hoy me rompe el corazón

a little over a year ago i came face to face with one of my abusers. I wanted so badly for an apology. initially i received one, then he recanted. he claimed it didn’t happen.

today my birth mother is going to see her family, including this abuser who is her brother.  I’m trying to understand how to feel about "the family" supporting him, wanting to see him.  it's also disturbing that the birth mother would go and not stand up for her daughter. i’m confused. Parts of me are feeling defeated. How could the aunts and uncles, her brothers and sisters, want to associate with an abuser? Is there not enough love in their heart for me to hate their brother who hurt me?

I wanted to go with them for the visit. only just to scare him, intimidate him, and make the visit uncomfortable for him. but i thought in the end it would just hurt me worse than it would him. i thought the Littles would be traumatized by his presence and the rest of us would feel small again. helpless.

sadness is coiling around me, squeezing out the ever flickering light inside of me. i feel so betrayed, so alone, so . . . silenced.

Forget that. I need to numb out. I need to escape. I'm not fit for survival. I'm trapped. There's too much damage and I'm all by myself.

Surviving Myself

 Despite myself and sabotaging my own efforts, I keep surviving. It isn’t pretty, but I’m doing it.

I read a post today from a regular blogger to whom I subscribe that reinforced her description of her blog. She related it was a pro-recovery blog, and so she was trying to keep everything positive in her posts. I have a different view of my blog. Recovery is never perfect, and, for me, infrequently positive. At least right now. So when I write, I share exactly what is going on with me: the good, the bad, and the ugly. If it is triggering, then I’m sorry. If it’s negative, I can’t control that. I have to be as authentic as I can, and that often means when I write it is not from a good place. So if this blog triggers you or takes you to a place in which you find it difficult to cope, I apologize.

I relate this, because I vaguely recall a post that was submitted recently, and I’m afraid the post was triggering. I do not know what this post was about. I never go back and read my posts, because I don’t want to be reminded of what I might not have written. But I have a funny feeling it might have been triggering. If so, I regret that it might have hurt people.

As I’ve obsessed about mentioned before, I am having horrible anxiety attacks, and they are related to food and weight. And right now I’m in the sticks of Tennessee where my in-laws specialize in anything deep fried, so it has been hard to navigate what to eat and what not.

For the first few days in Sticksville, I didn’t run because I didn’t know where the trails were. This town is the king of hills, and it is not safe to run on the streets. I finally found a trail, but it was on a riverbank that was disgusting and filthy. The trail itself was questionable; I couldn’t tell if I was running in mud or duck and dog poop. So the run was less than stellar.

But yesterday I found a trail that was beautiful and made me want to strap on my running shoes. The sun created twinkles on the lake, and the air was so crisp and clear to breathe. It was the run that saved me. It was 4.5 miles of grounding myself by listening to my feet pounding the pavement, hearing my heart beat, and focusing on my lungs expand and contract. I cleared my head of all non-sense. I saved myself by running.

My salvation lasted only a few hours, and then the anxiety returned, kicking me in the gut, seizing my thoughts, fueling my desire for escape, and rendering me useless. But that’s okay. For a few hours I felt like myself. And I realized in my darkest of darks, I can save myself. It’s not beautiful, and it’s not scripted. It seems to be rough and ugly, trial and error. But I’m saving myself! And I know if I’ve done it before, I can do it again.

Peace.

"End this sweet madness, all it's glorious sadness"

That's from the song "Angel" by Sarah McLachlin

Warning: I’ve lost my mind.  I can not be held responsible for the crap I spew out.

I suppose since no one reads this crap anyway I can say what I want.  And what I say is purely none of your business, but I feel better when I say my shit and send it to the universe . 

And today I won’t make sense.  I am going to throw it out like the garbage that it is and not regret it.  “We will not regret the past not wish to shut the door on it.”  That’s what we say in our AA meetings and EDA meetings.  But I do regret the past.  I regret being born, I regret being abused, I regret gaining weight back.  I regret everything.

My favorite tattoo reads, “For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.’”  I wonder what might have become of me if I had not been abused.  I wonder what would have happened to that little girl had she not been hurt.  I wonder what might have been of me.  Would I be a capable, productive member of society?  Would I have normal friendships and relationships?  Would I not feel this innate, inconsolable loneliness? 

We are out of town for the holidays and it isn’t a good idea for me to be away from home.  I am very unhappy and I can only guess it’s my effing weight.  I know everyone notices I am sad because they ask me if I’m alright.  No, dammit.  I am not alright.  I am constantly worrying about everything I put in my mouth.  Even the broiled broccoli for dinner was a sin.  

And I have no suitable clothes to wear.  I packed jeans in my suitcase but I can’t stand the way they feel against my skin.  I can feel how large I am when my skin grazes against the fabric of my jeans.  I hate them!  So all I’ve been wearing are lounge wear and sweats.  Clothes that I can’t feel myself in.  My  lounge wear is large and I can get lost in my clothes.  And why I don’t know exactly how my abuse is linked to feeling my skin in my body, I do know that I can’t feel his hands on me when my clothes are huge and don’t hug the skin.  When I’m smaller I don’t feel his hands between my legs, but I do now and it hurts, hurts, hurts.  I feel his god damn hands and I don’t want to anymore.  There are lots of us hear.  Hurting.  Crying.  Needing some kind of release. The littles are here.  The self-harmers are here.  It’s all gone to hell.  

Hi, my name is Sophie, and I was raped.

“Let me be empty, oh, and weightless, and maybe, I’ll find some peace tonight”  ~ “Angel” by Sarah McLachlin