She waited. Patient. Patiently. I’ll wait for you forever, she told him. And so she waited. She waited and waited but still he never came.
She called. Impatient. Impatiently. She called and she called and still he never answered.
She searched. For him. For answers. For hope. And still her hands came up empty.
I am your only hope, he’d told her. I am the one you’ve been waiting for.
And so, she waited. In the dark. Through the dawn. Throughout the day. And still, he never came.
He’d promised to come. Promised to bring her the keys to their new home. The money he owed. He promised to give back the dreams he’d killed. The trust he’d broken. The hopes he’d dashed. Today, he’d promised. Today.
She believed him. She was patient. She had to, believe him. Give him the space and time and support. It was all she could do. She had run out of options. Run out of strength to fight. To make anything else happen.
She waited.
Patient.
Patiently.
And still. He never came.
She started to cry. It had been so long. So long since she could remember a time when fear and shame and self-loathing were not her constant companion.
She prayed. Please, please, somebody make it stop. Somebody come and take away this horror that I am living. Please.
She was patient. Oh so patient.
And still, nothing changed. Nothing ever happened. She stayed locked. Locked up in this hell that was her life. On the outside smiling. On the inside dying.
And nobody could see. Nobody knew the truth.
She was patiently waiting for death to come knocking at her door.
But death was busy. His scythe was slicing through other life-cords. Setting others free to rise up and find their place in that time and plane where all beings unite with the One who lives eternal. That other-world beyond this fearsome world that had become her reality.
She opened her arms to death. Her life-cord remained intact. And she cried.
Please come, she begged. Please come.
But still, he didn’t call.
Her phone remained silent. Her mind screamed in agony. Her body writhed in pain.
Somebody make it stop. Somebody please make it stop.
And all the patience in the world couldn’t awaken her to the truth. Nobody out there could make it stop. Nobody out there could make him go away.
She had to do that. She had to wake up.
And she told herself she couldn’t. She was too frightened. Too weak. Too alone.
Be patient, he said as he held her in the dark. Just a bit longer and then you will see, it was all worth it.
Nothing would ever be worth the terror of his embrace. She knew that. But she couldn’t see it. Feel it. Breathe it. She couldn’t feel. She couldn’t breathe.
She was suffocating beneath the lies. Suffocating in the sea of fear that held her up to the mirror of her shame. She couldn’t see. She was lost in the dark of his embrace.
And so she waited.
And nothing changed except the fear.
The fear engulfed her. The roaring in her head grew louder. She lost all sense of time. Of place. Of being.
She lost.
And fell into the sea of despair that had patiently waited for her to surrender all hope and fall. She fell. She fell and closed her eyes.
Patiently waiting for death to come.
But it never came.
And then, in the dark of despair, the dream of his coming to save her died and she awoke and lost all patience with him.
She lost all patience with his lies, his deceit, his manipulations. She lost all patience with hiding from the truth and found her voice to speak up.
I have run out of patience! She cried. I have no more time for you.
And in her voice she found the courage to speak up. To stand up. To walk away from waiting for him to come and make it all better. For him to sweep his magic wand across the night and raise the dawn. She lost all patience for him and turned her back on waiting.
She turned her back and reached out. Oh God, she cried. Help me.
And He did.
I am here, my child, she heard Him whisper inside her head. She felt the blood flowing in her veins. The warmth of dawn caressing her face. She felt His breath rise and fall within her and she wept. Tears streamed down her face and then she felt a hand upon her brow.
Cry no more, the voice whispered. Cry no more. You are free.
She opened her eyes and saw the wonder of the world around her.
It had been there throughout time. Waiting. Patiently. Waiting for her to open her eyes. To open her ears and heart and mind to the truth within. For her to awaken to the truth of who she was and who she was meant to be. She opened her eyes and her heart beat a wild tattoo of joy upon her breast.
I am free. I am free she whispered to the dawn. And she opened her arms wide and Love flooded in. Love engulfed her. Picked her up and carried her through her fear that what was would be forever more.
Truth is, the voice called out. Truth is. Within you. Always. Always present. Ever patient. Truth is Love and you are your truth. Love yourself. Love your wounded heart. Your battered spirit. Love your beauty and your beast and let yourself surrender and fall, In Love.
And she did.
And Love embraced her.
And she danced forevermore in the arms of Love.
Dear One -Step –
Im going to be in so much trouble for being late today! LOL I signed off …got organized to get out the door…my computer is on a desk in the kitchen near the back door…I should be in my car (30 minutes ago) lol but logged on one last time…really wondering about HOC and what direction she will go in…
Anyway… I read your above post and what helped me through this and MANY phases of the healing process were Kathleen Hawks articles on the various stages/phases of healing. Ive highlighted the one relating to anger – and there is a followup one about how to rid the anger as well. You have to go to the top left of this page. Listed below all of the readers comments are various headings to click on. Go to Categories and find Kathleen Hawk – click on there and you will find every article in her “healing” series…
Starting with Part 1 all the way through Part 13….CHANGED MY LIFE!
Here is the link for Part 5 http://www.lovefraud.com/blog/2009/03/02/after-the-sociopath-how-do-we-heal-part-5-getting-angry/
Be sure to read Part 6 – you may be ready for part 6! Hang in there – your awareness is going to get you through this! You may be just taking a self imposed necessary time out so you can deal with all thats on your mind! (hugs)
LTL – My sister slacker! 😉
yes, thank you. i am going through those articles almost every day. pt 5 & 6 especially.
x one step
One Step,
None of this is easy to sort out. But my humble opinion is that you are dealing with a combination of things. Not just the anger, not just depression and not just PTSD symptoms but a combination of all three. And that just complicates ALL of it.
It is hard to even know where one ends and the other begins.
Because at any given moment you are not even sure what you are experiencing. And although different things “trigger us” into anger or feeling depressed, it is just when we don’t feel that we have an ounce of energy to deal with any of this that sometimes we find ourselves dealing with ALL of it. All at once….
Anger, especially in its raw form is hard to release. Because it certainly takes us out of our comfort zone.
Because our anger makes us uncomfortable we try and contain it. Or let it out in small doses. But I think part of what we experience in our raw anger is that we need to validate (even if just to ourselves) that this anger over our situation we find ourselves in is real. And because many of us have supressed anger for many years the anger goes far beyond the relationship we had with the S/P/N.
Have you read recently any of Kathleens articles on anger? I think we need to allow ourselves this anger phase and I think the first article on anger that she wrote is very helpful….No one says it better than Kathleen, so I won’t even try.
The PTSD and depression symptoms might be heightened by your recent mugging episode. Honestly you might think that you are “over” it but these things sometimes take on a life of their own. Because something like a mugging is just another REALITY in your life that you have had to face, how the world isn’t a safe place.
The fact that you recognize as you go about in the kitchen and not picking up after yourself / taking care of yourself, is actually a good thing. (not that crippling depression where we can’t even SEE what is happeneing in our lives) But it is kind of what happens in PTSD…It is almost like we are setting ourselves up, at times. We see it but are unable (or so it seems) to do anything about it. Then everything becomes overwhelming again….The house is a mess, (because we haven’t picked up after ourselves), we can’t work because we have no concentration, we have procrastinated doing the stuff we “don’t” want to do, we are on an emotional roller coaster, and see no light at the end of the tunnel.
The only thing I have ever been able to do to help with the PTSD symptoms in my own life is to SIMPLIFY. And because I loose FOCUS so easily, when I become overwhelmed, I really mean simplify. If you can only accomplish one or two things in a day. Then so be it. ALLOW yourself this one accomplishment. Praise yourself for what you have accomplished. Instead of being critical of yourself for what you haven’t done.
Anger and depression can fuel each other in an odd sort of way. Throw in PTSD and you have enough to feel paralized from being able to get through each day.
I think you can do this…Because of your self awarness of your situation. Awareness helps. But it is a SLOW process. It gives NEW meaning to the saying progress not perfection. 🙂
hi witty! thanks for your thoughtful response. i’ll read it over carefully tonight when i have time to let it sink in.
fyi – i was referring to depression in the past tense. i am wondering about some of these connections – if we are able to express raw anger, do we get depressed? is one the antithesis of the other?
i am lots of things – but i don’t think depressed is one of them. anxiety ridden yes, depressed, no.
i have things i HAVE to do this week. can’t get around them, as much as i am full on trying not to. my contract wraps up and there are some other work deadlines that i cannot extend. i have already thrown everything else out the window for the week – like job hunting, advertising for a roommate, cleaning, etc. i will see what else i can kick to the curb.
the mugging is all over me – took several days for it to hit me emotionally – that would have been part of friday night’s meltdown. don’t think for a minute that i am past it in any way.
have to tell you, i was walking home late last night – not the wholer way, but part of the way (the more populated part of the walk) and some skeevey guy said, ‘excuse me’. I luaghed a loud and said, ‘shit, no!’, crossed the street and grabbed a cab.
bye for now.
one step
One Step,
Well I am of the thinking that there is depression that is caused from brain chemicals being off, the clinical depression and there is temporary depression that is more of a situational depression. Like the kind we might feel temporarily because of what is happening at the moment in our lives….
And that is why I mentioned that maybe the mugging is triggering alot of stuff in you. At first your kind of in shock when something like this takes place. Adrenaline kind of kicks in also and you might be angry at first that this happened to you.
But many emotions follow after that….And also can be triggering things that you were already feeling but now they are intensified beyind belief. Like OMG….To much…Feeling to much. But important to feel it all.
I am so sorry this is all falling on you like a ton of bricks. And for sure it is going to put you in a hypervigilant state when you are out and about. And your anxiety is going to be kicked up several knotches as well. That is what I HATE the most of all is that damned anxiety. I am FULL of it. And it can be so crippling.
I have never been good at expressing anger, I hold it in, I can feel it inside but it never comes to the surface. i compare anger to violence i guess. my x on the other hand expressed it quite well, it was always just below the surface and would explode into violent rages if provoked, and he manipulated me into lighting his fuse so he could explode and rage, it was like a release for him, and always afterwards he was so sorry for his outburst. but at that point the next violent rage was building and building and I would walk on eggshells not to lite his fuse. it was a cycle with him, a pattern,, still I dont do anger.. sometimes i have visions of revenge and I daydream of letting go with a ball bat on him to the point of almost killing him..but I am always docile and easygoing – sometime’s i wish i was mean and butch and could go woop some ass but thats just not me..
I am feeling that raging anger and profound depression again. And here I find these recent posts that are resonating with me.
It’s been 4 weeks to the day since I finally kicked the scum bag to the curb and have maintained NC. But the depth of betrayal, is being flashed at me again in a very auspicious way through facebook. I’ve deleted all remnants of S but we share many common “friends” and he has made sure I know he’s back with the woman he was swearing up and down he didn’t want anything to do with.
I was used as his surgery recovery nurse, objectified as his ED nurse, his private architect and designer, his “woman” front for the family, had my pressious time stolen with flase promises of “this is it- your the one for me-I want to spend the rest of my life with you”, manipulated with money, punished when not complying with his every demand and finally betrayed….yet again.
I’m doing everything possible to heal myself, reading all the articles, all of your posts, THE BETRAYAL BOND, and still this worthless animal get’s to me in an indirect way when I least expect it. GGRRRRRRR……I can’t stand it……
just venting.
Hi Witty – I am not sure if your son has moved back in with you or not. What is the situation? I know about anxiety and yes it was crippling. i guess with your son this is something you need to control, the anxiety, good luck with that. i have calmed down alot,,but I think I lived most of my life in a state of anxious hypervigilence, with my mother and the string of pdo’s that I kept in my life..and there was a string of em – wow – in hindsight I was really a flashing sign that said USE ME USE ME – guess i have some confidence now – cause I know that wont happen again – life is good – maybe dull and lonely but i sure dont miss that anxious hypervigilence that use to be my constant companion..
Dear Aeylah,
CONTRATULATIONS on your one montn NC!!!! TOWANDA!!! That first month is so difficult, and you did it! GREAT JOB!!!
It is painful to realize you’ve been used for X-period of time by a person you loved, an person incapable of loving you back.
But you are on the road to recovery, making progress, and he will only stay the same—((((hugs))))) and God bless.
,
Oxy,
I often read read your posts with amazement of your strength and wisdom and the love you still have in light of what you’ve had to suffer and continue to endure from your own flesh and blood.
Thank you for the support and the hugs….means alot….you are an inspiration!
Love,
Aeylah