And at first, I was all, “Damn girl, give me the name of your therapist cuz that is seriously taking the express lane!”  But then I shook my head because frankly I consider myself a woman of above average intelligence and a pretty quick learner and I know there is no way in all that is holy that this woman worked through CSA and cult life in “just a few short weeks”.  I can only ass-u-me that she is lying (which I will not do) or that she has shoved it all in a chum bucket somewhere and that someday it will spill over again and she will be eaten by sharks.   Trust me, on this one, ya’ll…it’s happened to me.  Then I thought, “She’s judging me!”  But she really wasn’t – it actually wasn’t about me at all. 

Sadly, it does not just “go away” and there are a few choices we can take to “stop the insanity”.  We can 1.  try to ignore the pain and those “weird” feelings of worthlessness and shame.  2.  do what some people think you should do and just-be-happy- for crying out loud! 3.  pray really really hard that God will make it all *disappear*  - this only works if you pray out loud, in church…and have your very religious grandmother to request prayer for you too…out loud, in front of the entire congregation…on Easter Sunday… 4.  Drug up and shut up already!  5.  Half-smile and throw it in a bucket and hope like hell it doesn’t spill out on you again 6.  kill yourself 7. do the work it takes to heal from it  (I think I’ll end at seven…I like the number and I could go on and on and then you’d become bored and just stop reading and I don’t want that.  And neither do you because if you stop reading you’ll never get to the end and it’ll be all *unfinished* in your mind…and that’s just a sucky feeling. 

So anyway…. I digress (again! – undiagnosed ADHD – however, I’m sure it’s somewhere in my *clinical chart* I just haven’t come across it yet) 

It doesn’t just go away.  We act like it does (and I can say that cuz I used to be one of these “people”) and we grow up and we move onward, and upward, and make and meet goals, and plan our educations and careers and lives and we think, “That wasn’t so bad after all.”  And then one day we get jack-knifed from behind by the assholes we thought we had outrun.  And then it all starts again…the old patterns, the old riptides, the same-old-things you thought you were past…you’re not.  It’s there…lurking in the shadows, hiding in a bucket, swept under the rug.  The rain didn’t wash it away at all. 

There are people who do judge those who feel stuck in the quicksand, seemingly sinking, unmoving, maybe even falling backwards.  And for those who do feel stuck right now, you’re not wrong.  You’re not wrong for being exactly where you are right now.  You’re not wrong for reaching out for help, or not feeling like you’re “not enough”, or rebuking to hell therapies you do not agree with! 

I still vehemently rebuke dbt!  I still say it was retraumatizing for me and I still scream it from the top of my lungs (and I have a VERY loud voice, and vast lung capacity, I promise).  And the nun, with her, “If I can be happy than you can too…” attitude, you’re not superior to me!  I personally think your program sucks big-time onions and I’m not afraid to say it.  In fact, sometimes I think about dying and then I’m all, “No! If I die, who will stand up for the 100s of survivors who have read, commented, and emailed me saying they hated dbt, felt invalidated and unheard, retraumatized, pressured into taking the *untherapy* classes and did not want to go but felt like you had no voice to say no!  (sound familiar?)  I’m really good at sticking up for other people -I only have a problem doing it for myself.  Well, what-do-ya-know!  I guess that onion-sucker is keeping me alive after all… 

So, dahling commenter, I hope you’re right.  I hope you did work through all of your past in a few short weeks!  Good for you! And if dbt helped you – then Bravo!  The last thing any of us need is for that shit to keep coming back! 

But as for me, I’m still here living with ghosts who try to kill me nearly every night.  But once I get that demonologist and exorcism up in here – those assholes  and the buckets that onion-sucker tried to make me put them in, they will go to hell for good… never to come back again!

Distraction…before leaving for a 2 week outing (literally, OUTING) in the wilderness, the therapist asked me what I would do to “distract” myself and “keep busy” while she was away.  Which, she seemingly doesn’t understand this, but some of you do: I could buy tickets to Las Vegas and plan to go -but should I fall into the pit of hell – I will not go even though I had it *planned*.  Ever happen to you?  Happens to me! 

Harriet sent the 5 year old a kit to make pot holders! 

My friend Harriet was kind enough to come up with some ideas, games, things to keep the 5 year old busy…so we made pot holders!  Yes!  The 5 year old likes pink  a lot and so she made a pink potholder from the really awesome kit that Harriet sent to her.  (Harriet knows how kids should be treated and is a good mom!) 

The pot holder is complete!  YAY ME!

Thank you Harriet!  So sweet of you to think of the 5 year old and to send this stuff to her. 

Do you not just love it!  So *preppy* – I need a new IZOD to go with it!  LUV IT!

But I still see that girl.  She is five, eight, ten, twelve…they are still inside me, screaming in pain, yelling at me to help them and here I am 25 years later, standing here alone with all of these girls so wounded and afraid and I am unable to help them.  All of this pain from recent years has shattered me, ghosts haunt me, and I realize just how much hurt I never let go of.  Every night takes me back to the most painful times in that girl’s life and I see just how little I have recovered from the destruction they left behind – the wreckage that was supposed to be me!   All of the pain, all of the baggage they put on me, forced me to carry, it is too heavy!  And I am so tired.   

I plead with them at night, “Please don’t be like this…”  And it is so frustrating because I don’t know how to make them be any other way.  Every night I feel like I am trapped behind this one-way mirror and I can see everyone but no one can see me.  And I am screaming for help but no one hears me.  No one sees me.  No one will help me manage them and I have no idea how to do it on my own.  I feel diminutive and insignificant in a way that feels simply dreadful and it makes me feel worthless.  I feel a bit like I don’t exist.  I watch and listen and look and I am pleading…please help me…please see me here…but they don’t. 

I know that’s not true.  I know that can’t be true.  People care about me, people love me, want to be with me, offer me help, try to get me to talk to them, but no one really SEES me.  No one sees beyond the obvious projection of who I *appear* to be and into my shattered heart and deep into my soul.  No one really knows her and that is what makes it feel so extraordinarily lonely, that’s what pushes me over the edge of the cliff and into the darkness…falling, falling, falling…and there’s no one to catch me.  Where is everybody?  Where are you?  I can’t see the bottom and it’s so black and cold and I’m so afraid… but I have to believe that there is someone down there in the darkness that is strong enough to catch me because I’m not strong enough to catch myself.   Because I am not strong enough to say out loud, “Please take my hand and help me, I am dying.” 

And of course now I am crying and can barely see the computer screen and my dog, Sammy, is pressing his face under my arm and putting his paw in my lap as he tries to get as close to me as possible.  He loves me and he’s trying to tell me, “It’s going to be okay Grace, I promise, we’re gonna make it after all.”

I need to take a deep breath and know that it’s okay.  Because it is.  Because it has to be.

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I am sitting here with my heart in my throat and I need to be here.  I want to be here.  I crave being a part of this community but at the same time I fear the judgment.  I have felt so deeply absorbed in my own pain and yet wanting so desperately to express my thoughts and feelings here.  Voices inside of me begging to be heard, to connect with someone who might possibly understand how it is I feel.  I have poured my energy and channeled my anger into writing.  The hurt, the sadness, the rage, the hurt, the shame, and my Lord, the unbearable pain…all made me write…and write…and write.  I pour my heart, my soul, my very self out here and the sense of belonging and community here make me better.  Even if only for a minute…

Sometimes it is just too heavy and I am having a hard time coping.  With the crazyiness…with life.  I move from wanting to change to giving up on myself constantly.  I am not yet ready to explain what giving up feels like, but Friday night, I gave up.  And I want you to give up on me too.  I want you to be angry at me for giving up.   

And yet I want you to care and I want your help.  There is so very much to fix inside of my crazy-brain.

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I just needed someone to *acknowledge* my pain…because the pain itself was my ultimate truth!  A necessary means to a desperately needed end!  Thank God that’s over!

** Grace struggles silently in her drunken effort to understand herself completely and achieve the ultimate enlightenment in one fell swoop** after an evening of engaging in smoking crack with the nun (you did know she’s a crackwhore right?**

…a.n.d…I did it!  I have finally reached the ethereal state of Zen.  Read my *book* on how you can do it too!  Coming soon to a bookstore near you!  My book, “Gracie loves the Zenigans” will be right next to the ‘blo-me a kiss when you-r-leaving  ‘huge red and black book – don’t touch that one though – it’ll burn you right to the core! 

Come over here and help me transcend upon another one-a- them there ’soulgasms’, would’ja?

I walk on this path where madness and insanity are the only stepping stones.  And the voices get louder with each step I take.  They speak in familiar tones telling me how much I am hated, loathed, despised, unlovable.   And I know…I know how close I come…when my vision becomes wavy and the voices grow louder and the counting begins…Everyone hates you.  You are worthless.  No one cares.  Not a soul in this world would miss you.  So close…closer…closer…I can feel his breath in my ear and there is only one way to make him go away.

Yup.  Thanks to the wine, loraz, and insanity, I’m speaking freely tonight!  I got a lotta worthless shit to say and I’m spilling it here in the internet, so sit down, shut up, and listen (Hilarical!I just told an inaminate object to shut up!).
I am scared.  Sometimes petrified!  I work hard…so hard to just stay here, and it’s difficult at times.  Like I use EVERYTHING in me to fight it.  And I’m scared.  What if I can’t?  What if nothing I have will work?  What if I succumb to the madness?   The clock is ticking so loud in my ear and I am shaking and digging through this box of keys, frantically searching for the right one. And I know time is limited.  I know that I have to find that key before the clock stops.  What if I can’t find it?

Yesterday on my way home from work, there was an accident and the police had the road blocked, which forced me to drive on a kind of detour, weaving through some country roads, driving around the reservoir.  The road isn’t really paved, so you have to drive fairly slow…and as I rounded the east side of the reservoir, the sun was reflecting off of the water as it began to descend behind the mountains and it was breathtaking.  You know those people (maybe you’re one of them) who spends a lot of time in “nature” and you see beauty and you feel at peace?  I saw beauty and I felt at peace for a brief moment.  And I thought, this would be a good place to spend your last moments, right here, in this water, as the sun sets behind the mountains…peaceful. 

Madness is just another ford for fucked up.  Don’t you think?  Gawd…I am a quite literally *mad*.  I hate this – this rattling on and on until I fall off into the abyss.  Tumbling into the darkness and not knowing where, or even if, I will land.  I hate to think of everyone judging me.  I think you hate me.  I’m fairly certain it’s true.  Weak.  Mad. Insane.  I hate me.  Why wouldn’t you?  I judge me…why shouldn’t you?  Weak…Mad…Insane… 

It is too much sometimes…never really feeling alive, so never really capable of dying to escape the cruel evil abusive people who tear and claw at me, skinning me, burning me, killing me slowly and oh.so.painfully.  And I hear his anger and I feel his hate.  And I fight…I stay in survival mode and pretend everything is okay.  But why?  When I am certain not a soul would truly miss me.

I am not going to fill out a *self-care* sheet because as you know I frankly don’t think it is worth the paper it’s written on (and thank you for not *forcing* it on me).  But I thought I would tell you (in writing) that I will do the best I can  (but no guarentees) during your absence to limit my exposure to the ever coveted trail mix and social lubricant (that’s booze…btw, not sure what you were thinking…and as it stands I’ve not seen the other social lube since the talk I had several weeks (months?) back…yay me). 

Anyway, the purpose of my writing you prior to your upcoming venture into the wilderness is not to discuss the ole’ traumatizing rectal rogering, but to let you know that I swear on the host body’s life –  my life - shit! I will do my very best to be ‘good enough’ and try not to let my emotions dictate my actions while you are away hiking, 218 miles, sleeping with bears and peeing in bushes (OMG! And I’m the one in therapy? Something is terribly wrong here!  What are you thinking bushwoman??  I digress- and I can’t help but wonder: did you fall for it this time?)

But please take note that after a few nights of listening to the incessant screaming and fighting and angst and litany of questions and crying drawn out for hours and hours in a vomitous string and – I- don’t- really- like- it!! I’ve no idea….URGH!   It feels like a brain hangover.  Only it’s more pounding and torturous because it comes every night, lasts much longer and it burns a hole through my soul instead of my stomach, and there are no pills that will erase the burning.  And I know you don’t have the answers on how to quench the internal fire so I won’t ask. (But if you do have the answers, and you feel good about them, I’m happy for you…and feel free to share…as long as it doesn’t involve any spiritual Buddhism or hiking 200 miles or ssris that make you fat.  Seriously.  I’m not joking.)

Yesterday, you made me cry…but in a good way.   Thank you for *hearing* me and for not pushing the backup-MWB or even offering me her card! (For real…honest).  And I love you for your care and your ‘safeness’…even though it brings great suffering and bone-crushing pain I am grateful to have been given the opportunity for the real me to speak and to laugh and cry.  For the chance to be ‘good enough’.

Loads of Cherry flavored licorice Hugs,

Grace & Co.

P.S. I really didn’t mean what I said about the food thing, btw…and in fact, I am willing to bake you a casserole and have it parachuted in, if you like.  (Water too!)

P.S.S.  Should you come back from your vacation and find that your awesomely fantastic giant dolphin I call Dorothy, is missing…I didn’t take it, nor did I leave the ransom note.  I don’t even know who CrazyBrain is…or the 5 year old.  (The nerve! Some people just cannot be trusted!…even when you think you *know* them!)