I deal with fear nearly every single moment that I'm awake. My past has left me a very fearful present.
I am also afraid and that feels very different. To me, being afraid is the current not directly tied to my past.
Just a side effect.
Afraid of being fragile. Afraid of being pitied. Afraid of being angry. Afraid of being mean. Afraid of losing my job. Afraid of being abandoned. Afraid of losing everything because I can never grip it tight enough.
I try to wrap my arms around Afraid because I cannot hold it all in my hands. But then a tremor wiggles through my hand. And then it works its way up my arm. My shoulder shudders. My head twitches. The other shoulders rolls as my other hand is paralyzed. I am limp and worthless to contain Afraid.
Afraid tells me that I'm doing this all wrong. That I'm not healing right. Good enough. Fast enough.
I am afraid of Afraid.
Hello darkness my old friend,
4 months ago
2 comments:
I know you realize there is no "doing it wrong" when all the while you are "working" on it all. And that you would not feel anyone else was doing it wrong.
But I also know that KNOWING and FEELING are not the same. And the paralysis of fear.
I am almost sixty. I went through what I would roughly say was a ten-year process of recovery. But the first five didn't feel one damn bit like recovery. Only when I was far enough along so SOME of the memories were just that. Memories. I could recall them without reliving. Or I could file them away and put them out of my mind entirely.
I remember the first time I realized that something was a memory and did not reduce me to the shakes was an epiphany. I remember it entered my mind, an incident with the mouse in a mousetrap... And I said, "I don't want to think of that. What's on tv?"
A small act, yes. Miniscule. But I watched some mindless drivel and hit me! I DID NOT GO THERE. A first. For me--and maybe it isn't how it works for others-- several years into the whole PTSD treatment, it was a turning point. A point where little by little I realized that I was taking back the power from my brother.
I can only say that, from reading what you have the courage to share with us, I see movement. Just as you were able to actually TELL. WRITE the anger, the truths, the fear. AFter years of shutting up.
But sometimes to me that was even more terrifying than shutting up.
But people are here, reading. Probably many who do not write. And in the reading, there is hope. You may be doing so much good. But perhaps, if you can picture that perhaps eight out of ten readers don't respond in writing, but respond in sending you their courage, their support, their understanding and their FAITH in you that you will one day stand beyond the damned fear. And then take a step further from it. And another.
In YOUR time, no one else's. IN YOUR way, no one else's. And we will be here and celebrate with you.
Breathe deeply. Keep remembering HE or THEY cannot GET YOU any more. EVER. You have already stepped away from them.
And, once again, screw the people who did not help. You have already begun to turn to people who are helping and will.
I'll shut up now. May you have some peace--maybe even some LAUGHTER this weekend. Dare I hope for fun?
You have courage--and it shows all the more BECAUSE you feel so afraid.
Be gentle with yourself, please.
It's encouraging to read about your turning point. I want to be there so badly as these memories are turning my life upside down.
"You have courage--and it shows all the more BECAUSE you feel so afraid." I'm going to have to remember this because it makes some sense to me. Thank you.
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