I've encountered two very different reactions to the article in the paper on Sunday. I have encountered friends in public that I haven't seen in years that simply come up and give me a hug. (FYI: You might want to ask first...) Then, of course, there are the people commenting on the News Tribune site that state I have no business airing my dirty laundry in public as that should be the job of social scientists.
I sincerely can't stress what a difficult time I (and others reading this blog) have had in finding someone in similar circumstances. There is a decided disconnect when reading a sociological treatise on pedophilia in modern culture. I know, I've been there. I've read disserations so dry and filled with statistics that totally take the heart and soul out of everything that normal human beings go through in a situation such as this.
Can you quote me the statistics on how many mothers have flashbacks to what they have read in police reports?
Can you quote me on the statistics of the mothers who get off the phone with the prosecuting attorney, the victim advocate, the therapist, the lawyer, the teacher, the neighbor, the friend and quietly hang up the phone and sink to their knees and sob uncontrollably for an hour?
Can you quote me on the statistics of the mothers who look back on their own marriages and see the warning signs like flashing neon but were too trusting? Too blind?
Can you quote me on the statistics of the mothers who stand at their windows at 2 a.m, looking out on a rain washed street, feeling so hollow that they can hear their insides rattle at the slightest breeze?
Can you quote me on the statistics of the mothers who tried to protect their children from harm only to find harm under their own roof?
Can you quote me on the statistics of the mothers who endured verbal abuse and physical assult by telling themselves that "as long as he doesn't lay a hand on the kids...as long as I can hide it...as long as I don't call forced sex within the marriage rape...as long as I just pretend...everything will be ok.
Can you quote me on the statistics of the mothers who stayed up late at night, looking at a line of perscription meds on their counter and wondering what the magic concoction would be to make the pain go away? Permanetly?
Can you measure the decibel level of the screams in the middle of the woods? The cathartic wailing once a mother finds herself alone and unable to move one more foot along the path.
Can you quantify the fleeting looks in your child's eyes that betray the words coming out of her mouth? Can you inform me how many minutes, hours, days, and years I can wrap my arms around her and tell her that I'm sorry. That she didn't deserve it. That she is a beautiful, valuable human being that never deserves to be used by another human being.
Can you quantify the anger? The dispair?
Give me your statistics. I will break their structures and rend their pages and show you that they have nothing to do with my heart.
We are not numbers to be studied. We are not statistics. We are flesh and bones and pain and anger and hope.
My hope for anyone reading this that KNOWS what I'm talking about would be the ability to look in the mirror and see what your experieces have done to you and for you. I would hope that you can come to terms with your ability to trust people. Your ability to protect yourself. Your ability to learn about healthy relationships. Your realization that strength comes in many forms. Some days, it's just getting out of bed. Other days, it's facing your bitterest fear in the court room.
I'm by no means an expert. I do, however, strongly recommend that people seek out experts.
If you live in Duluth, there are agencies out there to help. Our personal experience was with PAVSA, the Program to Aid Victims of Sexual Assult. We had trained people helping us every step of the way, sitting with us through police statements, court dates, meetings with probation offices, group therapy, and individual therapy. I can't sing their praises high enough. They also have a crisis line and have advocates that can help women during rape exams at hospitals.
Here is a listing of their mission and services.
There are also organizations that assist women in situations of domestic violence and native women facing these same issues within their own cultural framework.
You've lived through the nightmare. Maybe this morning, maybe fifty years ago. Realize what you need for your own well being and seek it out.
You are worth it.
Showing posts with label favorites. Show all posts
Showing posts with label favorites. Show all posts
Monday, July 27, 2009
Thursday, April 02, 2009
This Is My Brain On Thursday
There are many “behind the scenes” issues burbling right now. Things that came to the surface while standing in the courthouse and seeing stbx.
There are places in this universe that are like mental fault lines, tears in the fabric of life. When I stand on these faults, I can feel all the misery of every single soul that came before me. It seeps out of the ground like toxic sludge. It flows down the walls like tears. If I listen hard enough, I can hear weeping.
The unbearable sadness of this situation is clawing at me. I’m the single stationary point in a time lapse movie. The world is spinning around me and I can’t comprehend any of it. The only thing I can do is warm my hands on my coffee cup, close my door, and cry. This is The Grieving. This is beyond anger. This is when the situation implodes.
To see someone that I thought I used to care about and know, in my heart of hearts, that I could put a gun to his head and pull the trigger, all the while staring him straight in the eye, is unsettling. Most human beings, I would hope, have never stared into that black pit in their soul.
It’s like death. It’s the full revelation of how twisted we can all be as human beings. It’s a constant struggle to hold onto that line by Abraham Lincoln and be guided by the better angels of my nature.
It’s the realization that I don’t believe in angels.
The universe is whole and entire and I am completely outside of it. I’m standing in the street after the bombs have gone off, surrounded by what used to be my life, my family, my everything. I am surrounded by ruin and covered in blood.
The pieces are so many and they are scattered so very far.
There are places in this universe that are like mental fault lines, tears in the fabric of life. When I stand on these faults, I can feel all the misery of every single soul that came before me. It seeps out of the ground like toxic sludge. It flows down the walls like tears. If I listen hard enough, I can hear weeping.
The unbearable sadness of this situation is clawing at me. I’m the single stationary point in a time lapse movie. The world is spinning around me and I can’t comprehend any of it. The only thing I can do is warm my hands on my coffee cup, close my door, and cry. This is The Grieving. This is beyond anger. This is when the situation implodes.
To see someone that I thought I used to care about and know, in my heart of hearts, that I could put a gun to his head and pull the trigger, all the while staring him straight in the eye, is unsettling. Most human beings, I would hope, have never stared into that black pit in their soul.
It’s like death. It’s the full revelation of how twisted we can all be as human beings. It’s a constant struggle to hold onto that line by Abraham Lincoln and be guided by the better angels of my nature.
It’s the realization that I don’t believe in angels.
The universe is whole and entire and I am completely outside of it. I’m standing in the street after the bombs have gone off, surrounded by what used to be my life, my family, my everything. I am surrounded by ruin and covered in blood.
The pieces are so many and they are scattered so very far.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
The Bear Went Over The Mountain
Today was another day of group therapy.
Before I started group, I was told that it might make things worse. It might make the flashbacks more frequent. It might make me relive it all again.
I was at the precipice when I started group. I was all hatred and homicide. My past and my present were ganging up on me.
That was a few weeks ago. I've been choosing to laugh instead of cry. Often I pause and feel every molecule in my being. I am heavy with the weight of it all.
It's a struggle against hate. It's a struggle against unbearable sadness. It's a struggle against curling in the fetal position and sobbing.
I have flashbacks to things I only remember with my skin. I am grounded in the present yet I am a child, hiding in a closet. I can stand in my kitchen and feel the fingers grasping my throat thirty years ago. Ten minutes later, I am a ghost in the recent past, reliving what I read on the police report. I am watching in horror as it all unfolds in front of me, powerless to prevent it.
It's like a burn. People are telling me I have to scrub the scabs off in order to heal. I am so very tired and this journey is so very long.
After a day that included not only group but a pap and a mammogram, I remember what it is like to have no ownership over my body. I remember opening the door to madness when I was nineteen and stepping through. I have so much more to lose this time. I have to hold on.
On days like this, when every moment seems like a chant against self destruction, I have to tell myself what would happen if I take the easy way out. If I commit an act of violence, I would be giving this horrible loser more years of my life. If I choose not to wake up tomorrow, he wins.
There are times when you have to look at the world in a grain of sand. Nothing else matters right now except for the fact that I can't let this bastard win.
But I am so tired and this mountain is so steep.
Before I started group, I was told that it might make things worse. It might make the flashbacks more frequent. It might make me relive it all again.
I was at the precipice when I started group. I was all hatred and homicide. My past and my present were ganging up on me.
That was a few weeks ago. I've been choosing to laugh instead of cry. Often I pause and feel every molecule in my being. I am heavy with the weight of it all.
It's a struggle against hate. It's a struggle against unbearable sadness. It's a struggle against curling in the fetal position and sobbing.
I have flashbacks to things I only remember with my skin. I am grounded in the present yet I am a child, hiding in a closet. I can stand in my kitchen and feel the fingers grasping my throat thirty years ago. Ten minutes later, I am a ghost in the recent past, reliving what I read on the police report. I am watching in horror as it all unfolds in front of me, powerless to prevent it.
It's like a burn. People are telling me I have to scrub the scabs off in order to heal. I am so very tired and this journey is so very long.
After a day that included not only group but a pap and a mammogram, I remember what it is like to have no ownership over my body. I remember opening the door to madness when I was nineteen and stepping through. I have so much more to lose this time. I have to hold on.
On days like this, when every moment seems like a chant against self destruction, I have to tell myself what would happen if I take the easy way out. If I commit an act of violence, I would be giving this horrible loser more years of my life. If I choose not to wake up tomorrow, he wins.
There are times when you have to look at the world in a grain of sand. Nothing else matters right now except for the fact that I can't let this bastard win.
But I am so tired and this mountain is so steep.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Home Movies
In trying to do the right thing for my family at this point, I find my grief compounded by watching my daughter search out her childhood. It's a common thing for victims of molestation to go through, searching out photos, family movies, anything that can jar their memory of their own past. After denying their emotions for so long, after convincing themselves that it wasn't so bad, that it wasn't so wrong, that they can continue to live life with this blackest of seeds at the center of their soul, they take that first step toward questioning everything that they have used to keep themselves safe all these years.
It's not something overt. In fact, it's disarmingly subtle. As a parent, if I didn't know it was normal in situations such as this, I would just pass it off as another weird phase that teenagers go through. But I know what it's like to be haunted by the things in childhood that brought comfort. Cartoons, stories, old photos; they all become street signs leading the survivor down a very long road.
You have to learn about the childhood that was stolen before you can know the child. You have to learn about the child before you can admit that what was done to the child was wrong. You have to admit that it was wrong before you can point a finger at the perpetrator and say "You were wrong". You have to say "You were wrong" before you can take the shattered pieces of your childhood and begin to assemble them once more.
But you can't let on to your child that you know what is going on. They'll just roll their eyes and tell you that you over analyze things, that you think too deeply.
And then they'll go back to digging through your closet, looking for that family movie. The one when they were a child and mom and dad were there and everything, for just a moment, looked safe.
It's not something overt. In fact, it's disarmingly subtle. As a parent, if I didn't know it was normal in situations such as this, I would just pass it off as another weird phase that teenagers go through. But I know what it's like to be haunted by the things in childhood that brought comfort. Cartoons, stories, old photos; they all become street signs leading the survivor down a very long road.
You have to learn about the childhood that was stolen before you can know the child. You have to learn about the child before you can admit that what was done to the child was wrong. You have to admit that it was wrong before you can point a finger at the perpetrator and say "You were wrong". You have to say "You were wrong" before you can take the shattered pieces of your childhood and begin to assemble them once more.
But you can't let on to your child that you know what is going on. They'll just roll their eyes and tell you that you over analyze things, that you think too deeply.
And then they'll go back to digging through your closet, looking for that family movie. The one when they were a child and mom and dad were there and everything, for just a moment, looked safe.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Moving Like A Ghost
Some days, you are able to keep your shit glued together until you start driving to work. It's times like that when you are grateful to park your car in a lot frequented by alcoholics and meth heads. No one even gives you a second glance when they see your shaking hands, snotty nose, red rimmed eyes, and unsteady gate as you exit your vehicle and begin your day.
Other days, you keep your shit glued together until you reach your lunch break. Or perhaps until you get a phone call from the next brick in the wall bureaucrat who is laying the mortar for the prison cell that keeps you in and the criminals out. You must learn that the system is there to protect the guilty and fuck the innocent. God Bless America. Be sure to pay your taxes on time and salute the flag.
Perhaps you're lucky enough to have a day when your shit never comes unglued. Perhaps it's a day when you look in the mirror and the only thing in your face that betrays your situation is your eyes. The thousand yard stare of someone quietly, inexorably, falling down in slow motion.
But every once in awhile, you wait until you get home. You visit the mailbox hesitantly. Will it be a letter from the County? The Police? The Lawyer? The Victim's Reparation Board? God? Satan? Nothing would surprise you. You're lapsing into numbness. It's the only protection you have anymore.
And then you see a letter addressed to the puppies of the house. It doesn't have a return address. When you open it, it's a gift certificate for Petco.
A gift certificate to go along with the other anonymous gift certificate from Yarn Harbor that someone slipped you secretly while you knitted with your friends.
For one moment, you're able to glimpse a crack in the morter. You're able to remember that no matter how alone you feel, no matter how powerless, no matter how lost, there are people on the other side of this wall, slipping little notes through the cracks.
Other days, you keep your shit glued together until you reach your lunch break. Or perhaps until you get a phone call from the next brick in the wall bureaucrat who is laying the mortar for the prison cell that keeps you in and the criminals out. You must learn that the system is there to protect the guilty and fuck the innocent. God Bless America. Be sure to pay your taxes on time and salute the flag.
Perhaps you're lucky enough to have a day when your shit never comes unglued. Perhaps it's a day when you look in the mirror and the only thing in your face that betrays your situation is your eyes. The thousand yard stare of someone quietly, inexorably, falling down in slow motion.
But every once in awhile, you wait until you get home. You visit the mailbox hesitantly. Will it be a letter from the County? The Police? The Lawyer? The Victim's Reparation Board? God? Satan? Nothing would surprise you. You're lapsing into numbness. It's the only protection you have anymore.
And then you see a letter addressed to the puppies of the house. It doesn't have a return address. When you open it, it's a gift certificate for Petco.
A gift certificate to go along with the other anonymous gift certificate from Yarn Harbor that someone slipped you secretly while you knitted with your friends.
For one moment, you're able to glimpse a crack in the morter. You're able to remember that no matter how alone you feel, no matter how powerless, no matter how lost, there are people on the other side of this wall, slipping little notes through the cracks.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Gestalt Goes Shopping
Dear Mt. Royal Fine Foods:
Allow me to introduce myself. I am the customer that, over the past three weeks or so, has begun to openly weep in your produce section.
Believe it or not, I am not an overtly emotional person. I have been going through some trying times lately and aside from your establishment, I have been able to keep my shit together everywhere else.
I have been to both Cub Foods and Super One in the past three weeks without any emotional trauma. I have not gazed at their organic foods section and suddenly felt, as I did today, that my protective carapace was ripped away. By the time I had reached the Omega-3 infused cage free eggs, I was a flayed thing. My soul was exposed. My heart was broken. I blindly reached for the eggs and as I began to cry, I sobbed loudly and said to anyone within earshot "I just can't stand the thought of chickens in cages."
Perhaps it's the comforting aroma of coffee right as I enter your establishment. It may be the warm and welcoming color theme. It may even be your impressive hot food bar which has all the delicious foods that my mother never made for me.
Or perhaps it's the fact that your store just doesn't have the overt crazy people that I can find at other local grocery stores. I haven't run into anyone with poo on their pants or any mother beating their child. I haven't been accosted by anyone screaming at me in the parking lot or drunkenly demanding money.
Thus, I conclude that I was put on this earth to be THE crazy person at Mount Royal Fine Foods. I have absolutely no reason to react this way at your store but it's become a Pavlovian response now. The first time, I didn't cry until I reached the bakery. I'm afraid that next time, parking in your parking lot will cause me to hold my fabric grocery bags to my breast and keen for all to see.
Please be patient with me. Please don't think that I am trying to shoplift anything if I rush into the bathroom suddenly. Please, treat me like any other crazy, broken, sobbing stranger that you meet.
Please, just look the other way.
Allow me to introduce myself. I am the customer that, over the past three weeks or so, has begun to openly weep in your produce section.
Believe it or not, I am not an overtly emotional person. I have been going through some trying times lately and aside from your establishment, I have been able to keep my shit together everywhere else.
I have been to both Cub Foods and Super One in the past three weeks without any emotional trauma. I have not gazed at their organic foods section and suddenly felt, as I did today, that my protective carapace was ripped away. By the time I had reached the Omega-3 infused cage free eggs, I was a flayed thing. My soul was exposed. My heart was broken. I blindly reached for the eggs and as I began to cry, I sobbed loudly and said to anyone within earshot "I just can't stand the thought of chickens in cages."
Perhaps it's the comforting aroma of coffee right as I enter your establishment. It may be the warm and welcoming color theme. It may even be your impressive hot food bar which has all the delicious foods that my mother never made for me.
Or perhaps it's the fact that your store just doesn't have the overt crazy people that I can find at other local grocery stores. I haven't run into anyone with poo on their pants or any mother beating their child. I haven't been accosted by anyone screaming at me in the parking lot or drunkenly demanding money.
Thus, I conclude that I was put on this earth to be THE crazy person at Mount Royal Fine Foods. I have absolutely no reason to react this way at your store but it's become a Pavlovian response now. The first time, I didn't cry until I reached the bakery. I'm afraid that next time, parking in your parking lot will cause me to hold my fabric grocery bags to my breast and keen for all to see.
Please be patient with me. Please don't think that I am trying to shoplift anything if I rush into the bathroom suddenly. Please, treat me like any other crazy, broken, sobbing stranger that you meet.
Please, just look the other way.
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