
There is nothing easy about the healing process. The deeper I find myself going on this journey and the more I recollect those memories from the place I thought I hid them, the harder the work becomes. Some days I feel like it would be much easier to just give up.
In the past, I have blogged after I've had time to process a situation, but this morning, I felt it was important to share what I am currently experiencing while in the middle of this week's raging storm; to be able to express the raw thoughts and emotions as they are happening, in the hopes that it may help someone else who is struggling.
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Weeks like this one, SUCK...! My thoughts won't shut off. They are on replay over and over. If I'm not gravitating from one end of the spectrum to the other, I am over analyzing every situation, which after a while leaves me exhausted and unable to think clearly.
I am spiraling in my battle with PTSD and depression...
I recognize it. I've been here before, just not on this magnitude.
This is where I get myself into trouble and where I fear the damage, I cause within my relationships, is irreparable. This is where I wonder if anyone is truly listening, even if I'm not saying anything. This is where I tend to push people away so they don't get too close. This is where I feel trapped, trying to break past the bars that keep me confined and unable to fix what I have broken. This is where I want to hit myself in the head in order to get the thoughts out. This is where I get angry and where I sit with my thoughts and cry until my head feels like it will explode with pain. This is where shame brings tension throughout my body. It is where sleep now comes in waves lasting anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours during the course of the night. It is where my appetite begins to decrease. It is where I wonder how many more times I can fall and still get back up...and how much strength I have left in me to do it again. It is where I begin to feel like a burden to everyone around me...where I feel like I've let everyone down... It is where, when I am in this emotional state, I feel like I'm too much for others to handle. It is where I misread signals and statements and why I tend to back away and get quiet. It is where I go on the apology tour because I'm bouncing from one emotional extreme, or thought, to the other and I am fearful of what I've said, things unsaid and for what I may have done while lashing out. It is where I begin to wonder which me will show up, as I move from the rational, to the irrational, and back to the rational. It is where I beg God to help me fight this. It is where sometimes I don't hear Him or feel His presence. It is where I struggle with my faith. It is where I feel I have disappointed Him. It is where I cannot imagine His forgiveness, because I have yet to forgive myself. It is where I get overwhelmed at the thought of His love for me. It is where I feel the loneliest...and in the end, it is where I tend to isolate...
This is what the storm has been like for me this week. All of this, at once....over and over again.
I have to remind myself that this is the biggest step I've yet to take in coming to terms with the trauma and pain associated with past events. As I attempt to deal with one memory, more of them enter the picture and together they wage war in my head and in my heart. I have a lot to unpack and process but it's just going to take time and patience. It took years for all this to build up and I cannot expect everything to change in a day. I'm in a battle. The lines have been drawn.
Things get very blurry and very messy in such a hurry that I can't seem to keep up. My rational mind reenters from time to time reminding me that I do make the right choices when I seek out help, that I do have a voice, that this time of struggle won't last forever and that I do have friends who support me, love me, and who will grab me by the back of my neck and turn me around.
If I say things or do things that are out of character for me, I apologize. It is not intentional, it is absence of thought. Please don't give up on me...I'm just at a place where the old me is dying and the new me is beginning to grow, to understand where I've been and what has happened. Know that if I have reached out to you, I see you, I hear you and I appreciate you more than you'll ever know...I just may not always be in a place to articulate, or show, that.
Healing hurts...it can be a dark, lonely and sometimes ugly place at times. I cannot personally heal if I'm not willing to be honest, vulnerable and do the work it takes to move past this. This is why I chose to write while I'm in the storm and not wait until after I had time to process it.
I'm nowhere near having all the answers I seek, or where I want to be, but I am aware enough to know that this journey will eventually bring me to a place where I will find that peace and freedom.
~Parker
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