(This was originally written March 2015.)
My blog has always, and will always be a place for me to work through problems. A place to try and find clarity. I have found that the more I write about my life and things I feel, the more perspective I am able to have because I have to dig deep to be able to say these things out loud. None of it has been easy. I’ve decided in this post that I’m going to try and use my voice to discuss an issue that has plagued me for so many years. I want to desperately understand. I NEED some clarity.
I do not understand family dynamics. I don’t understand my place in a family. Where do I fit? I am unpredictable. Volatile. And I can create chaos.
Seth and I tried to discuss this issue last night and he said that it is going to take a lot of time for people to get over how bad I have offended them ………hey! Wait, ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Right now, people I know are dying around me. There is so much suffering. In the grand scheme of things this life is just a matter of days and moments. SO why do we have to do it alone because someone has been offended? Well, hello family and friends. Let me introduce you to my blog. Yup, I get that you don’t want to talk to me to try and gain understanding. Start reading and get caught up. I discuss my life and the challenges I have faced having severe brain trauma and a personality disorder. I discuss my marriage in depth. I have strangers in seven countries that read what I write. They are grateful that I am bringing these issues to the surface because no one else is talking about it and most of the time they tell me their story as well. This is a record for my daughters and their children to read. Speaking my truth is empowering.
But I struggle with feeling that I am worthy of love. Always have. Right now the only people that I know without a doubt love and accept me are my parents. When I told that to Seth, he said that maybe they are the only ones that can love me right now.
That stung.
I am 33 years old going on 34. If my parents are the only people on the face of this earth that can love me … after all the people I have met and interacted with and cared for over the years, what a sad reality. It is lonely and isolating. We are not meant to be alone. We are not meant to feel alone. Yet how many of us do?
Random fact about me: I am a person that loves to talk on the phone. I don’t like to text unless I have to. I crave human interaction. Yet no one calls me unless I call them first. No one called me or checked in when I was dying. I guess Seth decided to withhold it from most of his family. My parents kept it pretty private as well. I figure that if you withhold that kind of stuff from people that care about you, then you must be ashamed. Doesn’t matter whether that is true or not. I wasn’t ashamed of it and I didn’t care who knew. After I gave birth to my daughter and over the course of 18 months I was hospitalized 5 times. I did not want to live. I was experiencing an extreme case of postpartum psychosis that mixed with BPD created a deadly combination. Shameful? I guess. Why I couldn’t have just died one of those 10-15 times that I have tried I do not know.
Yes, I realize that I have a greater purpose. But a big part of me still wishes that I would have died anyway. No one should be able to take hundreds of pills, cut themselves open, breathe in deadly fumes over and over again and live to talk about it. I do not feel ashamed for what I have done. Sad? Yes. Pained that I caused those around me to feel fear and pain? Yes. Shame? No.
Question: If I did die, who would notice or care? Don’t say my kids because yes I know they would care. I’m asking in a broader sense. Who would care? I have a close relationship with my parents. They would care. But would anyone else notice? Would they think about me sometimes? Probably. They would initially post about it on Facebook and question why it happened. But then it fades. People move on because they have to.
So family: If I have offended you and you are pushing yourself away from knowing me and my daughters because of it, then stop. I’m really trying to understand. What is the purpose of family?
God gave Adam Eve because he said it was not good for man to be alone. It is not good for anyone to be alone. I’m guessing a good portion of my family feels alone as well, and we probably don’t know how to fix it. Our society is screwed up like that.
I read an interesting article a few weeks ago about the power of kindness. That researchers could predict whether people were happy in their marriage based on the amount of kindness in the relationship. I’m going to say that extends to other family members as well. The more you are kind to others, the more you forget yourself and the better relationships you create.
I feel that I have earned the right to be happy. And I can choose happiness. Right now I am lost. When people you know die and you start to inspect your life and what it means, it can be a very sad journey to take.
As far as I know, there has only been one person to walk this earth in perfection. He chose to take on our imperfections, our pain. He suffered for MY imperfections, for MY pain. Yours too. So I understand why I lived in a way that if I didn’t think I could do something perfectly, I wouldn’t try at all. I became ashamed as my many failures started to pile up.
When you look at the nights sky, do you see the moon and the stars, or the just the darkness that surrounds them? How would you feel if I chose to dismiss your light because there was darkness surrounding you? I shine because of the darkness.
Watch the video I posted. Does it make you realize how insignificant you are? Or do view the opposite like me and you realize your great significance? I see the beauty. If there are as many people as stars in the sky then how GREAT must God be to personally show His love for me. I feel His great love surround me daily. I know He cares about me. I am but a grain of sand and yet God loves me anyway. How great is our worth?! IF God can love as many stars number the sky then why can’t we love each other? How come we find fault and diminish the light in others?
Stop
Eye Opening Honesty 