Here I find myself again, with tears streaming and a heart that aches. I have no idea what to do. I feel lost in a world that is passing me by, crippled by the fears of the unknown that consume me. So many paths lay before me and I can’t even take the first step, the pain inside crippling. Betrayal, anger, hurt, hate, love, loss; all consuming thoughts.   I don’t want to be here.  I feel tired and broken and the task of putting the pieces back together is impossible; even if I could, I would never be the same. My life can be seen through a series of misfortunes that have torn me down to what I am today. I know what people want to see and I give them that. The happy go lucky girl who loves and is loved but nothing could be further from the truth. Events shape us. Trauma consumes.
You’d think in my 30 years I would have learned how to get past it, how to deal, but as each year passes time feels to drag on. I am raped daily in my mind, beaten by my father, criticized and belittled by my mother, ignored by my brothers, beaten by a boyfriend, married the first man who promised to take me away from it all then brought back and cheated on me. I suffer the loss of my best friend every time I see emergency lights on the streets. I hold my breath and pray for everyone in it and anyone who knows them as I remember the night I watched Erika’s husband hold her hand and weep as the blood from within her gradually seeped out onto the crisp white hospital sheets.  I silently wept in the corner watching so closely for her chest to rise, for a machine to be turned back on.  I ache for her yet I envy her at the same time. She was able to leave this world quickly, when it was her time. I wait for my time and sometimes even find myself praying that it would come. Tired, beat down, I feel as though the only option I haven’t explored is taking matters into my own hands. I lay my head to rest a mere 3 feet from a loaded 357. Thoughts have crept in that I should just pull it out and end it all. Then reality sinks in. I have two wonderful little boys who are my world. How could I let them find me or say their goodbyes to their mother with her brains blown out? They are my heart, my world, my reason for existing and I don’t want them to see me like this. I watched my parents down many bottles of alcohol to numb the pain that they themselves endured and inflicted; liquid courage and liquid demise. I think of smoking again, the sweet sting of release that immediately follows the first big drag, but then the whole cancer thing pisses me off too and makes it not worth it anymore. I workout as hard as I can and I’m pissed that my hair is soaking wet and that I have to go wash it AGAIN. I write because no one can criticize me but them no one also knows of my issues buried deep.
I weep daily, often times so hard I can’t breathe. The pain builds to rage yet there is no way to heal the cuts on the inside so I put them on the surface. Here they are tangible, painful, and able to heal. My secret has remained for years. Fear of people’s reactions and judgments’ has forced my mouth shut. So many times I have wanted to share but the thought of being treated as if I were sick is too much to bear. I wish I had someone who could just be here, non judgmental, and just listen to me spill every trauma and event that self inflicted wounds ironically merely conceal. I want to feel ok for the first time to break down but I need someone there to hold me up or I’m afraid I will crumble. I need to do this and I have no one I trust enough to understand it all and why it’s ok. I need to feel comfort and care unconditionally, no matter how bad I get.  Therapy was a joke, a timer and a stranger with a defined beginning and end….i never know where to start. It’s not even enough to scratch the surface on the real issues inside me. “You need to find happiness within yourself before you can find happiness with anyone else.â€Â This I have heard so many times I could vomit. Read the above and tell me where the fuck am I supposed to find any happiness from within? Within what? The shell of the person I have become? This deep, dark vast pit of emptiness, of nothingness. Good luck finding happiness there. I am at a loss for myself. It is the pain that I draw on that makes me who I am, but there is no happiness to be found just wounds and scars from my battles to be alive.
I’m tired and feel like the time to give up is drawing near.
2 comments
I’m careful to never tell anyone “I know how you feel” because that can sound pretty arrogant, but I will say that I do feel that I can relate to you a lot. The traumas over the years certainly do add up. I feel broken and tired too.
I finally gave in and started going to therapy after years of saying it was a silly idea, and much like you, it hasn’t helped me much. Like you said, barely scratching the surface, I try to cram in so much to every session and I’ve been going for a few months now and I feel like I’ve gotten nowhere.
I don’t have any kids though, you have 2 and you have to try to keep going for them. If it makes you feel any better, for a few weeks now my first thought in the morning and my last thought at night has been about ending this life, and I don’t have any kids or anyone who I need to worry about, I could go when I’m ready, but I will keep trying for now if you will too.
Hi lilredangel, your post has really touched me, hitting very close to home. I too have two children, although they are nearly grown up, but they still need me, they have no one else in this country.
I had a emotionally neglectful and partially abusive childhood, very lonely, excessive bullying throughout. This triggered my first bout of depression, for 7 years, with one serious suicide attempt when I was 21.
Like you I went with the first man who told me I was special, and endured 12 years of the most extreme emotional abuse, and also some sexual abuse including rape within that marriage, without so much as realising that this was even abuse, so conditioned was I from childhood that this kind of stuff is normal.
When I finally broke free I faced a very hard life as a single mother, with no family support, no support financially or otherwise from the father, and one son with severe behavioural problems. I was very tempted many times to kill myself then, but I put my children first and persisted, and refused to loose hope and eventually I married again – only to discover that he too became controlling and abusive, and I had to escape again. My second husband too turned out to me a monster, and the divorce was an absolute war!
But this time I was broken. In the last two years I’ve been in a psychiatric hospital four times, 6 months overall, and am suffering from severe recurring depression, PTSD, and chronic fatigue. I am so afraid of men now, I cannot even begin to imagine to even date again, let alone have a relationship again. I have nightmares of men slipping back into my life, yet I don’t want to imagine the rest of my life on my own. At 47 years, my career is destroyed, I cannot work and am subsisting on a disability pension. I have no idea what to do with the rest of my life.
I used to be passionate, I have two university degrees and was hard-working and intelligent and quick to learn anything new. All that is gone. The uni degrees are worthless, in one are I don’t want to work anymore, and the other one I cannot. I have not enough concentration or stamina to learn anything new. I have no idea what I even would want to do work-wise.
Like you I only live for and because of my children. Without them I would have ended my life already many times over and long ago. But I am worried that the pain will eventually overrule even my love from them. I see it as virtually inevitable that after another year or two, when my younger son has finished school and is of age, that I will complete suicide. It’s not a plan, but I am pretty sure once they need me a little bit less, that I will no longer have the willpower to resist.
In the meantime, I do a lot of therapy. Unlike you I do find it helpful, but even though I have been doing it for two years now, it has not lessened the pain. It has given me understanding, and tools and skills to survive and get through each day – but the pain persists. If it never goes away ….
My advice to you would be to persist with the therapy, but maybe try a different therapist. I recently switched to a different psychologist, and it was a good move. I still have some hope that with the new one I will achieve some results, she is very good! Not all therapists are the same, they have different personalities, styles, and use different methods. It’s worth trying several until you find someone who works for you. Try to find someone who specialises in trauma and abuse. Because giving up is just not an option in your situation, …. I understand that only too well. Are you on medication as well?