But what if you do? What if something comes up and you don’t have room for me anymore? What if you do forget how much it hurts? …………but what if you don’t?
I have an idea of something that I think might work in trying to reopen the lines of communication with the therapist…but something is still holding me back…is it fear?  Trust?  Safety?  

A girl holds a pillow in front of her face, her eyes water but she doesn’t blink so no tears fall. She is screaming inside, “I am afraid. You will hurt me. You will destroy me. You will get sick and tired of me and you will throw me in the trash just as they did. I am afraid of you so I will remain quiet and I will try to be good.”

And another girl speaks, stubborn and questioning all thoughts of safety and trust, “Now you want to ‘hear’ me again? NOW? Where were you then when I needed you? Where were you? Why should I trust you? I did trust you and you took it away. Shattered me. I can’t let that happen again! It’s easier to deal with it myself than to trust someone else. You won’t be there when I am frozen in pain and forget how to breathe. You won’t be there. It is too much for you. I will not talk to you. You will tell me to get over it, stay in the present moment. If I tell you I need to hurt myself because I deserve it you will send me away. You won’t understand and you will think I am pathetic and weak. I will walk away right now! I do not need you or your help!”

Another voice questions the genuiness of the therapist’s words, “Why do you try so hard to be nice to me? I don’t need your kindness because it isn’t real. Your kindness cuts me, it makes me sad. It hurts more than any pain. I prefer to fight you and push you away because I know how to do that! I know how to fight back. If you accept me, if you know me and accept me and then still tell me you care and treat me with kindness and respect? And then if I accept your kindness and lower my wall, my defenses, then I will be exposed and you can hurt me then. You will hurt her.”

There is another girl, a smaller one, one who cries because she is so lost and afraid…because it hurts so much inside and she does believe in the therapist but the others, they won’t let her talk. They try to protect her but really they are hurting her. Because every night her body hurts, her body feels things that her mind cannot process. It scares her and leaves her aching with shame and badness. She whispers things we don’t speak of. She wants help now. She wants it to stop.

How do I make it stop? How do I make it stop for her? I am filled with uncertainty and pain. He told me he would be here. He said he would not leave me and he would try to help me to the best of his ability. He said my feelings are safe with him and he will not forget me.

There is so much running through my head and it is preventing me from sleeping. Which I suppose is okay since we are 4 days from Christmas and I have yet to do any shopping. The therapist would tell me to stop “indulging” and live up to my responsibilities…(Like anyone ever “mirrored” that for me!) The therapist would probably tell me to stop listening to music that seems to make me feel even more depressed…but here I sit, anyway, head phones on, listening anyway.

But I feel so effing worthless and sad right now.  Here I sit in the midst of two Christmas trees, a mantle full of poinsettias and lights, garland strung on the banisters, frosty jingling behind me and I cannot FEEL any of it.  And I want to FEEL it right now!  I want to feel all the good things in my life…and I can't, which makes me even more frustrated.  And the only way to force it is to hit the liquor cabinet (which I have not yet ruled out).  

I don't think I intentionally planned it this way but the holidays are usually very busy here...which adds to my stress level as I deal with “family” events. Three birthdays to celebrate as well as the 26th being my 23rd anniversary. And I can't get caught up in it this year!  I want to and I can't.  

And here I sit thinking how I have been married to a man for 23 years and he does not even know me and I'm wondering how that happened.  But the reality is, no one really knows me... He loves who he "thinks" Nita is...but I am not really that person at all.  And it's really tiring for me to keep pretending to be her after 23 years.  

It's been a long long week…I got caught up in the suburban fantasy...it happens...I have fallen and the past can't be undone.

I messed up...I don't feel well at all tonight...not at all...

...I think it is time to go check out that liquor cabinet...

It occurred to me today that it take a lot of courage to be hopeful. One has to walk into hope with the knowledge that hope is just a dream, yet, with hope that dreams can come true. What a dichotomy!
Often we have no hope at all that a certain desire may be fulfilled. So much so that we discard the desire as a dream that is dead and buried, and turn to a journey where we actively work for someone else’s desires to be fulfilled. As we travel the road of fulfilling the hopes of another, our own hope peeks out from around the corner then darts back out of sight as soon as we turn to look at it…taking its essence with it. (Wait a second! I saw that hope die and I buried it a long time ago.) Then, it begins to get bolder, and stays just long enough for us to begin to recognize its face. Its essence invades you, almost against your own will, to make a real change in your life.

You begin to question…Do I dare to hope? Do I dare to take the chance? Do I have “reasonable confidence” that this can morph from being dead and in hell into livable reality? I cannot go through much more pain, unless the pain actually produces some positive results. Is this a real hope, or only real because I secretly long for it to be so?

Hope is just a…thing. But what courage it takes to dare to accept it.

I guess I have begun a new journey. A journey of hope…this time for myself and not for another. So for today, I choose to be brave. For today, I choose to hope. Today, I choose to rescue hope from the hell to which I personally banished it…come what may.

"You don't have to be okay, or perfect, you just have to get through the minute, hour, night..."* That's what DT said to me earlier when I called him. "Nita, you don't have to feel 'ok' you just have to get through the night."

But...DT, what about tomorrow? And the next night...and the night after that. I'm so tired of watching the clock and just "getting through the next minute".

"Nita, you know it comes in 'waves'...how you're feeling now. There are times when you will be better, and times when you are worse. You know that."

Yes, but what happens when I drown in the next wave, or the wave after that one?
DT was able to calm me down. I was full of fear, fear of the time each night when "logical" Nita disappears and the irrational angry and sad ones take control, put on the red boots and walk all over DT and me! And Nita had one boot on already earlier when she called DT.

"I don't want to die, DT, I don't want to die..." That's what I kept saying to him, on the phone... and I don't, I don't want to die...but I'm so scared that I'm going to die because the pain becomes so overwhelming that I will do anything to make it end. DT told me what to do, step by step, he told me: ”Nita, I want you to go and brush your teeth, take your medication and tuck yourself into bed. Then tomorrow morning, you will get up, shower, get dressed...and get to school. And then you will call my office at 3:30 and we will continue to talk."

But now, the headache that I have been battling all week has now pulled out the new arsenal which is immune to all medication. The lack of sleep has made my eyelids as heavy as bricks, my mind cloudy and my body weary. I am unable to focus. The nausea which subsided for a day is now back with a vengeance. I have thrown up multiple times tonight – and I although I continue to brush my teeth, I would pay the asking ransom for some stronger mouthwash and perhaps some diet sprite.

Although the nightmares abated for a few days, they have returned from the game of hide and seek – l am now hiding and they are now seeking. The ever present feelings of discontent will no longer allow me a moment of peace. This journey to “inner peace” seems to be an impossibility right now.

There is no party at the end of the rainbow – where my heart will sing and my soul will dance with joy. Instead, all I find is the hurt – and sometimes it is so painful, I want to cut out my own heart to keep from feeling it. I am an emotional baby in an adult body and I don’t know how to grow up. I am overwhelmed; there are not enough words in the dictionary to express how it is that I truly feel. Yes, there are times when I want to end it all, but really, I don’t want to die, I want to live, but I want to "live" and not just "survive" the day.

As a child I would spend my nights in prayer. Praying to God to make it stop or **** me. Life went on then as it does now…slow and painful, with me begging for it to end. I still remember the prayer I would pray to God. A prayer that still gets prayed even today.

“Dear Mr. Jesus, if you can hear me please do not let him hurt me anymore, Mr. Jesus. Please come and take me away with you. I want to be an angel with soft fluffy white wings. Don’t you need an angel like me, Mr. Jesus? I’ll be good. I promise I’ll be a good angel.” Apparently, he didn’t. And it was because bad girls can’t be angels. Bad little girls have to stay with bad people and be punished for being bad.

She is still bad. Bad bad girl. That is why therapist doesn’t want to talk to her. Nobody cares that we are hurting.  All because she is a bad bad girl. Bad girls don’t get to be angels. Bad girls get punished.

There's a heaviness in my heart- something is trying to happen far away within a part of me I don't remember how to find. I feel lost and I'm just wandering around within my mind, waiting. Wishing for someone to tell me what to do and how - but I am on my own with this. So I write about it, because that's what I now know how to do. And the writing, it soothes me and teases me out of my own thoughts. So much hurt and anger.

Everything around me, and the very fact that I have to go on, whispers to me of my own failure and horribleness as a human being. I know all that I tell myself is not true. I could name a dozen things that make me a good person, but this is not the kind of thing I can just stop and tell myself, “Nita, be thankful and happy.” If there is a switch I can flick I’m unable to locate it and turn it off.

I see myself as a child. I see a little girl sitting in a dark corner, hugging her knees and trying to be as small and "out of the way" as possible. When she looks at me, her eyes are full of a terrible anger- rage, really- and pain. She is scared. I have never seen myself so dark. But she is undeniably me, and she must have existed during that time of my life. I have ignored her, I chose to ignore her because she did not fit the image I held for myself. She makes me think about everything that happened to me. So pain and hurt. The pain from it is unspeakable. I try to list the things my father said to me- did to me- not to relive the memories but to acknowledge the suffering I never could when I was actually going through it. I try to describe the pain and it's so overwhelming that no words will come.

I suppose there is no way, no road map, nothing but fumbling in the dark. I am so tired of walking this road alone. I am not tired of the pain and anger; they are mine- a part of me. But where do I go from here? So many people…they all say different things, no one agrees on anything. How do you know if you’re right or wrong? How do you know if you hurt or don’t hurt, or even if you have the right to hurt?

It’s dark now, the night, the darkness… its killing me! I can’t sleep, when I try I dream.  And I’m so tired all day long. I’m really not sure how much more of this I can take.

I think, “Nita, reach out to… Email someone…call someone…don’t let it end like this. But who??

So, grab the razor, reach for the broken glass….let’s have a look at the badness that resides inside of you. Get it out, Nita, let it out. That’s a good girl…watch the blood flow out of your body. It’s bad! It’s evil! It’s part of him.

You deserve to die! Do it already! Just do it! We hate you!

Earlier I was thinking that I’m losing me…but the reality is it’s already happened.
THERE IS NO ME LEFT...

“I am certain that I cannot fully understand the gravity and turmoil that you face when they consume your mind.”

Really, DT, I hadn’t noticed! All that wasted time I’ve spent trying to get you to UNDERSTAND. I have an idea how to make that happen, a plan to finally make it actually CLICK  in your PhD/MHP brain…so that you’ll finally say, WOW I get it now!

“I/we need to continue to work toward understanding these, even if no resolution is accessible at this time.”

See, here’s the deal…just as you have your limits, I also have limits. I’ve played beat the clock, and hang in there it will get better….guess what? It’s NOT better! And the bad place remains.

“I also want to acknowledge that what you experience and think each night is real for you and that the "choices" that you face are nearly always painful and feel hopeless.”

DT, that’s so sweet of you to say that. I also want to ACKNOWLEDGE  that you also did your best too – in this “process”. It’s just that I still haven’t found what I’m looking for – PEACE INSIDE MY F@%KED UP HEAD! – and I’m pretty sure it doesn’t exist. So forgive me if I give up the lifetime search for the Holy Grail!

“Nita will work it out, DT, I assure you she will work it out.” She will “deal with it”.

“My words "when and if" were heard and processed in such a manner as to feel rejection/abandonment and because this is your expectation, you will go to great lengths to prove this... at least to whatever extent you can with words/thoughts....which ultimately seem to make you feel worse...which I know you don't want. “

You’re RIGHT! I don’t want to FEEL worse! In fact, I no longer want to FEEL at all!!!!

And, DT, I ask for your “understanding” and “openness” to see my point of view and why I don’t want to do it anymore…no room for “judgment” DT …”we all have our reasons for doing what we do.”

**I’ll  work it out and it won’t be “perfect” DT, just “good enough”.

A part of me still yearns for openness and being able to share emotions and thoughts with others. Yet I cannot remove the barrier between us.  I sit and I am silent even though in my head I have volumes to share.  I try to hide myself.  I will not let anyone look inside of me.  Even though I know they all want to help, I refuse to let them in and then when I am alone, I sob and ache for refusing. You ask me how I am I tell you I'm fine; I lie to you just as I lie to everyone else.  Even though parts of me beg and plead to tell the truth.  

What would the truth even sound like?
What kind of intimacy would it take to make it possible to speak of such shame and pain?  
What kind of trust would it take to believe they would listen and care and be able to emotionally stay with me?  
Is there such a language?  
No one can answer my questions: Why did he do that to me?  Why didn't my family love me?

So the pain is still here.  And the child Nita uses her childlike logic of wanting to ask for help but not wanting to admit she needs help- and not believing that she would get the help even if she did ask.  That childish logic feeds my thought process and conscious conclusion that my desperate longing to reach out for help is ridiculous and wrong. And anyway, who could possibly tell me that having experienced what I have, having lost what I have, that I could possibly be healed.

"It wasn't your fault”* The words follow me wherever I go; inked into the many pages of a torn journal, etched bloodily into the flesh of my arms.  Haunting me endlessly and echoing inside my mind in bursts of staining black.

"Why do you hurt yourself?"  I want to scream an answer to this question, yet I never do, I never will. I don't have the answer they want.  Yet my mouth wants to spit the venomous words out at them.  My tongue, however, is empty of the truth.  I smile condescendingly at their horrified faces, doing whatever I can to escape.

"Just be a good girl and everything will be fine” Can you not understand?  I'm not good. I'm bad, tainted, my very essence poisoned and corrupted.   Don't touch me. I'll contaminate you.  Just stay away, keep an image in your head of me, smiling, happy, innocent.  Never come close enough to look past my mask, and then everything will be okay.  I don't want anyone to put me back together again, I deserve to be shattered.

"You don't understand!"  How many times have I heard that?  Too many to count. Being misunderstood is part of me, when people finally understand, their empathy will eventually turn to pity. I can't stand it, hate would be easier to tolerate than sadness.  Don't be sad for me, be sad for yourself, you're much more important than I'll ever be.  Just leave me alone, if you get to close to me I'll hurt you.  Somehow, I will. I will kick my way around you, until you have no other option but to loathe me. But I deserve it.  I always break everything, it's now my turn to be broken.

"It's not your fault."  Sure, keep saying that while you're 'holding' me. I know you don't mean it.  But I'll nod my head like the doll I should be, as if I believed you.  I'll just go along with it.  The need to make me feel pure, good… shut out all the other signs.  My hands can't stop shaking, the cuts I inflict upon myself are pale white yet swollen.  The scars are reminders of how I deserve pain, and the hideous ecstasy that comes along with it.  But just ignore them, I don't want you to know anyway.  Keep repeating those words to yourself, over and over again, trying to reassure me  I'll just sit there and nod soundlessly.  Watch me smile the way you want me to as I repeat it back to you.  I'm blameless. It’s not my fault.

You won't even notice the lie behind the words………
Blameless…shameless…faultless….guiltless…

When do you stop blaming yourself? Stop believing that you deserved it because you are worthless, *****, a failure (just look at everything else you have failed in)? When do you sleep through the night and not wake up with your stomach in a knot and your lungs begging for air? When does your heart start to open up and love yourself? When does it stop being scared?

I'd love to know...because I'm not sure how much more I can take. It's kind of funny because, I am not even sure how much of these feelings are from the CSA or how much is from family problems now or how much is just from my declining physical health. Today is a rough day. I'm hoping once the coffee sets in and I wake up a little more...it'll get better...

Hi, I'm NitaAnn…
I know we have met....however, I can't really talk to you but I need to know if you can help me.

I am married with 2 children, both girls.  I'm a dog person.  My favorite color is green and I am a Leo (which should alert you to my tendency toward stubbornness).  I prefer down pillows and lots of 'em!  I am intelligent and creative...and very independent.  I tend to be overprotective of my children - my girls call it my 'worry meter', but they mean everything to me and I want to protect them.  I love to read.  I love to travel and enjoy new adventures on the road.  I love camping and being outdoors. I love the musical Phantom of the Opera and have seen it live... I hate onions and liver and right now my favorite food is anything Mexican.  I have a past, everyone does, right?  But I don't talk about anything that happened before age 10...and not really anything til after 22.

I've been in therapy before - many times before.  But I have this incredibly hard exterior that has never been penetrated by a 'professional'.  Not one.  Some therapists have told me I have a lot of anger...depression. One therapist told me after 3 sessions that I was fine and she didn't even know why I was there and that was after I told her I had seriously considered killing myself in the shower with a razor...I was 13.

I don't know why I'm here today.  Well, I do, but I can't talk about it.

I have major trust issues.  I'm hypervigilent and always on guard and I will search for reasons not to trust you.  If you hurt me I will pull away from you and I won't let you back in.  I would like to ask you if you can help me, but because I cannot trust you I can't really tell you anything right now...but I really need to know if you can help me...because if I can't find someone to help me I don't know what will happen to me but I do know that I can't do this alone anymore.  

But I can't tell you that.  Because I don't know you....I don't trust you...I will not let you see the weak and frightened Nita.  I cannot take the lid off of the box that contains the first 10 years of my life because it will all spill out and I am afraid I won't be able to put it back in...and it is scary, and ugly, and shameful, and bad.  It's very bad.  And I can't talk about it.  

But I really need to know if you can help me...

I began writing to express myself in the written word. To ‘speak’, in writing, of things from my past I was unable to speak aloud. Healing through writing... I needed a place to express myself that was not in a written journal that could be found by the wandering eye of someone in my real life.*

I reflect on the past year, and I do not reflect back with words of healing and strength and self-empowerment. Oh, I would love to write with the grace and eloquence of a woman who has gained the much sought after wisdom and perspective through this painful process, I thought that by now I could face and somehow outgrow the painful things that happened to me long ago.

I wanted to be able to look back on 2012 as a year of personal growth, from a place of asset and growth from my pain. I had wished that by 2013 I would have the ability to distance myself from this pain, that I could hold my pain and not let it consume me as it has for the past few years. But, regrettably, that is not the case.

But this year has not followed the path I had set forth, the goals I had set for myself remained unachieved. I did not want my writing to sound as pathetic as it does, I did not want to continue being buried alive in this pain, and I am so disgusted at the woman behind the mask, and I am filled with hate for little girl who aches with pain and continues to feel hopeless and alone.

Sadly, instead of feeling like I am on a ‘healing’ path, instead of being able to express myself in real life, instead of being able to take off my mask and be real, instead of being able to ask for help when I need it, reach out for help when I am drowning; I am now surrounding the brick wall I built long ago with barbed wire, and hired trained guards to patrol the perimeter, for reinforcement.

I wonder which side of the perimeter the therapist will end up on...I know he used to have the pass to enter into my world, but then a perceived breach revoked his credentials.  And I wonder when I will finally just pack it all up and just fade away. In a sense I have already done so emotionally ~ only the shell remains.  

*I am pathetic. I am last week’s leftovers that should have been thrown away long ago.  I am tired and I don't want to do it anymore. I am not the woman I wanted to become...not in person, not in written word. Tonight, I am wishing for something to turn me into dust and ******* away...

Dear Tears,

How very sorry I am for what you have lived with.  You and I have not spent much time together.  I avoid you because I despise crying.  You avoid me because we are not supposed to cry.

So other than objectives, we have not known much about one another.  Sure, I've squeezed out a few tears here and there; but a sob?  Not really.  And those times that I have needed to cry, you stood by and fought a deluge at much cost to yourself.

Over the past few days I have cried.  And when I say cry, I mean real and bitter tears.  Tears stockpiled over years of pain.  Tears we both did not believe to exist.  As this happened I watched you through my blurry eyes, shaking in a corner.  You were waiting for him and he did not come.  We were both surprised.

No one hit us until we stopped crying.  No one ****** us until there were no more tears to cry.  Not once was the blood running faster than the tears.  In fact, there was no blood at all.  

Each tear, it did hurt.  Like crying razor blades.  But it was a healing kind of hurt.  To borrow a thought... it hurts a lot less to rip a band-aid off quickly than slowly.  Or not at all.  So I sit in my car and cry while I peel the neglected, crusty bandages of abuse away.  I do this while I worry about keeping you safe.  It's a role reversal of sorts.

Watching you with intent, I see that you are small.  You are a skinny  girl who is young, about five.  And now I am not seeing you through the haze of my own pain.   Without the need to dodge his fists, I see that you have glasses and black hair.  Your glasses are broken and behind the cracks you have no eyes.  No eyes that cry no tears.

No wonder.  

I can cry your tears now.  And it's OK if you never shed one of your own; that is not your job.   It's mine now and you know, tears are not that bad.

And neither are you.  So go and rest.

I just now realized something.

I am NOT Super Woman.

I do school work, research, church activities, housework,  and other daily life activities. On top of all of that, I have my physical problems and my emotional problems.

A person can only do so much until they can't do anymore.

I think I have reached that point.

I don't know what to do now, though.

Do I keep going? Do I have a choice?

I guess I will have to.

I know that with some prayer and with the help of my friends and family, that I will make it through this rough patch. I always do.

This time though, I feel like this rough patch is meant to teach me a lesson.

The lesson that I am NOT Super Woman.

A smile has a powerful message. It relays happiness, contentment, joy and love. It is a natural reaction as a result of one (or more) of these emotions. But sometimes we use our smiles incorrectly. Smiles should not hide sadness, pain, grief or loneliness.

Not only do we use our smiles to hide our feelings, but others do the same. How do we know when someone is truly happy or is using their smile to hide their real feelings? For most of us, we don't. Obviously the closer the relationship, the more you are going to recognize the attempt to cover up, but most of our daily interactions do not involve processing the true feelings of others. So is it surprising that we take the lead from others and plaster a permanent smile on our faces, too?

Today I have realized just how much that affects how I perceive other people. Tonight I decided it was time to get back on the wagon for real therefore prompting me to attend a meeting.  As I listened to the testimony of one of the leaders of the group, and his rocky road with abuse, ****** addiction, drug and alcohol use and ******* addiction, his breakdowns of multiple marriages, abandonment of his kids and the eventual path that lead him to God and to getting his life back in order. Listening to him go through his story, break down when he talked about how abandoned he felt as a young child, how empty he felt when he tried to use *** as a means to fill the hole in his heart, hit me hard. Not 30 minutes before, he was across the room, talking, eating, SMILING like nothing was wrong. And here he was before me, a flawed, hurt and broken person; just as every single one of us in that room is.

Why do we spend so much time hiding who we truly are? Why do we feel obligated to do this? Who are we protecting from our real feelings? There is no pretending that everything is happy behind our smiles. We all know otherwise. And for the first time I realized that I can be real. I don't have to always have a smile on my face, or reply "good or fine" when someone asks me how I am. I can take off my smile for a couple of hours a week and feel safe that no matter how I feel, I will be supported and loved.

Not everyone is given the amazing gift that I am just now realizing I have received. So the next time you put a smile on your face, I hope it is because you are truly happy, not masking your pain.

Today was a weird mixture of happiness and sadness all at the same time. It was one of the most unusual experiences I have ever had.

It was not one of those, "I am sad. Now, I am happy."

It was more or less, "I am sad, no, I am happy, no, wait. I am both."

I don't really know if I liked or didn't like it. I think I am leaning more towards liking it.

I liked the fact that I was able to feel two different emotions at once and not feel completely out of control. I liked that it felt real. That sounds odd, I'm sure, but it felt like that it must be what it feels like when you are happy yet hear something sad and it makes your heart ache. It was kind of like that.

It was certainly a learning experience, that's for sure.

So, here it goes…

Had a follow-up appt today with Dr to go over some tests I had done last week, we are now 30 days post-heart attack. I go in all cheerful expecting to hear good news and yeah lets start the exercise and getting healthy!

Nope…No…NO…NO…NADA….NO….NO!!

The doctor was all, “Um, yeah, we got your test results back, and there is cause for concern.”

Wait, what??

And then I was not even expecting the next words out of his mouth…

we found several masses on the MRI.
                           3 in left lung,
                           1 in right breast,
                           and 1 on thyroid.

He was just so matter of fact, he was just “delivering the news.” And then he rattles off the appts I need to go get done as soon as I can and then bye, we will see you later…have a nice day. ***!
Somehow I managed to drive myself back to my house.

Crying the entire way.

My ears are ringing and I think I may ***** but I don’t. I sit down and put my head down because nothing feels real and my first thought was: I need my grandma. But my grandmother is dead so I can’t call her. I started to call a friend of mine but suddenly everything felt so loud and overwhelming I hung up before she answered. What was I going to say to her anyway – I didn’t want to sound needy and pathetic. Or afraid.

So I called DT. He knew I had been having health problems, he knew I had been having tests done, he wouldn’t be surprised to hear fear in my voice, and I didn’t know who else to call. It was the middle of the afternoon and I didn’t expect him to answer the phone anyway. I could leave him a voicemail and try to compose myself to speak coherently by the time he called me back. He answered. I tried to squeak out the words, but all I could do was cry.  I don’t know how successful I was since he kept asking me to speak louder…slower. Finally I told him that I would email him and we hung up.

It’s funny, as I write this now, tears welling in my eyes, it feels as though I am reliving it again. You never know the day your world will change forever, it’s a day that starts out as any other day; you get up, tired from not getting enough sleep, shower quickly, get dress, head off to school. You hang with friends…I mean it’s a beautiful spring day. You make plans for the summer.  And then in the middle of the day, with a few words being said and your life takes a dramatic change.

I don’t know how this is all going to play out…

Hoping this is not really the end of my world as I know it.

Can I survive one more hurdle???

Imagine you are a child, alone in the darkness, trying to scurry away from the monsters for if they saw you, they would hurt you. You stayed shut up inside yourself, ensuring you did not move, did not look them in the eyes. You pretended it was not painful by going someplace else. Pretenses and secrets were how you hid in the darkness, how you survived. When you were unable to hide, you would smile at others, be thankful and polite…but when others would leave your mind returned to the darkness, the only solitude you had.

Imagine you were invisible and silent, your mouth forced close by others. They did not want to hear you, they could not hear you, they would not allow themselves to see you. If they were to hear you, they would hear themselves stumbling along in the darkness. They would see themselves grasping at the walls to steady their pace. They could not see you, for if they saw you, they would see a reflection of themselves in you, so instead, they threw you into the darkness and they force you to remain there.

**Silent

Invisble

Unseen

Unheard

I hate nights alone
          So many thoughts
                   Never stopping
                            No sleep…
Thoughts tear through my head like a tempest, never even pausing for sleep.
My past stalks me like the black shadow of death; a shadow as thick as the everlasting night.
She has manifested herself inside skin and bones, deep within a weak and hollow body.
I walk around half dead, half alive, unaware of any truth or peace.
The truth only makes me hurt worse.
It’s a wonderful paradox, really,
That I can search so desperately for something that merely causes me pain.

As I sit alone tonight,
         I feel trapped in a moment.
                   Time moves neither fast nor slow…
Suddenly a force so strong and so surprising burst from within me and I wanted to scream!
My face grew red as I tried desperately to suffocate the terrifying voices inside of me.
The anger and frustration, the memories and regret, the loneliness and terror…
Everything began to surface and erupt.
Tears spilled like poison from my eyes, leaving my face splotchy and red.
I imagined a line dividing my present from my future, floating in space, waiting for me to cross.
But it seems I’m only capable of shuffling along the side of it.
The task seems insurmountable which made me cry harder.
I felt swallowed by pain; unable to speak and unable to breathe,
Longing for someone to hold me~ but there was no one there.
After a long while my cries ceased and the room was filled with a heavy silence
More drowning than even my own tears.
My palms were sweaty and I could feel my chin begin to quiver.
My breathing was sharp and my hands were shaking.
I wanted to write something, needed to write, something.
I picked up a pen and etched two words into my journal: “without hope”.

Without hope…
          darkness begins to choke me.
                    I feel completely powerless.
Fearful…
Fear has been stitched into my spine for so many years now.
          Fear of the past,
                   Fear of rejection,
                             Fear of failure,
                                       Fear of being alone,
                                                  Fear of feelings…
How do I face this fear? What am I supposed to do?

I sat there, still shaking, staring up at the dark sky,
I could not find a single star hovering,
And I took that as a sign that more darkness is yet to come.
As the moon hid behind the clouds…
         I continued to stare into space…
                   No star to wish upon…
                             No light to follow...
All is strapped in the shadows of night, where skeletons rise from the dead to moan at the world.

And she and I sit together in the darkness, my past and me, the only friend who has never left.