EMAIL TO DON

My internal world is clamoring for boundaries with three remaining siblings that did not touch me in a criminal way but were silent by-standers and co-conspirators. Once too anxiety ridden and fearful of rejection to express my truth and outlining boundaries, it is time. Especially after Don added me to an email list of an attacker’s relatives. Don was once a father-like figure but that was long ago. Grateful for his help then, he is not same person now.

_______________________________________

I am not an invisible, compliant, worthless doormat. What happened was real. It is not in the past; it is my every day. I must manage the damage done daily because I was permanently hurt in many ways. Sudden noises or movements cause a heightened scare. No trust for others, just fear. No happy sex life, just thoughts of rape.

The extensive damage is not only from the attackers but the rest who knew and did nothing to help or stop it. You and Seth knew. I told Seth, “Danny fucked me.”

A little girl with that coming out of my mouth which must mean Dan said it to me while he did it, but it had to have been so violent that even now my psyche will not allow it up. Aunt Ruth knew. These days, as a school nurse, she would be required to report it, but not then.

I still am expected to be compliant and silent. No. Co-conspirators cause as much damage.

The insensitively of giving my name and addresses like you did shows that the love you profess for me is conditional, based solely on whether I interfere with your plans or not, that of collecting a clan or ‘family.’

That was no family for me. It was a place of terror and trauma, ongoing, relentless, and severe. I was expected to be quiet about all of it making the damage permanent because unprocessed trauma stays in the body breaking many systems beyond repair.

Then you become buddies with Tom, his attack horrific, but more horrific was the way he treated me the rest of my life, causing so much more damage to my self-esteem than any attack by all 4; his sly put-downs, sneers, and nastiness spoken around everyone about me, done so slyly it was hardly noticed by anyone but me.

No one defended me or said anything to correct him. I was put in a bad light in everyone’s eyes without anyone really being aware that his treatment of me tainted their view of me-useless, less than.

What did you do to help or stop it after you ran in the bathroom when I was 8 or 9? I was screaming in the bathtub because it “‘hurt down there.” (my exact words) You left looking disgusted. That was right after Dan raped me when no came to comfort me, give me medical attention, nor stopped 3 more from attacking me.

Would you expect your daughter to cozy up to Chet’s relatives if he had committed years of attacks on her? The same with your closeness with Tom?

No. I am supposed to be quiet and compliant, and be muscled by your acceptance with compliance, or rejection if not. That is not love.  

I want to love you, and I do, but I do not trust you.

ANXIOUS GRATITUDE

Feelings of safety were severely comprised due to the email hacking, now dealing with heightened anxiety which blows up in an instant when anything frightens me, and any little thing does even on my best days; a noise, working on the computer wondering if the hacker is following my every move, or even in the meadow where safely almost always reigns except when sudden noises occur, a snake is lying in front on me while walking, or an unaccustomed movement is heard in the weeds or trees.

My systems have been on alert since age 8, so anxiety is managed daily, but the hacker along with Don adding me to list of so called family about an dead attacker’s grandsons, put it on higher, red-hot emergency mode. It is akin to a car accident, once being struck from behind, then the year after always looking in the rear view mirror fearfully and on edge.

It will take a long while before safety returns fully, a relative term, because my system is on alert already. Yet, gratefulness fills me as the smaller increase of anti-depressant has allowed for several good nights of sleeps, making my days more productive and pleasant.

The meadow is opening with buttercups. The nests around the patio have baby birds chipping in chorus as parents fly back and forth feeding them behind me in the vine growing up the side of the house. The parents send out warning sounds when chipmunks appear protecting their babies from any climbing up.

That is enough drama for me. It is a fact that even in this quiet life, invasions and thievery occur stealing my peace, and heightening anxiety to untenable extremes.

As sleep returns so does gratefulness, lucky to have sons that help with computer stuff, a husband devoted, and land to thrive on… growing as it grows.

ALONE WITH MYSELF

PHOTO BY PATRICIA

Alone with myself, but not lonely. That is the magic of locating my core once again after last week’s separation from it.

A life of searing loneliness healed over time when feeling safe here on the land and in the meadow.

In childhood with repeated, terrifying traumas that went unprocessed, my body stayed on alert, finding everyday events life-threatening.

When real threats occur, it becomes unbearable and sleep issues return. My email was hacked last week, and the thief racked up hundreds of dollars on my account on Amazon.

Along with that the origin family added my name to an email about a dead attacker’s grandsons. They are planning a get-together. Do you really think my inclusion would be any benefit, that my sharing would offer anything positive about their grandfather?

The three remaining brothers want a clan even if needing to pull in those they never met or connected with. None met the grandsons nor had any connection with Chet who died a few years ago. Adding me to the email was insensitive, wounding me, especially when sensing their annoyance for requiring my name be removed from any further correspondence.

After upping my dose of anti-depressant with a smaller increase than before which caused shakiness and nausea, sleep improves. With adequate sleep my body calms allowing me back in my soul where comfort and answers can be found, and the meadow provides healing once again.

HEALING IS A PROCESS

Photo by Patricia– my secret garden

Healing doesn’t mean triggering is over. Ghosts from the past come out of the grave and crack me in two.

My younger brother Stevie, so needy of ‘family’ gave my email along with everyone else in the so called ‘family’ to a daughter-in-law of Chet, a brother who attacked me repeatedly, the first time violently.

Learning that suffocation could occur with his large body on me while fighting him, becoming still and feigning sleep at least let me survive, but gave him full use of my body whenever he liked.

And with Mom working after Dad’s death, Chet had plenty of time to do with me whatever he wanted.

So Stevie, who has his own sufferings; a 40 year old son living with him with schizophrenia who will never work, be married, or have friends, and losing his daughter at 30 from an overdose, has enough tragedy and pain which makes me hesitate to speak up at all when he oversteps boundaries treating me as non-existent.

When this woman emailed about coming up from a far-away state so that her teen sons, Chet’s grandsons could get to know the ‘family’, I deleted the email but felt invaded, as if a monster dead had come back.

Where has all this healing gone? Didn’t I just say I had healed?

Stevie responds to the email inviting her to come, blah, blah, blah.

That’s it, my need to protect myself from emails overrode my need to protect Stevie from hearing any negativity from me. My email to Stevie:

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Please do not include me in further correspondence. Not sure how she got my email but I don’t need to be triggered by horrific memories of Chuck or his descendants. His attacks were constant, repetitive and traumatic.

He is/was NO brother. Do you know he gave me crabs? He told me it was nothing yet he went and was treated by a doctor. Mom gave me a toxic, unsafe, poison to put on (DDT) because she was so terrified of the SECRET getting out. No one helped or stopped it.

All the traumas came flooding back with these emails despite the decades of my trying to heal.

I didn’t want to give you money when you went there for the funeral and I thought you had an understanding of why, but I guess not.

You do not know the horrors I suffered by 4 of the people who were supposed to be brothers, one memory so horrific (rape) that to this day have blocked out, the memory too violent for even a 71 year old to allow to surface.

These people are NOT family.

_____________________________________________________

Stevie wrote back with an apology, and I wrote back- “I’m always here for you and love you, always.”

HEALING

Healing does not mean all can be fixed. There remains broken parts such as trust issues and much more that are gone forever.

But the drowning shame for crimes that were not mine yet inflicted on many children subject to sexual attacks by those loved and trusted within a family, have been washed away by excising the wound.

Exposing my wounds to air, telling my story in many ways as many times as needed, cleaned the black, tarry, gunk swimming inside me like sharks biting from the inside out.

For a child to keep such evilness within her throughout her life causes damage much of which cannot be healed, but instead managed. Yet, to finally use the word ‘healed’ and feel its meaning for the first time shows that all these decades of hard work succeeded.  

Before, ‘healing’, was just a word. Now the feeling internally is not black, red, swirls of rage and hurt. There is placid safety where it once was dark and stormy.

BLOSSOMS

The stellar beauty of pinks, and whites against the robin’s egg blue sky is as if from a magical land found in fairy tales, but it is right here, right now!

Photos by Patricia

Finally well rested, with the spring sun too, the ability to sit still with

a relaxed body is a miracle occurring…

MORNING SUN

Let your restless, chaotic spirit be hugged

By the breezy morning sun

As petals fall like fairy wings

And birds sing.

NEW LIFE

Under the pear tree

Confetti falls.

Gently swirling,

As birds sing

Their glorious songs.

This old, rusted garden sculpture, given to me years ago for my birthday by my son and daughter-in-law, sorely needed attention. The bold paint once prominent almost gone.

New life breathed back in, much like spring breathes it back into to me.

MAJESTY

PHOTO BY PATRICIA

Sobbing to Samuel, “I fucked up my body.”

“It’s OK. You can go back down,” he responded compassionately.

At a month video check-up with my doctor, the newly added Zoloft was such a success my thought was more is better, so pushed for a higher dose which made me nauseous and shaky.

Sending her an inner office note she responded quite quickly that it was safe to go back down to 25mg, which is good because that was my intention for that evenings dose.

The little tweak of an anti-depressant added to my medications has allowed for a dramatic increase in my ability to sleep.

Unfortunately, being HUMAN, a mistake was made by asking for more. More is not always better. And if kindness were to be extended to myself, is it so wrong to want good sleep? No.

The harshness bestowed on me, by me, is here to stay, along with daily anxiety. And these things will continue to challenge me and need focus daily.

Life isn’t easy for anyone, but with acceptance of its challenges, the beauty can also be enjoyed. And the beauty as spring unfolds is quite stupendous.

My walks to the creek along the large singing pines brings new delights daily. You never know what splendors will come.

One day three pileated woodpeckers swooped onto the dead tree near-by. They are about a foot long.

The shy heron gracefully landed, also near-by unaware of my presence, and looked for her meal in the water as I stared in wonder.

Our muskrat living in the mud-hole along the creek bank swam by. The bluebirds have taken up residence in the birdhouse at the edge of the water, their brilliant blue backs lighting up in the sunlight.

Each walk in the meadow is an exploration.

LOVING SELF-KINDNESS

The beauty of growing inward and learning to love all that is discovered, cherishing even the flaws and quirks, is that my life becomes my own. That living it my way while different from others is OK for me, more than OK, it is my own soul calling offering a freedom unfounded.

So much thought has been put into what others must think, and with my critical loudspeaker it is usually negative. Learning that my life is mine alone, and finite, allows for the freedom to live it in a way that brings all that one could ask for to flourish. But too easily my thoughts get caught up in the tornado of misguided presumptions, and even if true, so what? This is my life.

It is what I feel and think that matters. That would seem easy to figure out, but with a lifetime of being how my mother groomed me to be; nice, pleasing, non-existent really, just a cut-out daughter to meet her own needs, well, that makes finding my authentic self a tangled path, mysterious, often darkly jungled, having to hack away others opinions to swath a path toward the light of my real soul.

But it is there, that center that offers comfort, kindness, and loving acceptance.