raw, shameful, empty, embarassed, and filled with self hatred and loss of a sense of importance and worth. Depression, anxiety, ptsd... it's a melting pot created by a a collection of shitty situations and chemical imbalance that create the masterpiece I am today.
Despite having these things for the better part of my life... I'm still learning, adjusting, adapting, and coming to new understandings that comme with growth. These are live demons that can take handle of everything I love and hold dear and tear it to shreds in a matter of seconds. Sometimes we are so used to pain and suffering, when we aren't experience enough of it we tend to need to create such things for ourselves. We need and hunger for the pain because it's often been the only time we feel alive, or like we HAVE to fight. We can't sit it out or we die. I'm not being dramatic. This is where harmful behavior, catestrophic behavior, suicide and unhealthy lifestyles come to play. It's not just a sudden feeling someone gets and runs with without thought. OFten its been a battle no one is comfortable enough to discuss and understand despite the fact that, when a loved on dies from suicide, everyone says "If only they had reached out! I would have spoken to them!" To be clear, I am not suicidal.
Fuck off with that. I am so sick of people thinking they could have been the savior in a persons life. IF they're struggling in that way. Hurting. ANd living in this dark abode... they need more than a conversation over coffee some afternoon. SUre that can help but they need you at 4 am when they can't sleep. Or at 11 am when they can't leave their bed. These are battles we fight every day. We need help every day.
In my therapy.. I've worked a lot on boundaries. I've been hyper aware of what i"M feeling, how I'm reacting, how I"m triggered. I've worked insanely hard on these things the last year or so. I've made specific plans and rules to live by in order to keep myself safe, protected, and to give me a plan when I am triggered.
I had a happening this weekend I did not expect. I became triggered in a way I did not expect. I saw my rapists wife at a restaurant. I, foolishly thought I had overcome it and had moved on when in fact I hadn't thought or reflected upon it at all. This trigger sat inside my heart and my head for two days and brought me down. I thought I was sad. I thought I was PMS'ing. I thought I was just overwhelmed with the typicality of life. I wasn't. I was in a trigger. I didn't' address it.
I spiraled. I broke every rules and guideline and boundary I have created and agreed upon and broke them. Every. Single. One. My trigger resulted in one of my greatest self sabotage moments of my entire life. a sabotage I didn't think I was even capable of.
I spent my phone call with my counselor in absolute frantic tears this morning. I shamefully expressed how I had wrecked all of my progress in a series of moments. The closest thing I can compare it to is by celebrating sobriety with a bingefest. I wept with my tail between my legs and am now on a semi watch list.
I feel like a failure. I feel like a.. I feel like an idiot.
and now? Now I get to start all over. From the beginning. Pick up the pieces I'm allowed and try to force them back into some shape of a picture... a picture I may just never get to see again. a picture that may just fade away completely like some memory.
When I get this low, I can't sing. I can't listen to songs I know. I can't.. think or focus or,,, I just fall into the rotation and muscle memory of shit I'm supposed to be doing. The fact that I've been able to write is astounding to me. I'm not going to edit it. I'll end up deleting everything and that's not the purpose of this blog. The purpose of this blog is to help people who go through shit like this. To know that it's not just inspirational quotes and hearing how strong you are. It's not about statistics or causes or whatever else.
I want people to understand the deep and lasting effects of being a survivor of rape. ANd it is this. It's failed marriage. It's pushing friends and loved ones away. It's pushing love in any form away. It's acceptng trauma. It's sleepless nights, and days of gloom. It's eating disorder. It's depression. It's anxiety. It's crippling fear and panic at seemingly nothing. It's losing your sence of self worth. It's losing your mind. It's spending the rest of your life in therapy. It's shutting down. Backing off. closing off. boundaries up. walls up. It's people judging you and calling you crazy until you tell them what youve been through andn then they tell you how strong you are but they''re still going to keep your rapist in their lives because it's easier. It's wishing they had known. But then not caring to know. It's "Get over it".
It's being frozen in anger and fear and flashback everytime the news is on. Its watching your friends and family support a rapist and call the accuser a liar who wants attention. But then they want to know the names of mine. Why?
So now, despite how low I"m feeling. How awful I'm feeling. How weak and depressed, and devestated I'm feeling... I will take a shower. in silence and in the dark. I will get dressed. I will do the bare minimum of what I have to do today.
Apparently this makes me strong. Me not killing myself or winding up in a ditch makes me strong. me laying in bed and wallowing in my own tears and spilled coffee on my bedsheets makes me strong. I keep going. I'm not strong. I'm about as weak and as fragile and as scared as anyone could be.
fuck.
