When I am told things like,
“The adult part of you needs to step it up and return …This has to happen NOW!”
                                                                      - it feels like everything that’s going on inside of me…
                                                                                   the pain,
                                                                                        the nightmares,
                                                                                             the helplessness,
                                                                                                 the hopelessness,
                                                                                                      the anger,
                                                                                                            the sadness,
                                                                                                                  the fear…
                                                                                                                                    isn’t even real.
It makes me feel like I’m so inadequate and a failure and over-dramatic. It makes me feel like you think it’s all in my head and I have the power to just stop all of it and if I would just “step up” and use that power – I’d be HEALED! Yea Me! And I wonder why I don’t feel that way – why I still feel so much pain. Because of your invalidation I doubt my feelings, what happens to me, because I “choose” this because I want to feel this way. I must be a stubborn ridiculous drama because I can’t just “summon” the adult to take over when ****** chick’s in charge. "Just figure it out, Nita! You’re such a whiny baby…come on! Get over it! Deal with it…” That’s what it sounds like. AGAIN! I’ve told you that there are times when I CAN do it – but there are just as many times I can’t!

I am not asking you to ‘understand’ it – or say you ‘understand’ it – that’s not possible. But it isn’t that easy to just “summon the internal ‘rational’ Nita”– and it’s overwhelming and it feels like a boulder has fallen on top of me and there’s no strength to lift it off. And I don’t want to die – but I fear every night that the ****** angry Nita is going to **** me… that one night, she is going to be in charge, and the ‘tools’ I have presently are not going to work, nobody is going to be ‘available’ and it’s going to be the wrong night…and it’s going to be my last night. That’s real to me. Let me say this again. I DON’T WANT TO DIE! ME! I DON’T WANT TO DIE! But she does – because it doesn’t stop. And she can’t make it go away nor will she relinquish control. Not right now. Let me say this again, too: I do NOT expect you to understand how horrific it really is those nights.

                                           You couldn’t possibly because :
                                                         1. You aren’t ‘living/experiencing’ it.
                                                         2. If you did understand, you wouldn’t tell me to “step it up
                                                            and take charge” because you would understand that it isn’t
                                                            even possible to do that.

I know that you have tolerated my pain for a long, long, very long time. And I am immeasurably grateful. I do feel the love and acceptance in your compassion and hope and commitment to our friendship. However, at the same time I feel so disconnected from you and unsure how to respond to such feelings. I wish I knew why and how to fix that. And I know that all the ‘pain and fear’ is not going to let up any time soon and I am so exhausted I don’t know how much more I can survive, or if I even want to. It’s so depressing that some days I cannot even move and I want to die just to get some relief!

Tonight the pain in my head is excruciating – it travels down the back of my neck into my abdomen – and nothing touches it. I desperately want to hurt myself tonight. It will make it stop – at least temporarily. I bite the inside of my lip until blood flows – trying not to do further damage.
There are voices all talking at once now, and at this moment, I don’t know if I will be here tomorrow, or if I am what state of mind I will be in.

I am so lost right now. I have tried to believe that it won’t always be this way but I feel so depleted and hopeless. I cannot take care of myself right now. I want to be alone but when I’m alone, with no one to distract me, or talk to me, the piercing truth of my reality cuts into my heart and burns through my soul. I am so drained I cannot even think straight. My heart aches….this is the roughest patch I’ve hit and I can’t believe I’m still alive.

The pain I feel is unexplainable. I’m so tired and frustrated and I feel like it’s all just too complex to deal with. Too multifarious for me to understand…and the therapist would say, “It’s not, it’s so common and understandable, and you can do this…just keep on keeping on.” But he’s wrong. Clearly he doesn't understand…I can assure you…I am dying more every day.

Oh, wait, I’m a “survivor”, right? I forgot. I have tried to collaborate my shattered thinking to form some rational simplicity from my emotional intricacy. I’ve tried to understand. But my mouth forms words my brain is unable to process. What I do understand is that the human mind and body shields a child from the horrible truth so the child can survive. She can survive but not realize how she has been shaped, altered, wounded, until she grows up to become a woman and it gets so bad that she feels like she’s nothing, nobody, worthless. I understand that because I had no idea how much he really shaped who I am today. I feel nameless, fragmented, unlovable because I cannot love myself. He cut me into pieces…so many pieces I don’t know which pieces belong to “me” and which belong to “him”. I cannot sort through them.

See, now I am afraid that the only way I see this working for me is to shut down completely. I really do not know how else to do it, the “feelings” are just too big and overwhelming for me right now. I barely make it week to week, day to day, really. I do not have a good support system in place right now. So much is happening inside of me and I don’t want to rely others, I don’t want to “count on” others for support…

I’m struck by how little my life has become. I am afraid and I can’t even tell anyone. Afraid and overwhelmed by what goes on inside my head and my body. So big, so real, so much stronger than what is outside of me. So sharp…I feel it, cutting me, stabbing me, with its serrated razor-sharp pieces. It’s painful…

Someone recently said to me, “God does not give you more than you can handle.” That’s really been weighing on my mind, it inches to the surface, and I feel a surge of anger, then it’s tucked back into the back of my mind. God does not give you more than you can handle?

I know my grandma believed that with all of her heart. Week after week, she would pray for the salvation of my mother, my father, my brothers, sister, and I. Every single night, she was down on her knees praying for redemption, and thanking God for the gifts he has given to her. And she believed it! I admired her strength and her belief in God, because I learned as a small child that God can give you more than you can handle, and when that happens, and you reach out for help, sometimes there’s no one there. I’m not going to sit here and write out examples and questions…such as, really, then why do children suffer and die from cancer?...because I’m sure there are those out there who can provide justification for that.

Sometimes I would ask my grandma about her unending faith in God. “Grandma, what if God doesn't answer? Is he too busy? “ I’d ask. And grandma would answer, “Nita, you just need to pray harder, God will hear you…just pray harder.” And I would remember her words at night, when I was scared and alone, I would think about her words when my father would touch me, and I would pray harder.
God doesn't give you more than you can handle!

Now, in the present, I know that I am “handling” it, but there’s no other choice, is there? Handle it, or give up? I don’t want to be here, facing all of this, and yet, here I am, “handling” it. Is this what it means? That God doesn't give you more than you can handle? Sure, my family and friends have suffered as a result of the abuse of my past. Is God giving them more than they can handle?