[Raingirl]

No problem Sunshinegirl!

I mean a lot more these days and try to choose my words more carefully...so yes, I did mean it that way also! I am the same in that regard - if I didn't have the drive to understand the world, then I wouldn't have even got this far.

I am so glad that you recognise and can understand that too. Words can have so many meanings.....and we know very well how much they can hurt us. I try to teach that to others now, and encourage kind words and positive thinking.

Even your username makes me smile! You chose to call yourself that...so in your darker days, please remember that the sun is always shining...even when we don't see it! :)

[mandy]

Has anyone reached the point of just being happy you're alive and able to rely on yourself? I've never before felt like I could survive by my own means, but now it is becoming the most important thing I can think of.

I will have moments where it is just me, no thoughts or worries about my family, my husband, my future, past... just the silence in the moment right now. It's so calming and powerful.

I realized yesterday, after talking with my husband, that we are probably heading for separation or divorce. Neither of us understand why we're together anymore. For the first time in my life I feel like I have a choice free from pressure and abuse to move on and make my own decisions about what I do and where I go. I have full confidence I will make the right choice. It's hard to not rely on others, you know? for that guidance of what to do.

I am excited.

[Raingirl]

Oh Mandy! I know what you mean! That's fantastic. I'm so happy and excited for you. :D What you said reminded me of the start of my poem,
[i]"Pass It On":

Life can be grand when you don’t trust a soul
Completely alone, not a link in the world
If nobody knows you and nobody cares
You at least know where you stand, aware.[/i]

You may not have had people around before that you could rely on, but you sound like you've found the perfect person to help you now - YOU! It's like an independence we never learned or something.....and now, as 'real' grown-ups, we have a chance to realise our potential, stand up for ourselves, make our own choices...

Realising we can decide who to spend our (precious) time around, we can decide who to expend our (precious) energies on, we can basically decide what happens in our (precious) lives.....is liberating!

I still have moments of doubt, lower points, but NOTHING like as bad as before. Knowing something...and realising it is something else!

Well done Mandy - keep looking after you! xo

[Emms]

Well done Mandy. Yes, Rain is right, the best person to look after yourself and YOU! And it's a great feeling when you actually find you've coped with something that not so long ago, would have made you feel you were going crazy. Well done!

[sunshinegirl]

That sounds cool to me mandy. I am wondering when I will get there I have glimpses of it sometimes but then get battered down again. I just feel a powerful need to have someone special to rely on but my special someone currently is not reliable at all. I feel alienated from him, I feel completely detached from him, last night I felt so rejected by him I couldn't understand why I felt the need to put up with his disrespect and this pain I feel when he treats me bad.

I saw it clearly last night and still puzzle over my need to go back for more.... I mean I know that there is nothing there for me right now but maybe later there will be ...but why put up with the pain in the interim? I don't understand my motivations. I just feel so weak and vunerable at the moment, my health is taking a battering, and I need a friend and support and encouragement and the person I have relied on in the past is not there for me at all. And they are treating me with disdain.. I don't know why they are at this place that makes them so distant but I ask and ask and there is no response to this question. Its like talking to a black hole.

[Emms]

It's so hard to say this and to hear it (for me too) but the only person who is ever really there for you all the time us YOU! I don't think anyone else can ever completely understand us, and by 'us' I mean everyone, not just those who have been damaged by child abuse. Just that with the survivors like us, I guess it takes time for us to learn that skill of being independant and caring for ourself, looking out for ourself and being there and sorting out our problems. We have to like ourselves to do that properly and believe me, there are times when I've hated myself, and often still do.

There are times though when we ALL need help and advice from someone else, this forum helps with that and there are places we can go to get advice, but it's difficult getting any decent advice from anywhere at times, I've found that anyway, esp here with organisations here in England with all the cut backs our government are making. I'm so sorry your man isn't there for you to rely on. My hubby tries and he's there in a kind of physical way, but emotionally I may as well be talking to a black hole too, he just can't deal with emotion and sometimes we all need more than the odd nod or 'hmm, I think I understand'. And I usually get that from him while he's got his eyes on the TV or the computer screen, not on me.

Life can be very lonely, but we need the one person who can help us the most, we need our SELF to be strong for us, we need to build on that and it's one hell of a difficult thing to do.

[Glider39]

Well put Emms! That is so true. But I feel like I don't even know myself. When around people, I feel that I have to put on this front to pretend that everything is ok. But inside things are not ok. In all honesty, I don't even know the things I truly enjoy. I just do what everyone else wants me to do. So i like whatever they like. That's pretty sad. I just wish I cared more about myself. How do you begin to build your self worth, or self esteem?

[Emms]

I think EVERYONE (abuse survivor or not) puts on some kind of an act when they are with other ppl, we ALL do it at times. That's (in my opinion) more or less 'normal' behaviour. But having to like what they like is something we have to learn not to do all the time. We can say we're not so keen on this or that without making the other person who does like it feel that we are being critical of them or putting them down. We have to learn (and it's hard). But there is no one anywhere who says we HAVE to do what others want as long as we are doing no harm and not breaking the law. Ppl sometimes make us feel that we are bring wicked if we don't do everything they want, that we are somehow letting them down, that we owe them something, but we owe them nothing. We are entitled to make our own decisions and it doesn't matter what another person has done for us, if they want us to do something and we don't want to, we don't have to do it, don't let anyone make you feel guilty for refusing them something, it's YOUR choice. It is YOU who does it though, you heal yourself but you may need that professional help to show you how and we all have dfferent ways of learning and coping. What we really have to learn to do is look after ourself, but for a survivor who has never been tought the normal social skills and how to look after themselves, that is so hard to do.

I know every situation is different and it's so hard to behave this way when you've been conditioned to do as you are told, to tag along with the 'gang' and plese everyone, to be part of the 'others'. But we are all individuals and have the right to be ourselves. YOU have that right and although you may feel you do not know yourself at the moment, that confusion CAN lift and you can feel better, but it's not easy to get there and never expect to feel great all the time, no one does, esp me.

We're all here for you, Glider39, vent as much as you like here. I don't pretend to have the answers but I know you can do it and you can find that person you really are, hopefully sooner rather than later. Plesae don't give up and please get some professional help if you can.

[sunshinegirl]

i had the best group session ever a couple of weekends ago now....

I saw alot of things clearly and felt so happy for the moment to be in the moment and I saw myself clearly and how hard i had worked and all my good qualities and how awesome that I am it was pretty amazing... It seems almost forgotten now... but somehow just a bit of it stays behind with me... I saw how i create my own reality and I saw that the reality that I create was a result of the misery and pain that I had been raised in...

I also found this part of myself that was really hard to accept that part of me that I get ashamed of, or embarrassed by and tell to shut up and go away... i met that piece of myself and realised that I couldn't ignore it and make it go away cause that makes me feel a terrible deep depression.... I realised that I had to make it mine and bring it with me into my life...

I also realised that everything that hurts me in the world is just a result of the reality I live in.. oh Ive said that but well it was like receiving a miracle really.. I have heard lots of people say it but I haven't understood what that actually means.. but now I get it...

I just get very tired and stressed..and things get on top of me... i get it i get it i get it i get it...

a major break through for me... Idon't think that I will ever have that awful crazy depression phases that I have been going through after that...

[sunshinegirl]

I just see things a little more positively... Im not that scared of people anymore too... things seem to be lifting somehow for me... and now I seem to be sleeping 10hr nights must be the healing process