The bigness

 There are so many things, and my heart is more than heavy.  Today after all this time, My past feels like it was yesterday.  The memories and pictures in my head are as clear today as they were the days that they happened.  I am living breathing here today and there are pieces of my mind that keep replaying the things of the past.  I really wish that I had an understanding of the why's and the how's.  I want to let go, make it go away, make it hurt less and yet the things that have happened to me are like those little stickers that used to stick in your feet during the summer as a kid.  When you think that you have removed them all there are more.

I feel terrible that my mind refuses to let go, that I still replay parts and pieces trying to come to some understanding. My mind gets in these loops and all I can see are the things that I have barely survived. Things that are so big there are times that I wish that I didn't.   I have been told many unhelpful things, that only added to the ache in my heart. Nothing that was ever offered acknowledged the bigness of the things that I went through. I was told the only way to heal is Church, that he didn't know of anything else to make things better. Wow thanks for the advice since church was a place that tried to cover my wounds and pretend, they didn't happen. The men that gang raped me were men that I met at a youth weekend.  Don't you dare tell me to believe in something that let so many unbearable things happen to a girl.    Yea, no thanks.  I have been told that God was the only answer.  Maybe for some that does work, and I am glad.  For me I prayed at 5 not to wake up another morning.  I said my prayers every night, now I lay me down to sleep begging just to let me die.   Medicine, because let's just cover everything up and pretend that all is well with the world.  I was told that I was the one holding on and dwelling on it. The nightmares my fault.  The flashbacks also my fault.  I have been told all of those things, and I was the one who was just dwelling it. There was never an understanding of how big that the things that happened to me are.  My entire life I have listened to all those words; blamed myself made myself small because I mean come on if these things keep happening to me there must be a reason Right?!?  

If all of these people keep telling me that I am the problem, I am the reason that I am not healing then isn't the problem with me?  I have spent my entire life making the things that happened to me Small, making them my fault, making them no big deal.  The things that I have said to myself, you would not believe.   By the time that I was raped at 13, I was angry that it even bothered me, those things had been done since I was 5; I should just close my eyes go away and everything would be fine.  I am angry that I am still so affected.  I am angry that there were never people to acknowledge the bigness of the things that went on in my life.  

I told Mark last week if I could have just met him 34 years ago the course of my life would be so very different.  If I was able to feel and heal and feel love and support and care.  My heart would be in a much better place.  If my heart was heard instead of pushed aside.  If someone heard the things that I was unable to say, today would be a different story. 

I do not want to dwell on the things that didn't happen I do have Mark today and I will forever be grateful.  I get those things that I so needed as a little girl when he hears my questions, reads my writing and is thoughtful how he words things how he asks questions. He is careful with my heart, never adding any more ache.  Growing up there were so many people that were more that careless with that little girl's heart and soul.  Today my heart is cared for, there are still so many gaping wounds, and big holes but never am I brushed aside.  Never am I made to feel small and insignificant.  I truly think that Mark does understand the bigness in ways that no one ever has.  Piece by piece he points me in the direction, and I can see some of the bigness now more than ever and its hard it's terrifying, but I am not alone.  

The pictures are so clear so vivid, the stupid little details that I can recall like the back of my hand.  Then there are really big things that I don't remember and don't want to; but the feelings are there. The kind of feelings that Chip away at the person you are and the person you are trying to become that were so devastating my entire world went black. I was in a safe place far away.  The bigness of those things even though there isn't a picture or a memory, the bigness of those things lurks like the nothing in the Never-Ending story. 

Lately I feel the bigness.  The things I have clear memories of; the things that I don't and everything in-between. There are days where no matter what I am doing at any second, it becomes a reminder of something hurtful. I do my best to keep those things at bay but sometimes it's just so overwhelming.  I want to be normal; I want a day to be a day in the here and now and not memories and pictures of awfulness.  Some days, maybe even a lot of days lately it's a real struggle. So many days even everyday things that are so innocent and simple become something huge for me. There are days that I watch law and order SUV thinking that maybe I am going to hear those magic words that will make all the pieces fall together and make me whole.  The bigness of the things in my life makes me feel like the scarecrow in the wizard of OZ.  There are pieces of me over there and over there and over there.  I look forward to the days when each and every part of me is with me, and together we can be a complete whole person. I look forward to that day when I am just a girl.  

I don't see the girl, I don't see her just for her in all of her uniqueness, I see what has happened; what has been done and how she has been treated.  I look forward to the day, I am no longer parts and pieces but a whole real girl who has endured, who has thrived and who can finally make her dreams come true.  Someday Someday, little 13-year-old Callahan.  You got a shitty deal in this life, and I am fighting to make it better for you. 

I heart your heart 

Not many feathers left

 

I am struggling, and I have few feathers left to share.  I am exhausted beyond every level, and I am hoping that things will change.  Every day I look for that Glimpse that my sweet, amazing Vincent has come home.  I am not sure where he went, where he left or why he left really.  I think there were a string of things that led him astray and he won't let anyone in to help him find his way back.  I was really struggling the other day.  He was going to have lunch with one of his friend's mom.  I understood the why, but I was crushed.  Later that night, when I asked him about it, I was met with no understanding and not a care for his own mother's heart.  I was crying that hard cry, he didn't even care.  I told him how much that I missed him, and that I didn't understand that he was going to lunch with someone else's mom and yet wouldn't give me the time of day.  There was excuse after excuse and after each one I told him that he was missing the point.  I told him that I try every day when I pick him up from work, when I ask about his day when he comes downstairs.  I told him that I wish I knew why he shut me out.  I told him how much I loved him and how I missed him.  There was nothing, he didn't hear my words, he didn't care that I was crushed.   

I understand that life is hard for him.  I understand he has challenges that I will never understand.  He has faced things that no 18-year-old should have to worry about.  He has lost so many people in his life.  His weightlifting coach, his grandmother and his best friend.  That is a lot, and it is understandable that he would struggle. I understand how sad that those things have been in his life, but he must make a choice to be different to do things different.   

Since my mother died, I have been blacklisted.  I wish that I understood why, I wish I knew his reasons so we could talk about them and figure them out.  In his mind I became enemy number one when she passed away.  He listened to other words about me.  He listened to things that my mother said about me.  He listened to others and has yet to have a conversation with me.  There are so many things that he needs to understand.  So many things that I want to say that he is not ready for.  He can be sitting less than two feet away and is unable to hear me.  That breaks my heart. 

I will never give up on him, I will forever and always keep trying.  But there are also times that my heart is so crushed that I cannot see a time beyond that.  He is more hurtful than I ever imagined my own son would ever be.  I have missed out on big things because he didn't want me there, didn't want me to be a part.  There are times I feel he is embarrassed by me and wishes I was someone else. He wishes I was different I was someone else and that feelings cuts like a knife. He rarely if ever will even look at me, when he does, he tries to stare through me, and that literally kills me. There is not an ounce of feeling in his eyes for me. I try so hard to comprehend why he hates me so very much. 

I have missed out on Graduation celebrations; I have missed out on dances and high school milestones.  Even the memorial for his friend, I wanted to go for Vincent for Caleb's parents, and he didn't want me there, I was told it was his friends and he didn't want me.  

My heart breaks because he means the world to me.  I am sorry that his life isn't easier.  I am sorry that he got me for a mom. I could write for days at all the things that I am sorry for.  I wish that I could give him the world, the things that he longs for, and I cannot. 

So, I keep doing all that I can.  I keep talking to him whether he hears me or not.  I will keep talking, keep trying until my very last breath and he understand just how very important that he is. I hope that someday soon he will come around, let me in even a little and enjoy the person that I am.  I hope someday he can appreciate all that I have given up for him and all the things that I would do over and over just to have him as my son.  

I love you I love you I love you 

Your mom 

I heart your heart. 

Everything is Foreign

 

The first few minutes after I told everything was in slow motion. I heard people talking, but they seemed very far away.  My body wasn't mine.  I can still feel their hands, I can still hear their voices, their laugh their smell.  All of those things were on repeat in my mind.  I was trying to understand, I was asking all the questions wondering what I did that was so wrong.  I was walking in the present, but my mind was on the things that happened. My mind was trying to comprehend the things that had happened to me.  Trying to process all of the things in front of me that needed time and attention, but I would look at my body as if I was somewhere else, my hands still shaking, I saw my body black and blue and every shade in-between.  Everything hurt, my heart was hurt, my body was brutalized and there was all this commotion around me but not one person was paying attention to me and what I needed. People were talking at me, but no one heard the things that I was unable to say.  I was literally dying inside but everyone was too busy to notice.  Everyone was worried about my parents, but there was no concern for me.  It was all about reactions, and what other people would think, and I was left alone.  No one asked who they were, no one asked, what happened to me, no one cared that physically I was not ok.  

I remember so few things.  I remember it was a Tuesday night at Youth group.  I remember there being kids everywhere and then all of the sudden everyone was gone.  I remember that I was not cared for, I was not believed, I was not held and told that it wasn't my fault.  I felt nothing but shame and embarrassment.  I remember being worried that they were going to have questions, and I remember reaching to give Calvin a hug, but it hurt to raise my arms. I just wanted to stay with him he was the only one that gave me any comfort.  I had Joan worried about a pregnancy test.  And I had her husband telling me how different that things were going to be.  They had no idea; and they didn't really care they were worried about how they were seen and their reputation. I could have been supported and cared for and instead I was made a lying laughingstock.  That youth group could have provided so much love and support They could have wrapped their arms around me and made me feel loved and protected.  They could have made a life changing difference and they did not.    Instead of those things that could have helped me heal, I was shunned, gawked at and looked down on.  I can never erase the way that they made me feel, like I was at fault.  Like I was the one to blame like I was the one who wanted what happened to me.

I was talked about; I was made to feel as if I was asking for attention and was offered no support.  They never cared about what happened to me or how I was affected because they didn't want to acknowledge that there was blame that belonged to them.  She was a 13-year-old girl who wasn't old enough to go to that weekend, Celebrate 88.  A thirteen-year-old girl left alone on the weekends, and somehow, they knew when she was left alone.  They never changed the locks, they never got rid of that couch. Nothing changed other than the fact that they knew I was hurt yet did nothing. 

Today at 47 I am still trying to figure out some of the same questions that I have always had.   I struggle that there are pieces I don't have, and do not understand.  I struggle wanting to remember all the pieces so that things fit together.   To this day, I don't know if I told them after it was the five of them or after Don's last time.  I don't remember, and I guess it doesn't matter but it does to me like I feel like there is so much that I have to prove.  I have to prove everything and have it some order so that it makes sense and during this time there were more things that didn't make any sense.  I was left alone with the things that happened to me nothing was talked about or ever acknowledged.  So, I was left to juggle the pieces and try to keep living as a thirteen-year-old girl.  Not a woman who could navigate life but a girl who had only lived 13 years.  

If I was ever told that a girl was assaulted everything would change and I would do everything I could and more to make sure that she felt seen, heard and protected. I would ask questions and meet needs before she even knew that she had them.  I would hold her and tell her millions of times plus more that she didn't do anything wrong. I would give her space to talk and space to be silent.  I would be gentle and understanding.  I would let her be sad, let her angry, let her be furious.  I would find moments to laugh and moments to grieve all that was lost.   

All I wanted was to be normal, to be a part of the group to experience life as a 13-year-old- and that was all taken.  I wanted someone to help me, I wanted someone to see that I wasn't ok.  I wanted someone to sit with me tell me they were sorry that those things were not supposed to happen. I wanted someone to tell me all those things until I believed every word.  

It was watching the Handmaids tale and seeing how she experienced life once she was freed.  It felt like that for me I so wanted to be part of a world that I didn't belong in anymore, and that is still a struggle.  I know that there are many women who have experienced things like I have but there is an alone feeling that I struggle with.  There are pieces and parts that long to be understood that never will be.  There are things with no rhyme or reason that I desperately want to understand.  There are so many questions about being lovable and worthy, that are a struggle with every breathe that I take.  I am trying so hard to understand how she even survived.  How she lived through that hell.  There are parts of me that are part of her.  I know whales helped her survive, she was a girl that always saw the little things in life, those were the things that kept her alive.  Those things in life that helped her survive couldn't hurt her soul.  I have heard the term soul murder and I think that there were parts of her that will never recover.  I think that there are a few parts of her that are so far away safe and sound that they will never see the light of day, but that is not a sad thing just survival. There are days I am so tired I feel there is no fight left.  There are days I think I have a come a long way and can win if I just keep fighting.  Sometimes all of this feels foreign, and I wonder if I will ever be ok, because there is so much pain and sadness. There are days I feel like that girl is close and days I feel she is millions of miles away.  Soon she will be a part of me; safe and sound and able to finally rest.

Creed : Wash away those years

I heart your heart

Such deep wounds

 Such deep wounds.  There are times I feel like I am making progress. I can see Joy; I even think I am as close to happy as I have ever been. I am making connections and fitting pieces together.  Then there are times that this overwhelming sadness takes over and I don't even know how I am still standing. I have been staying busy; staying so busy then it all hits.   Somehow yesterday when everything seemed so ok, all things come to a crashing halt, and I feel like I could fall to pieces.  

There are just things that hurt, my heart hurts and I wonder if that is going to be a natural state.  I think that there are just things that are going to be.  I think that there are just parts of me that are never going to recover.  I am not sure how I feel about that.  Part of me thinks that I acknowledge and know that it will make things easier.  There is another part that thinks well that is sad to think that, that state of sad about all the things that happened is just a part of me.  I just don't know really.  It is not like I am like oh poor me this will never go away.  It is just an acceptance that there are things I will never understand.  There are things that I will just have in my head sometimes a gentle ache and other times a raging volcano and I just have to take each one as they surface.  I am not saying that I won't find happy, that isn't it at all.  It is just that there are pieces that there is no repair for, there are pieces that will just never fit.  

My brother has been distant and quiet.  I reach out but get not much back.  He understands little about my life and where I am coming from.  His distance is hard, but I can't fight for something if there is no response.  I texted him last night and he said he would call.  I was furious.  I told him that he was not allowed to say that to me.  I cannot wait for calls that don't happen.  Call when you are able, when you want to but do not tell me something then do nothing.  The last three times he was supposed to come over, he has decided not to show.  I cannot live my life like that. I just won't.  I have things on my plate that I have to deal with too, if you want to be in my life learn about me and enjoy my family, I would love that; if you don't, don't pretend to care and don't tell me things that you don't mean.  I am not broken but my heart is tender and needs care.  I will not accept anything else.  I will not add any more hurt to my already bruised heart. I will not be treated as an option.  I know I am not first and that has to be ok even if it hurts but I will not have my family disregarded.  

It is coming up on the year anniversary of my mom dying and there are a lot of emotions there.  Hard to believe that it has been a year.  Hard to believe that I am grateful because I can't imagine how my life would be otherwise.  There is guilt that I don't miss her.  There is guilt that I wish things were so very different.  I did not wish her to die, but for me it was a blessing, she made my life hard.  She didn't understand me and didn't want to learn.  She didn't understand the person that I was or wanted to be and your mom is the person that you want to understand you more than anyone. I feel more than alone in this world.  I just wish there was a way for me to accept this place that I am in.  I will always keep fighting for all that I want but there will be sharp pieces and there has to be some kind of acceptance so that I don't just dwell on them.  It's a balance I am trying to figure out.  

So many deep fractures so very early, and here I am still standing.  Maybe there are parts of me realizing just how alone I have been most of my life.  Now there is an awareness and I want things to be different.  I want people around; I want to share who I am.  There are times when I am terrified, but I even want to be seen. I want to find happily ever after and yet I am not sure that is meant for me. 

Lately there is so much more sad than anything else.  I am tired; I am so very tired.  And these next months are going to be hard.  And there is just me and yet I keep going.  

As I am uncovering more pieces, things are more intertwined than I ever imagined.  It was not like mt father.  And Randomly Albert then another Random weekend and somehow those men knew that I was home alone.  To many coincidences and I am struggling to understand that.  One piece leads to another to another and each one is worse than the one before.  So much started with my parents they set me up for so much heartache and pain.  I am just learning that there are going to be things that never make sense that always hurt my heart.  Nothing in my life was as it should have been.  And people were not there to love and protect me, keep me safe and sound.  

I will always keep working, I will always continue to heal but I will also be aware that there are moments that will always sting, and moments that will always hurt.  With wounds as deep as mine, it would take lifetimes and I only have this one.  So, I heal, find joy where I can and keep moving one foot in front of the other.

I heart your heart.

The sign is back on my head

 I can't even tell you how long it has been since it has been there. That blaring sign on my head that is a reminder of all the gross and disgusting that has been done.  It's been years like a lot of years.  But the other day in Wal-Mart I felt it again. And it took me by surprise, I wasn't expecting it at all.  It stopped me in my tracks, and I wanted to shrink, I wanted to hide.  It felt like everyone could see that 13-year-old girl, her wounds her bruises her disgusting self and I didn't know what to do.  I have fought so hard to remove that sign.  I have fought to feel normal and not feel like the things that have happened to me are blaring in neon lights.  I thought that I smashed that light never for it to return.  But it did and it came back in a big way.  I was talking Wednesday, and this is the longest week after week I have talked about her and life at 13 if even in a small way and then this happens.  I go between realizing what a big deal that things were and trying to make them small and tell myself that things were not as bad as they seem.  I am not sure which one is better.  But my heart hurt all the same.  It is crazy because it literally feels like everyone can see the things that have happened.  Every face that I see I wonder do they know can they see the things that I feel.  It's like the Scarlett letter that is blaring from the inside out.  I know no one can see anything different, I feel more vulnerable, I feel more wide open and its scary.  I become that person looking around every corner making sure that they aren't there.  And the scary part is that I don't even think that they would look the same today.  Then everyone could be them and I am scared all the time.  

Yesterday was the biggest panic attack that I have had in a long time.  We were going to Nebraska to look at an oven and a couch.  We left late, and it being a holiday weekend, it was crazy crowded.  I literally panicked and we left.  There were too many people and the thought of the sign on my head and so many people, I just couldn't.  After all the time I couldn't even go into a store, the panic that I felt was so intense and so real and really there was no reason.  And the day just got worse and worse.  

I would know Andy; I think that I might know Don but the others I am not so sure. Like I knew good and bad, but the others just played along and did what they were told.  I hate feeling like this, I hate being so scared I hate that all this time later, I can remember them taking turns over and over, I can remember their laughing I can remember that even when I couldn't move anymore, they were still humiliating me. When I feel that sign blaring on my head, I feel like that 13-year-old girl, and she literally just wants to hide.  She doesn't want anyone to see her, she doesn't want to talk she just wants her body not to hurt, she wants the nightmares to stop so she can sleep, and she wants to stop being so afraid that they might show up around the corner.  When that sign is blaring it is like I am always in eminent danger.  That If I am not careful, if I am too loud, too much of anything I could be hurt by them again.  After all this time I cannot believe how big that fear is.  That 13-year-old is scared all the time.  ALL. THE. TIME.  She never gets any rest never has any peace.  I cannot fathom surviving what she did. I do not know how she cleaned everything u including herself and kept living.  Even the things I remember that they did, and I want to go away, I feel like she has all the pieces and is devastated.  She is devastated by the things that they did and all that they took from her. She is so very sad.  She doesn't understand why they hurt her so badly and why they didn't leave her alone.  It was a never-ending fear, even as she graduated and moved on to college that fear of them was constant.  

I think of Mariska being 18.  She isn't afraid of anything.  She walked to 7-11 one day.  She walked for her job interview and there was not a single ounce of fear.  There is a part of me that is blown away by that.  She is safe and isn't afraid.  I don't remember a second of not being afraid.  

I am angry, and so very sad that I don't remember any long stretch of time when I wasn't afraid.  That is not a wat to live.  And lately with that sign blaring, once again I am reminded of all that was taken and in all the ways that I never got a to be a kid.  That was an exceptional amount of time to be afraid.  Like why they couldn't have done what they did and just moved on.  Fine hurt me, then move on and never think about me again.  They couldn't do that, and I desperately want to understand. They had to taunt and terrify me for such a long time.  Thinking about it I was 13 when I met them, and I was 18 in college they were still lurking.  Maybe it was a coincidence, but they knew I was scared, and they liked it., didn't they have anything better to do?  I only saw them a few times at Collin, and that was enough.  But that fear was always there.  I was so afraid all the time.  That 13-year-old girl lived with so much shame and fear and that was a constant for a very long time.  I was in my 30's before i felt like that sign was off my head and yet here, I am again.  It is a feeling that is so dark and so debilitating.  It makes me feel worthless and used.  Poor girl,  I am just so sorry for all she had to endure. I wish I could smash the memories and the feelings for her.  I wish that I could take away the things she remembers, about them about what they did about how they kileed parts of her so sweet soul.  My heart breaks for her.  

There was a therapist on Facebook and his thoughts were that there is a part of a person that trauma doesn't touch.  Like there is a part a piece that is untouchable.  And I watched it more than once and I wanted to scream, because I can tell you there is not a single part of who that 13-year- old girl was or would have been that wasn't untouched.  There is not a single part of her that survived untouched.  It changed and destroyed everything, and I will spend the rest of my life rebuilding all that was taken.  

I heart your heart