Thank you in advance for the read everyone 
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, LOVE, WRITING
For years after they gave me those electric shock treatments up at the mental hospital ashes came out both of my ears.
That never happened, I told Aunt Marguerite who was only eight years my senior, half giggling to myself that her stories were the same as when she was in her twenties before she met Wanda.
After that my aunt’s chaotic life changed. She finally belonged somewhere and meeting Wanda was undeniably the single best thing that ever happened to her since Chunky Marlow left her at the altar. Actually he never even made it to the altar. Aunt Marguerite immediately began suffering nervous breakdowns that escalated in both frequency and duration until Wanda.
Known as the Larsen Ladies, they lived over forty years together in a benign neighborhood of charming bungalows originally built as army homes. Everyone outside of relations assumed them sisters until Wanda died of a heart attack and Aunt Marguerite came right unglued at the funeral. Nobody would even care about it today but back then, it was as good as having an unwed pregnancy. All I know for sure and will attest to is their love for me, giving me safe haven from the havoc of drunken parents arguing yet again or handing me a birthday gift when no one else appeared to even remember my birth. Looking out for my beloved remaining auntie was the least I could do out of respect for both of them.
How would you know? You weren’t even born yet when I was poisoned by all those rotten smells in that drafty old boarding house.
Marguerite’s words peeled me back from the layers of memories to her room where dust motes danced in the air, brought to life by her expressive hands to play in the sun for a few seconds more. Her eyes were focused on me so sharply I remembered her telling me once “I am the hawk, I see everything.” Her hands rested on the book she was reading when I entered. I read the spine as it lay on her lap “The Last of the Crazy People – Timothy Findley.” I smiled and looked at my aunt’s outfit, her heather grey skirt her favorite garment in winter months.
Aunt Marguerite wore dresses all her life, always looked nicely put together even if she was only going to fetch some turnip for one of her aromatic soups and stews. Even now where no one but myself and the nurses would see her, her hair was bobby-pinned tidily back above each ear, her earrings matched her bright red sweater and her knee high stockings bared their tops below the hem of her wool skirt.
You were the only one affected by those bad smells, remember? I said, pouring some water in glass and taking a long cool swallow. Water is the only thing people can’t fool with, I thought, it always tastes so good. I held a glass out to my aunt who shook her head no at me.
The rest were a hardened bunch, that’s why it didn’t affect anybody else in that boarding house, she said, her eyes daring me again.
Listen to the planes overhead, they go all the time now, she continued, calmer, I can hear them crashing right through the sound barrier.
I thought of all the things I could say. It wouldn’t matter what I said really. Wanda was gone. My Aunt would never be the same again. Death changes you. It leaves you double bound. You don’t want to go on without those you love. And yet you know you must. Somehow.
I can hear the planes too, I said softly, though her care home was a good two hour drive from any airport. When she smiled up at me her eyes went from being small and fearful to become huge orbs of violet love just for me.
Aunt Marguerite, I’ll see you next week, okay?
I said this while kissing the top of her soft white hair, the fragrance of roses wafting up to me.
Don’t let me detain you, she said, her nose already back in her book.
JAM 12Feb2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, FORGIVENESS, HEART, JUSTICE, LIFE, LOVE
”In the shadow…you can see your own shape… taking shape… as you watch those in the sunshine thinking they are free of darkness…nobody ever is… crossing that line out of shadow to the warmth of light sometimes takes more courage than there is inside you… but you do it anyway because you know there is no other way.”
AuroraMorealist (c) 15May2013 (c) photo AuroraMorealist
NOW EVEN NOTHING IS SOMETHING
Lyrics © AuroraMorealist (Janice) May 11, 2013 all rights reserved
Before you I decided
Life was best alone
Now I can’t imagine
That old world of cruel stone
Before you nothing seemed
Like anything I’d want to do
Now even nothing is something
Whenever I’m with you
Your kind heart proved trust and love
More than just a scam
I don’t need you more than want you
I already found the best man
Before you everything
Was hard- oh how I’d try
To put the brave face on
Never let them see me cry
Before you nothing seemed
Like anything I’d want to do
Now even nothing is something
Whenever I’m with you
Your kind heart proved trust and love
More than just a scam
I don’t need you more than want you
I already found the best man
Now I cry proud I still can
No more rising floors
Though sad tears happen too
I’m just so happy to be yours
Before you nothing seemed
Like anything I’d want to do
Now even nothing is something
Whenever I’m with you
Your kind heart proved trust and love
More than just a scam
I don’t need you more than want you
I already found the best man
Lyrics © AuroraMorealist (Janice) May 11, 2013 all rights reserved
If anyone wishes to buy this song, please contact Aura M here or Aurora Morealist on Facebook via private message, thanks!
Tags
family, love, mothers day, poem, the way
Posted in BLESSINGS, BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, FORGIVENESS, HEART, JUSTICE, LIFE, LOVE
For many of us living in tall castles the parental celebrations loom as painful barbs, reminding us we no long have our loved one to celebrate with. But celebrate, I do. I celebrate what courtisans and courtiers cannot not teach a soul no matter their well intentioned gestures.
Celebrating my mother’s life with memories of what we endured together, she the queen and me the princess, later me the maid in waiting and she the royal child of not knowing better than she did. Of this, we are guilty, all. What can come from this unsteady ground is a love and understanding beyond all castle walls. It is an abiding love for one another and an infinite understanding that even with royal flaws, we can love one another fastly. Perhaps even more fastly than if we overlook the chinks in our armor, pretending to ourselves that humans are or were ever perfect is not something we did.
Our love was the real kind of love where you could stray out of bounds off holy grounds and return to one another with a bond that you know is eternal. My Queen mother and I went through so much together, apart and yet found our way together again that for the last fifteen years of her life, we loved one another better than ever before. Woman to woman. Female to female. Sister to sister. Daughter to mother and Mother to Daughter.
A favorite aunt visiting from afar on iron horse was key to the understanding for what my mother went through before she was my mother; of that, I knew little. They say humans want only one thing, to be understood. From her words to me, I knew she understood. From mine to her, she knew I understood. She also knew I was telling her story before she fell ill. When I am strong enough I will resume writing the story of a Queen whose biggest mistake in life, perhaps, was following her heart.
Who among us cannot forgive such a mistake… I daresay none. Some day soon I will tell our full story of life in our tiny but most loving kingdom. Queen Mama knew how to love past the trials and flaws and this is her legacy: love, pure love.
Baby pink roses will soon be blooming…once again…time changes everything… if you are present enough to grasp your moments fastly… love is all.
“When it was the last Mother’s Day, I knew. I knew when I wrapped her gifts and had to stop to take crying breaks while doing so. I knew even as we chatted on the phone and she called me to say how happy she was with the gifts. I knew she would not be “present” for another Mother’s Day. She did not. All she had was constant nausea, felt sick if she ate and sick if she didn’t. I urged her to go to the Doctor. She couldn’t get in right away for one reason or another and would not see the Doctor on duty in her own doctor’s absence so it took some time. She did not know until summer set in brutally. Nor did anyone else. How do you tell people things you “know” and you don’t know why you know certain things yet not others… You don’t. You just watch life unfold and do your grieving before the real world grieving sets in with the realities of aggressive cancers. Happy Mother’s Day, Angel Mama. Fly High.”
(c) AuroraMorealist 02May2013
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, FORGIVENESS, HEART, JUSTICE, LIFE, LOVE, POETRY
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The father was born so long ago, he would be nearly eighty now but his life was cut sharply in half of those decades. The daughter misses him still. Hears, sees and loves him everywhere she is, in everything she does. Happy Birthday, Father. Your life is celebrated daily, she says. The father’s leaving left a hole almost filled in by love everlasting. (c) JAM 29April2013
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A story of just three paragraphs, each beginning with the same sentence was the challenge, this was my immediate response, written in flash fiction time of 5-10 minutes:
(c) AuroraMorealist 28 April 2013
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, HEART, JUSTICE, LIFE, LOVE, POETRY, SOUL, WRITING
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, FRIENDSHIP, LIFE, LOVE, POETRY, SOUL, STORIES, WRITING
Tags
~dusk to dawn to dusk~
frayed ropes dangle life to and fro
~laughing last tyre hangs still~
(c) auroramorealist April16/2013
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, LIFE, LOVE, POETRY
Tags
~
dreamers adrift love seize all
mighty visionaries raising beings cloud high the
once invisible hearts of two
~
JAM (c)9April2013
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, JUSTICE, LIFE, LOVE
~
Hounds circling wide moat
Vultures scouring from on high
Hope of feasts beyond water
Falling not from the sky
Arrow sights displaced
Troops high hopes misled
Eternal starvation for
Hearts that never bled
Over a tall princess who wasted
Nary a second freeing her soul
Her last tears banking moat
Whilst fleeing far away whole
~
JAM (c) Apr5/2013
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JAM 03/Apr/2013
Posted in BONDS, CREATIVE WRITING, LIFE, LOVE, POETRY
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JAM 02April2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, POETRY, WRITING
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, POETRY, WRITING
Tags
haiku, Human, Law, nature, Psychology
~
centuries bowing one by one
staggering successions felling leaves and limbs askew
pages fashioned two by two
~
(c) JAM 19Feb2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, HEART, JUSTICE, LIFE, OPINION
(c) JAM AuroraMorealist 2013
~
“Writing is both mask and unveiling.”
E.B. WHITE
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, JUSTICE, POETRY, WRITING
Tags
*
moss drapes trunks once live
branches circling centuries anchored in truth lore
pride never survives human nature
*
JAM 8Feb2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, POETRY, WRITING
Tags
haiku, Life, poem, pyschology, writes
~
road thrice traveled deviates anew
bowing trees merciless roots spring innocent shoots
sorrows ceding todays into tomorrows
~
JAM (c)27Jan2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, POETRY, STORIES, WRITING
Tags
haiku, Literature, poem, stories, words
*
good hooks swing me high
above
myself
*
emotional eating disorderdisorderdisorder
up down too much too little too far
looking pretty in my coffin
*
dust ignored weaves thick creatures
trusted broom bristles gather sweeping sweeping sweeping
electrical circuit bound shadows remain
*
(c)JAM 10Jan2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, FRIENDSHIP, MEMORIES, POETRY, WRITING
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“Solid ice ‘neath rosy sky, no churning turning burning spurning only learning, happy we were to fly.” (c) JAM 7Jan2013
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, OPINION, WRITING
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forgiveness (Photo credit: cheerfulmonk)
Tonight I was talking to a friend about forgiveness.
He said his new religion is me and we laughed.
That was not long after I said, “The priest in Les Miserables did what I or you or anyone else would do for someone who was just released from prison, hungry and trying to make a new start and try to show the con a better way, give him a start to a better life. (Bear in mind I saw the live production at the QE theatre 3x so I am a sucker for the goodness the priest showed.) Wouldn’t we do the same? (My friend didn’t answer so I kept going.)
But think about this, does anyone really, honestly believe we should forgive Charles Manson or Hitler or the 911 bombers… I mean if that’s the case, why do we think of things as such tragedy and have a need as humans to debrief, process and come to terms with terrible crimes against our person or psyche or loss or … why can we not simply pull up our socks and get on with it – isn’t that what separates us from the animals? But even animals mourn and grieve… have you never seen it? I have.”
We both agreed we do not believe in bearing grudges or continuing to walk in anger, only that there is no “certain time” to be at peace with a situation that is grossly unjust, unfair or inhumane. I said that Chris Isaac came into my head and his interview where he, in jest, said something like “just as long as you say I’m a Christian…” because I think this massive idea of forgiveness was religion sprouted. Some things in life are simply unforgivable. They are too horrific to even speak of let alone forgive.
But that does not mean that we are not free to carry on loving others, free to trust others and move on, move forward away from the pain as best we humanly can. But sometimes we are haunted until we die. Or still have a legal process ahead of us to survive. We are not automatons nor are we clones, each of us is entitled to a different idea about healing processes because they are as individual as the person surviving them.
Sometimes there is no forgiving because, even though you probably would save that person’s life if you were called to do it in a moment of collective humanity, you wouldn’t want to be put in that position. Just in case.
Okay, I’m nuts, I’ll admit it. I was laughing when I wrote ‘just in case’ just now. But do you see what I mean?
I can’t make right wrongs others choose to do or forgive them when they aren’t even sorry and likely never will be due to that high horse they jumped on and won’t dismount.
For example, could you forgive an abuser and keep on forgiving them for incessantly abusing you further making YOU wrong every time they didn’t want to deal with the FACTS of what they had done and/or continue to do to you without any sign of regret whatsoever, all the while deeming YOU crazy while they did so?
I didn’t think so.
Neither can I.
But that’s really okay. It’s really okay not to forgive sometimes. Because sometimes forgiving just puts us right back under the wheels of the bus.
And I’m just a little more than totally exhausted from ironing out all those tire tracks on my hide.
Permission to be human and permission to not forgive if that’s what we need to do. It doesn’t mean nursing hatred or hostility because that is harmful to the self. It just means being at peace with the fact that it really is okay not to forgive. Because sometimes, you just can’t.
Oh I know holy and holier than thou people every where will likely disagree. But that just means they don’t know exactly what I mean.
No more harping at people in pain that forgiveness is the path to freedom. Or telling those unable to forgive that they are negative! That is a supreme form of abuse of someone who has already been hurt or abused in my opinion. The real path to freedom in my world is, as author and clinical psychiatrist David Burns, MD, says in his Feeling Good Handbook, getting rid of all the shoulds.
No more shoulding all over myself. No matter what the shiny, happy never-even-rode-in-my-canoe people say I “should” do. Try telling the Sandy Hook parents what they should do right now. Myself, I think I should shut my mouth and let those mourning folks do whatever it is they need to do because this is a life long healing journey and I can’t even begin to imagine how to tell others they should heal when I am still struggling myself over issues not even close to theirs on the richter scale of pain and suffering.
You should forgive, they say. They being so many who think they have or actually have or are in a far different place of wellness, having finished their own healing journey, to judge others anyway. If they really knew what they were talking about they should be quiet and accept me just as I am, wherever I am in whatever stage of the process I am in or whatever I choose to do or not to do that is best for me.
The next time somebody says “you should…” or “you need to…” to me, I will remain silent and trust that what I should really do is forgive them for their arrogance and … walk away. Quietly. I resolve not to let them disturb the peace I have found in not forgiving. They could never understand what I mean if they haven’t been here anymore than I can fathom how they preach freedom in forgiveness while walking with such loud invisible chains.
But that’s okay. We are not all the same. Different – just the way I like people.
JAM(C)3Jan2012
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, POETRY, WRITING
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, CREATIVITY, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, POETRY
Tags
mama cardinal rules chickadee girls
little boy wren musical rooster daddy trailing
back home now and then
feathered species take root dropping
age of branched years limbing minds heart
entwined salty tears born apart
Momma said birds are angels
winged ones reach, bestowing on me more
angel love borne El Salvador
what Momma foretold – oh lo!
behold those bearing wings wrapped as flower
friend’s christmas gift angel power
pink and green shades love
crocheted snowflake hers, angel hearts ensuring fast
Momma’s love will never pass
JAM 11Dec2012
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, POETRY, STORIES, WRITING
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P triangle (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
You failed him, Jino said.
Janet couldn’t hear Jino.
She loved Jino, trusted her, would never fail her bestie of two decades.
He just needs the right woman, Jino said.
Janet never suspected Jino meant herself.
Betrayal would have been nothing, such a small thing to overcome if Jino was nobody.
~ ~ ~
Alex’s rage eventually escalates into violence. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
She didn’t have to mock her friend. The plotting, betraying liar didn’t have to further destroy her friend. He’d ended it. Again. She didn’t have to kick her friend. She didn’t have to avoid the clear exits. Right things to do are often the smallest.Why didn’t she just leave?
~~~
The Madhouse (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Everyone watched the man sobbing. One woman held his hand. They muttered and sputtered around.
Sheesh, look at him in public office and all. That’s the end of his career.
Another woman shouted, Are you people crazy? He is not a criminal, it’s just mental illness!
~~~
Prisoners Cell. Alcatraz (Photo credit: Daniel2005)
Don’t think keeping quiet erases your crimes. The memories are as etched in my mind as if you had actually taken a knife and carved them directly into my grey matter. Despite hollow justifications, there will be no righting your criminal commissions against my heart, a pounding small matter.
~~~
Christmas Tree with oil paint effect from Paint.NET (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Your hands are in every treat I eat, your voice in every merry I hear. Your face in every card I write. Carols choke my heart, albums in my mind so silent in the night, I can barely bear up. Christmas without you will never be a small thing.
~~~
JAM 10Dec2012
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING, FICTION & CREATIVE NON-FICTION, POETRY, WRITING
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~
Friday feelings, excitement air light
Breezes blasting Wednesday, Thursday better still
Loneliness freeing all Sunday night
~
JAM (c) 27JUL2012
Posted in CREATIVE WRITING
Tags
acceptance, big boobs, boobs, Bras, Breast, busting out, Clothing, Health, living with big boobs, lopsided boobs, respect, Shopping
"Oh, look, boob cakes!!! Who'da thunk it???LOL LOL" Image by mayhem
Recently I learned that, thanks to genetics, I have a physical deformity shared by some sisters and nieces alike.
Apparently, through no fault of our own, we were born with one breast larger than the other. Now, because I’ve already posted a piece about the merits of breast massage, I know what you are thinking.
This woman is “breast obsessed.” That would be wrong.
But I do have a fond attachment, even a newfound respect for ”my girls.” It’s amazing how much we can so dislike something in high school as I did my generous chest and naturally curly hair, only to find ourselves appreciating those very features later in life.
Today while shopping for another bra in the midst of fifty percent off sales (yes, 50% which is a lot in the land of quality bras), I had a lovely woman assisting me and we wound up in a conversation about how one side of the body tends is a bit larger than the other. Usually the right or left hand or foot or both are slightly larger than the other. However, her chest lopsidedness was not at all noticeable.
On a recent shopping trip with a niece to spend some quality time together celebrating her birthday, she bemoaned her uneven chest through the walls of the change room. I’ve never noticed, I said, you look great to me.
Seconds later, she said, unlock your door. She stepped inside, shut the change room door, lifted her top and said, “Look, I wasn’t kidding!” We laughed together but she looked so stunning in the aqua halter-top she was trying on, I assured her no one would notice. I know this because they don’t seem to notice it with me either. But I do.
When I was in my twenties, I used to suffer upper back pain and several times, my doctor suggested reduction surgery. Instead, I worked out harder to strengthen my upper body. It worked. I no longer have the shoulder pain and upper back pain I used to suffer. And I am so grateful I didn’t have surgery.
Jacket and dress shopping are challenging because the waist is often a 6 or 8 but the 38 DD top just won’t stuff in no matter how I rearrange my flesh. I do not share to brag but to illustrate the shape that has often mistakenly resulted in the assumption by others that my sexuality is always ”on roar” or more readily available just because of my physical shape. It really is quite insulting to your intelligence.
“The girls” have often garnered far more attention over the years than I was comfortable with. Dark tops in brown, black and navy are helpful and I seldom wear anything showing any cleavage at all, just to downplay that element because everyone except little children seem to notice “the girls” first, then look into my eyes.
Sometimes they don’t even look at my face at all. Especially some men. They “talk” to my chest. I hate that. But then, people do tell us who they are, don’t they? These are some of the things that have caused me to envy my less endowed sisters.
Once while trying on a dress in a local boutique, Lotus, I think it’s called, the owner was helping me but I lamented that the dress wouldn’t fit my boobs at all. “They are beautiful,” she said, “did you buy them?”
I burst out laughing and said no, I was born with them. You are so lucky, she said. I consider that a compliment on high because, I suspect, in all her years of fitting women, she’s seen enough boobs to know. Men often say anything just to try to have their way with you but I figure she’s a “sister woman” without ulterior motives so she, as Alanis Morissette sings, ”oughta’ know.”
Lopsided or not, they are mine, they are attached to me and the only thing I detest anymore is when people use the word boob to describe someone foolish. That’s because I find it an insult to breasts but other than that, I’m good with my ”girl boobs.” At long last.
24 Friday May 2013
How do you get PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder)?
I don’t know that there is a pat answer to this question. Soldiers, those in combat, hostage takings (which I once was in the remand centre while in the line of duty years ago – and while I was not a hostage or even working in the section of the jail where it took place, we were all in lock down for many hours and they brought debriefing teams in to help us cope with what we’d gone through). That was just one day! Not months of recovery from horrific car accidents, war, multiple losses, shootings or other catastrophic events that thrust the human psyche beyond it’s own protective walls holding it hostage for months or even years at a time.
What I understand is that some of us may never fully recover. Shock after shock and trauma after in an 18 month period that was brutally relentless with loss after loss, shock after shock and death after death (literal and figuratively), is the way I got it. Those are what still trigger me.
Today I had to think about how I will pay my rent. The day was fog-ridden in my brain with much of my time struggling to think straight. I have 600 dollars and my rent is 750 (a good deal as it includes heat, hydro, cable, internet, laundry and hot water). So I am trying to figure out how to do this by the first of June.
I had to make a phone call I did not want to make and spent four hours upset about it before I finally followed through. The call ended badly, with him defending my former bestie who deleted the messages I left him on my own former home number on my own former answering machine in my own former home. Instead of saying, don’t worry, I will do what the court told me to, don’t worry, he escalated our exchange. He is an escalator and a blamer. I hung up on him. I wish the courts would just deal directly with him. This left me crying and triggered pretty high but because I slept so little last night due to these worries, I am so exhausted now, I will probably sleep well tonight.
A lovely lady who helped me with a ream of paper work understood PTSD without me saying a word. Their family had a house fire when their daughter was in grade school. No one was hurt but the girl was so traumatized and fearful that she was in her teens before the symptoms of PTSD (anxiety, hypervigilance, overwhelmed, brain flooding, headaches and crying) began to lessen their hold on her psyche. She would even avoid the area of the house long since repaired or tiptoe around it fearfully looking at those rooms as if they could still somehow hurt her. Her sleep was fitful, she couldn’t concentrate in school where she’d been doing very well prior to the fire and nightmares plagued her relentlessly. I understand this. This is exactly my experience but for entirely different trauma/shocks.
There was never any room for my needs in my marriage or many of my friendships and three sister relationships. This is because I was so busy being “there” for them, I never even voiced any needs of my own. Even if I had, they were incapable of hearing me and often “blamed” me or “shamed” me for having any. Then again, I didn’t even know what those needs were. I sure know what I don’t need now.
Once when my mother-in-law and I had one of our all night talks, she said that knowing what you want out of life is the most difficult thing to determine. I think she was right. For all of my life I was taught/trained to put others needs first, to make sure everyone else was happy. It was almost as though I didn’t really exist. Or was invisible. And I was.
If I tried to say ‘hey, I am worth something, look what I just achieved’ I was shot down and abused, my achievement nothing and my abilities criticized though I was successful in most things I did to the point of getting straight A’s or graduating with 97%. Sometimes I want to just lay down and sleep forever, it feels like I’ll never have peace in my life again. There will always be court with torment present in the form of my former friend who has no business in my business. There are always money stresses and yet, some days, it’s all I can do to get myself groomed and dressed never mind try to do more.
I know now that was wrong, that healthy relationships are reciprocal and caring about your needs is what healthy people do. They ask you, they actually even want to know… it’s amazing to me to be this age and just now learning this.
It’s also amazing to think that writing, the desire to write something, anything from a three lined haiku to a rant about recycling methods or just talking about this PTSD experience can give me a sense of achieving something and I really am. I live to write and I write to live.
Taking so much in stride for decades, I was able to put myself on the shelf and accommodate people I loved to the point that they grew to expect it and when I dared complain once of cleaning up after family visiting my own home, I was told promptly, “We are on vacation.”
There is still no room for me even as I fight my hardest to get through these days, when tormented by the mockery of those who shattered my psyche with their nasty, hidden-agenda secrets that expoded my soul in 2011 into splinters of my former self and I have been fighting to find my way back ever since.
The truth is, according the Trauma Counselor(s), PTSD psychologist(s) and top notch psychiatrist who is among the best in her profession and also a local hospital administrator, I may never return to the stores of energy I once had, or felt I had. This may be as good as it gets. And that’s really okay with me. As long as I can write, I will be okay. I told the Trauma Counselor that if I ever stop writing, I will die. So I write when I can in bursts that I can’t predict for brief periods and then I flatline for hours because my eyes hurt, my head hurts, my brain aches and I am exhausted. But it still feels good and I’m glad I can at least write.
Blogging was the best idea my friends ever had because once I started, I felt bad if I didn’t write something for a spell and felt I would let people/subscribers down if I didn’t keep my blog active. It gave me a purpose to get up, to do something, even if it only took 15 minutes, I could tell myself, Yay, you did it!!!
Everything is exhausting and has to be planned to the tiniest detail. Any shocks, surprises, jolts or triggers can throw me and render me incapable of doing anything and not just for a day but for many in a row.
On a good day I am able to attend a class in coping with PTSD or pick up a couple of groceries or even visit with a friend. On the rare extremely good day, I rest up to celebrate a friends birthday out (I do not smoke, drink or do drugs) or even do my taxes which I recently did online. However, when you have no income, that’s an easy chore. Unlike the days when I find I am too anxious to even leave my little apartment because of all the hatred, angst and cruelty in the world.
On dark, hurtful days, as in court in February when SHE had the nerve to show up at MY court hearing with MY husband, SHE who was more close friend, siphoning off my already broken psyche and joining him to verbally and in her own handwriting, abuse me even further to the point she physically kicked me, I plan my death. It feels so unfair, so wrong and so unjust that she got away with that and my life is in tatters.
Make no mistake. This is no pity party. If pity was all I wanted, I would write you the gory details, the like of which I’m sure would almost shock you into PTSD yourself. It really is an unbelievable story where friends and sisters you thought you could lean on blame, belittle, demean and mock you all to make themselves and their ill choices to use you when they need to okay with themselves.
I’m almost used to it now. Wait. I hope I never get used to it because it causes me to ponder whether I can continue on in a world so full of hurt that there is no safe place.
Still, when I think about how bad I once was, unable to speak properly and so overwhelmed with my brain flooding to protect itself, I see some progress inch by inch. It doesn’t take much for me to be triggered (see part 5) by the abuse(s) of others and I realize I’m not stuttering much any more as the frequency and duration of the triggers decrease. Still, court is not done yet.
When I look around my place, it looks better. The stacks of laundry everywhere are shrinking. The days of dishes are getting done up in less than a week now. The patio looks pretty and ready for reading. Last year I wasn’t really interested in anything. This year, I am counting my blessings in new friends, friendships based on reciprocity and compromise with trust and healthy communication the foundation.
This year, I am interested in figuring out how to beat this thing called PTSD. If I ever can. The thing is, a couple of days a month, I get the big idea that I’m pretty good, almost back to normal but when I look at the entire month, I see that two or three days out of thirty is not that great. And the thing is, you never know which 2 or 3 days it will be. Still, that’s two or three days a month more than I had in 2011 after the bomb dropped and more than I had all of 2012 after she physically assaulted me.
It may not seem like much but it’s something. This, these windows of time amounting to two to three days per month of decent time spent are what give me hope that I will be better someday. It’s all I have really. Everything else was destroyed. Hope really does float on dreams of better things ahead.
I know I’ll make the rent okay now anyway, I have enough credit to tide me over until next court in September but that is all. Hoping it is fairly settled at court so I can leave this nightmare behind me permanently.
More next time, my friends.
(c)AuroraMorealist 23May2013
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