The Jar

On 7/1/2012 one of my best friends committed suicide. I had met him online years before, on a support forum, he was a fellow survivor.

Yesterday marked 6 months since his death and I still cannot accept the fact he's gone. It kills me everyday knowing I'll never hear his voice or see him again. I'm filled with anger at the people who hurt him, who made him think there was no way out, no hope.

I'm not a religious person, I don't really believe in life after death. But I do like to imagine he watches over me, it's a nice thought. I like to think of him as a butterfly, free from the darkness. I'm sure he's off flying somewhere, wings filled with all the colours of the rainbow. He had such a beautiful colourful heart.

I Wish I could be off flying with him.

I struggle with feeling suicidal myself and have previously attempted it, let's face it the world isn't exactly a nice place to live. But his death has shown me the pain it leaves behind. He didn't get rid of his pain he just transferred it onto me. I get angry with him about that sometimes but then again I'll take that pain if it means he is happy and at peace.

This drawing and poem is for my Penguin. For anyone who is feeling suicidal please seek help, call a helpline, anything. Death is so final, I have to believe there is always hope...

The Jar

Trapped inside
Wings folded tight
Darkness all consuming


The claws they grasp
Fog is swirling
Echos of screams is overwhelming


Hell's gates are closed
The fires deserted
The demons take residence here


Glass treasures the pain
The way is shut
Cruel taunt of life's design

-----------

Freedom Wings

Words breakaway

The pain i feel now you're gone

Taken too soon

Your shadow lingers in my light

I place no blame, the darkness is gone

Free from your jar

You're where you belong

Wish i could be in that perfect place

where you now reside

Flying free

Holding hands

I'm forever by your side

RIP

xx

Without Words

As you'll be aware (as its all I harp on about lately on here!) Is that one week tomorrow...will be my One year anniversary. I've been fighting to much just to get through the days...keep the smile plastered across my face for all to see that its just so exhausting I haven't had much time to write. 


What i've been really struggling with - which no doubt sounds so damn ridiculous - is that here in the UK at the moment we have to reality shows on at the minute, Xfactor and Strictly come Dancing. On BOTH shows there is someone who shares the first name of my abuser. Naturally everyone in my house watches these shows and every weekend I have to 'his' name echoing up the stairs. It send chills through my bones, and on occasion has sparked a flashback. I hate this, it effects me so much, i go into a supermarket and the cashier has his name,
I go to a restaurant and the guy says 'Hi my name is C... and ill be your waiter this evening'. I can't escape him, I can't escape it, I can't escape from my own mind.


Another thing I have been struggling with is the fact my family who I live with, have gone away for a week. They will be back 2 days before my anni, but im all alone in the house leading up to that time. I've got my therapists number on speed dial in case of any emergencies, but it scares me just knowing that sometimes I feel capable of being in an 'emergency'. Im trying my hardest, although admittedly sometimes I wonder what it is im fighting for.


For next week, as of monday because i know ill be without words, instead i am going to post a single photo that represents how i am feeling that day, leading up to my anni on the 23rd.....


Stay tuned, and thanks for all of you who read this blog and offer your support.

Monster

Monster

You didn't hide behind the closet

Never concealed yourself in the shadows

Hiding your truth in plain sight

Utilising your mask well, obscuring the monstrosity of your very nature

Left no one questioning, Clever little monster

Your evil soul lurked in the depths

Your kind smile deceiving well

The verbal vomit of your lies

Covering the darkness of your truth

Naive girl, how was I to tell?

Upon completion of your web

You knew you had me trapped

Those poisoned lips infected me

Planting memories inside my head

Lying wounded, slowly dying on your bed

You fed the monster that lives within you

It was I who was your prey

An unlikely weapon destroyed me

Forever fearful of mans capabilities

Life affected until the end

Hunger satisfied you buried the monster

How long down there would It stay?

Your angelic face returned

To pledge it's eternal woe

Claiming not to be the monster I had now come to know

Your venom coursed through my veins 

Destroying all sanity and intelligence

For a time the misty haze swarming my brain denied me of the truth

Clarity intact, your venom now grants me the gift of seeing the hidden monster

The monster who ate me alive but refused to swallow.

Keeping me alive, was your greatest evil.

Written today on my eleven month anniversary. Copyrighted

Writers Block

Posting on my blog has been difficult for me of late. The same can be said for a survivor support forum i regularly use. I remember a time when i would reach out all the time! Post whatever is running through my mind in hope for some support from a kind stranger. Its getting harder and harder to reach out. The only person i am truly honest with is my therapist...in fact even that is a lie, i'd say I'm 80% honest with her. I lie to everyone now.
'How are you doing?' 
'Yeah I'm okay thanks, how are you?' - Why is it so damn hard to just tell the truth! 


I get so frustrated with the people who are aware of what's going on with me, they often just accept that answer and ask no more questions. I feel like they should know I'm not okay, they should know when i don't want to talk, and when in fact i'd like to but perhaps scared to bring it up incase of bringing a downer to the conversation. I know i can't expect people to be psychic but i'd like to think at least the people in my life who know me well, know enough to know when i am not okay!


I guess what's got me thinking about this, is my anniversary. 11 month anniversary. Tomorrow.


I am dreading the stroke of midnight on my clock-face.


Each time i don't know how I'm going to get through the day. Things would be so much easier, so much more peaceful if when i went to sleep...i never awoke the next morning. The hardest thing about tomorrow is knowing its my last 'month' anniversary. The next one is one year. One Year. I know for sure i can't survive this one. The week before my family are going away to Spain, they will be back for the 23rd but (and i'd never admit this to them) I'm scared of them leaving in the approaching week. Because I'm scared of what i may be capable of doing. My mum has been begging me to try to find some money to go with them, i know this is because she is afraid to leave me alone.


If anyone has any advice on how to get through the month of October and the 23rd, please let me know. I'm drowning here.


.....Wake me up when October ends.....

Time Flies...

They say time flies when your having fun, and the bad days seem to never end. I have found this well known quote to be completely way off reality. Next month will mark one year since my assault and everyday has been a living hell and yet it has flown by scarily fast. It seems like the incident happened only a few months ago. On a really bad day, the minutes seem to tick by slowly but then at the end of the day i realise its actually gone really fast. I feel like i have lost an entire year of my life. Not only have I lost myself, but i am also loosing time.

That bastard has taken away my time. Its overwhelmingly scary when you start to do a tick list of all the things that have been stolen from you, it seems impossible to take them all back. If i am honest i don't think they can be taken back.


In therapy i often discuss with my Therapist about my future, or lack of one. Last week she asked me to draw how i see myself now, and how i see myself in the future. For the how i see myself now i drew a question mark, a large black scribble of mess and a stickman dead at the bottom of the ocean, ball and chain around it's leg. Naturally my therapists interpretation was dead on (no pun intended). I know there something holding me back, something that is stopping me from moving forwards in my healing, what it is...i do not know. My therapist said once we are able to undo the chain which is holding me to the sea bed, i will slowly start to find myself again and begin to heal. She said my soul is not dead, but that it is off somewhere and slowly i will start to find it again and take back what has been taken. This is one the few times i completely disagreed with her.


I have started to realise (and i am not saying this is true for everyone) that when a trauma so huge happens to someone it is literally like it has killed them. I have had many survivors explain their trauma like 'a murder where there was no literal death'. When someone has died, there can be no resuscitation. I believe this is true with me. My soul has not simply 'gone away for a while'. It is dead, lying in the vegetation at the bottom of ocean. He killed me. I think - for me - it's not about getting back that girl i was before the rape (i'm not sure i'd even want to be that weak vulnerable naive girl anyway) it's about creating a new one. A new me. Trouble is sometimes it makes me so angry that the girl i have been for 22 years is suddenly gone along with all her hopes and dreams. Now all i have to work with is this empty shell. My therapist found this analogy interesting and could understand where i was coming from. She said 'isn't a blank canvas exciting, think of all you could create for your "new" self and the woman you could become'. Personally i think it seems like a lot of fucking hard work (excuse the curse!). 


It begs the questions:

• how do you live when you are already dead?
• how do you start over and create a new self?
• how do you know you will like the person you end up becoming?

It also makes me wonder, if rapists truly take a persons life (which i believe they do) then why on earth when it comes to our justice system do they not get given life sentences! IF they are even convicted, which there is a despicable 6.5% chance of, the average sentence is four years, meaning they are out in two years. TWO years for taking anothers life. People get more for driving offenses. The world is a f'd up place!

BOOM!

Yesterday was my 10 month anniversary.


I was so dissociated and disconnected that a few days back somehow i managed to book an afternoon shift at work on that date.I woke up in the morning feeling so down and like i just wanted to sleep and never wake up. So i laid between the sheets and went back to sleep. At 12pm my alarm went off for work. Feeling this crappy i didnt want to go to work. But i got up, I turned off my alarm and saw the date....then it all clicked. No, more like exploded. BOOM. memory, memory, flashback, memory. Being so disconnected meant i now had to go to work on my anniversary. I didn't know how i would get through, especially when it turned 6pm...roughly when the assault happened. But i had to go, so i went.


My tactic was to continue using a tool i am very good at. Dissociate from the date and what it meant to me. I spent the shift trying to push down all the stuff that was trying to seep out of my subconscious. I made it to 6pm which is when luckily they sent me on my break. I just sat in the staff room staring into space like a brain dead zombie. Thinking about what was happening at this time 10 months ago. I felt so empty and lifeless, i felt no pain, no emotion, nothing. Is that normal? Shouldn't i have been distraught and crying, feeling sick, shaking? Thats how they normally go! On the one hand i am so fed up of being disconnected from it all but then on the other hand i know I AM the one that keeps myself disconnected, because sometimes when the connections start to form i can feel myself disconnecting them again. Why am i doing this??


I made it to the end of my shift and came home at 9.30pm. Got in between the shifts, and talked to a fellow survivor online. Shed some tears with her.


What scares me the most about anniversaries is that it is month closer to the one year mark. Something i am TERRIFIED of. My next anniversary will be 11 months....the next,....1 year! I don't understand how it has almost been a year, that seems impossible, it feels like only three months ago. Where has this time gone??


I am curious as to when its  been one year, do begin counting your anniversary as years now rather than months? Cause i have a feeling im going to still be counting the months (13 months, 18, months, 24 months). Is that strange and obsessive? At what point does it become yearly? Because monthly ones are damn exhausting!

Dear 23

23 is all I see,
That number rips a hole in me.
Sends me shaking,
Breathing fast
A reality I find hard to grasp.


23 I dread its arrival,
Between the sheets is key to survival.
Refusing to leave, 
Despite my will
23 It haunts me still.


23 I know your face,
I'm used to being in this place.
Staring up,
The ceilings black
Trying desperately to not look back.


23 Makes dark memories stir,
Reality around me becomes a blur.
3, 2, 1, time travelling back,
No escaping
I'm forced to look back.


23 Please make it stop,
Nightmares, flashbacks
Memory attacks.
All these thoughts within my mind,
Feels like they'll never subside.


23 Your silence screams loud,
Unwanted ghost I hope your happy
I hope your proud.
The tortured girl within my soul,
Never again shall be whole.


Dear 23, because of you,
And all that you have put me through
This girl is hanging,
by a thread
how has she survived? how is she not dead?

15 Minutes to go....

In 15 minutes time it will be my eighth month anniversary.


Tomorrow will be a day filled with:
'At this time i was....'
'At this time he was...'


I find anniversaries very exhausting physically and mentally. Its hard because everyone around you forgets. Forgets today is the 23rd, forgets what's running through your mind, forgets what your body is remembering worse than any other day. Eight months already, time just keeps on ticking by. I feel like I'm stuck in the past whilst everything around me continues to keep moving forward. Sometimes i get so jumbled with my days, a few days ago i was convinced it was July and yet i always seem to know when the 23rd is approaching, there has only been one time i forgot and that was a very dark time. I wasn't even aware if it was morning or night let alone the date.


What's been worse about the past two anniversaries is my numbness. I have an inability to feel.....well, anything! No sadness, no grief, no tears, no pain, no joy, no nervousness. During my dark times i would have given anything to not feel. Now i spend my time just wishing to feel anything! All i want to do is cry, and feel the pain like i used to. At least that way i can process it, work through and try to deal with it. At the minute i feel like I'm pushing it all under the rug, saving it for another day and I'm fed up of it. I JUST WANT TO FEEL AND GRIEVE FOR WHAT I HAVE LOST! - is that too much to ask??


What really scares me about it being my eighth month anni is the fact its one month closer to the one year mark. I don't want to reach one year, that day will be a living nightmare. I feel like i'd rather die than face it. It terrifies me. I would love for time to stop still and for me to stay in this moment forever, i don't want life to continue with me having to live like this each and every single day. I don't want to reach that one year mark.


I still have a few months to get yet, i guess for now i just need to focus on getting through tomorrow....


Im going to need a lot of cigarets.....


......


and alcohol.