And the sun just keeps on shining :)

Today was wonderful...

I woke up, feeling deliciously drowsy and relatively pain-free (compared to how much pain I have been in lately)... I dozed for a while... and then just as a good dream I was having began to go bad in a big way, I was woken up by a phone call from a new but close friend, who I then spent a lovely afternoon with, shopping at Harbor Town :)

After I was dropped off home, I took myself out to Kmart where I bought some things I have been trying to save up for, for ages, got a light dinner on the way back home, and settled in for the night to play with my new purchases and just generally relax... (I got new sheet sets, canvases, a quilt cover set, some dress bags and hangers and some chocolate and twisties)...

Then the friend I recently reconciled with came over and we spent hours and hours just laying on my bed, talking and laughing like we used to before everything changed over a year ago... It is amazing what a difference just one conversation can make... And I'm so glad she loved me enough to hang in there and to fight for our friendship too... We have both learned a lot... And I think it may even be possible that we are closer now than we ever have been and that our friendship is stronger than ever too...

I am also so very grateful to no longer be in a position where I am questioning everything in my life, including the validity of our friendship, based on how incredibly confused I have been by the lies and misdirection I have had in so many of the most important areas of my life of late...

It is such a relief...

And then, just as she was leaving, another friend I'd hoped I'd see tonight (but thought was busy) arrived... (It feels like even my indirect wishes are being fulfilled, these past couple of days!)

Right at this moment, I feel contented, happy and blessed...

Life... is good :)

:D

I have had the best day! :D

Unfortunately I am too exhausted to elaborate right now... and being that it is 4:08am, I kinda think that is fair enough...

Going to bed is probably a good idea too :)

I just wanted to mark the day... because today (well, technically yesterday now) my whole world changed so much so that I am in a much better headspace than I have been in a very, VERY long time...

I am Happy... and I am going to be okay :)

I will explain more after I have had some sleep... Nite! xxxx :)

Life... Death... And the double-edged sword that keeps Me trapped between the two...

Right now, I suspect I have enough fentanyl, codeine and valium in this house to kill me...

And if not, I'm sure that all of the supplies of those that I have left, mixed with whatever restavit I have left and panadol and cold and flu meds and whatever else I have in the house would surely tip me over the edge...

These are the thoughts that are beginning to gain momentum inside of my head, getting louder and louder all of the time... And now that my Girls are gone for the week, I am left here to fight it... alone

I don't want to fight it...

I know I am supposed to want to fight it... But really? I just want it all to finally... be over...

I even know a few people who would be overjoyed at knowing this and would most likely be happy to give me whatever little push that was needed to make sure I actually went through with it... (wouldn't they, Rosie... and most likely a couple of other people Darren has lied to about me as well)...

I cannot sleep any more... I am in constant pain... My stress levels are too high for me to be able to deal with successfully... I am no longer able to un-see the fact that, despite the illusion of having people close to me who love and adore me for me; who I really am, this is, in fact, not the case... their 'love' is based on need... which really... means that I am just as alone as I have always been; my whole life...

I have no safe place to fall...

If I wanted to, I could easily just snap my fingers and be literally surrounded by people who would happily worship the ground I walked upon... I have always had the ability to do that... I am a people reader... And so it is not hard to very quickly zero in on what someone craves the most and to give it to them...

But finding someone who would truly see and love me for Me? Who would happily be there for Me, not in order to gain something from me? That, I am yet to find... I do not even know that I believe it even exists anymore... People, at their very core, are so incredibly selfish... And in this instant-gratification society in which we all now live, the chances of finding that diminish with each passing day...

There was a beautiful exception I came across today... An elderly lady saw the distress I was in (when I took Claire to see the doctor today), and she offered Claire and I her appointment time instead of us having to wait for our scheduled time... It was a beautiful offer... and I told her that I was incredibly touched by such a kind offer but that I would be okay... She is one of a dying breed...

I want friends and a partner who hold and live those kinds of values... but the likelihood of finding that in people my own age? Well, let's just say that the chances are slim to none...

In some ways, I am extraordinarily close to overdosing... Yet in others, I am nowhere near close... I guess that is the beauty and the pain of being highly dissociative and multiple; I am beyond broken inside and the pain is excruciating... whilst also being unbreakable and able to survive more than even the most sadistic, horrid monster could dream up, in the hope of destroying Me...

You could be forgiven for making the mistake of thinking that knowing this is a wonderful and comforting thing...

Sometimes... it is...

Sometimes... knowing that whether or not I feel strong enough to keep fighting this and winning, I will survive it and my daughters will not be left motherless, is of great comfort to Me...

But it is a double-edged sword...

Knowing that I will survive somehow, no matter what, also means that no matter how painful my life becomes; whether that be emotionally or physically... I will survive... There is no way out... No end to the pain... and the internal torment...

Right now, I do not know which side I want to win... I don't want to live in pain like this... and I don't want to leave my precious daughters, motherless...

I guess it is just as well the meds have finally started kicking in... I feel incredibly drowsy... And it is probably just as well... because I have overdosed once before... and with the way my life currently is and the state of mind I am in, it could potentially, quite easily happen again... Just not this morning... I guess

There is so much more I want and need to say... but I think I will allow it to wait... because even if I no longer want to live... my daughters deserve better than to be left motherless... I guess I should do whatever I can to aid in that process

I wish I wanted to do this just for Me... I wish that I was reason enough... for Me

I wish I had hope... for Me

I wish I wasn't stuck, trapped inside of myself, watching myself take emotional risks that I know, will only keep pushing me closer and closer to the edge, should they not end well (which in all cases so far has been a 90%+ chance that they wouldn't end well... even though, were that tiny 10% to pan out, it would have had the complete opposite effect)... I simply do not have the reserves or the rights to be playing with the life of my children's mother in this way...

And so now... sleep :'(

Oh... and on some level... I am grateful for the incongruent golden sunshine that seems to be everywhere today... for if the weather matched my mood today, I would have found myself yet another step closer to a death I am not in any position to be 100% sure I even want right now...

Despair...

Tomorrow my daughters go back to their father's house for their week with him...

:'(

Tomorrow, I am, once more, alone with my thoughts...

That used to be a good thing; the relief (from having to be unfailingly functional), the respite, the peace, the silence... Only now, I do not want to see or be what is in those silences...

I do not want to be in a relationship right now... (or perhaps, there is just no-one currently in my life that I want to be in a relationship with; I can't be 100% sure on this one but either way, it results in no desire for a relationship, at least, at this point in time)

But I do want someone to tell 'I love you' to... And who will tell me 'I love you', too...

I am deeply grateful that I know the difference between the two... I am grateful that being able to and actually applying this understanding means I am not finding myself in wrong relationship after wrong relationship, desperately searching for something I will never find...

I am open to the right relationship... Just as I am open to the right friendships... should they come along... I just don't see anything like that in my life right now... I want to... but I don't

This afternoon, I braved facing a situation head on... The message has been registered as having been seen and this person has been registered as having been active hours later... and still no response... There is always a chance that this person is simply unsure of how to respond or of even if they want to respond, as yet... I honestly don't know... I am open to this being the case but I am suspecting that getting my message has, instead, just given them the wordless 'out' of our friendship that they had been seeking all of this time...

I feel sad about this... but I do not want something that does not truly belong to me... I never have... And so if this is goodbye, then I guess I will have to find a way to be okay with that...

I don't know whether or not I will bother sending a message to the other mutual friend she and I had... I think that certain circumstances have made where things stand between that person and I quite clear... It is now just a matter of whether or not I seek to be heard... or whether I allow it to simply disappear into the abyss with so many other unaddressed hurts...

The jury is still out on a person I had previously believed had walked out of my life, albeit unofficially... I don't know what to think there as I am still getting mixed messages...

There was a reconciliation of sorts with one person in particular... but I really don't know whether or not that is going to hold; we have a lot of talking to do and I don't know where we will find ourselves at the end of it all... I don't hate her... I just don't know whether or not our time has come and gone...

I have a feeling that this internal restlessness and a wish to move on, while intensely painful right now, is actually a sign of progress...

I am becoming increasingly dis-satisfied with the people and things in my life that fall short of what I want and what I deserve...

As with any major changes, I am aware that to a certain extent, there is a pendulum effect in play here; it is incredibly difficult to make major changes without wiping the whole slate clean... People are used to who you already are... they don't usually deal so well with change... I feel really, really threatened by that... And having fought so very hard to get to this point, I don't want to risk not being able to hear my own voice... or getting so confused that I begin to wonder if maybe I'm just crazy and things should go back to the way they were... when I was so deeply unhappy but not creating waves in anyone's life... including my own :(

The more I think about it... the more I want to walk away from everyone and everything and simply not look back...

I want to start again...

New Life... new partner... new friends... new everything

I think it has been coming for a while now...

My family and I have been becoming closer and closer for quite some time... and although there is still deep pain with regard to some issues I have with my siblings, overall, I actually have a family for the first time since I left home at 17... possibly even for the first time... ever

The end of my relationship with Darren was not only the end of that relationship... but also the end of the very last of the lessons I needed to learn in order to have everything I require to be able to make 'normal people' decisions regarding my own life... Now all I need is the confidence to hear my own voice above all other voices no matter what... and the courage to implement these changes... without apology

Something standing in the way of true reconciliation with any of these women, is a complete lack of trust...

I have reason to believe that they are all talking about me behind my back... and in one or two cases, I have evidence...

I honestly just don't know that I even want to have friends like that in my life...

I don't want to always have that nagging feeling that I may or may not be getting all of the story... And that I may be being judged by what others have said, as opposed to being judged upon my own merits...

These women all spend quite a bit of time bonding... together

No... the more I think about it... the more I know that these things are not what I want...

All of us have online journals... and access to one another's journals (although it is impossible to really know whether or not any of us actually utilise that access)... There is only one of us who has not disclosed the location of her own journal... and she is the one who is supposed to be the closest to me... She also happens to be the only one of us that I know for a fact, religiously keeps up with all of our journals...

I have no problem whatsoever with someone keeping a private journal... It is not the privacy of the journal I have an issue with, but the gut feeling I have that there is a massive double standard at play here...

In our conversations, I am called to account and expected to justify each and every thought and feeling I have (that she has access to)... and although there is a careful acceptance, on her part, if I actively shut a line of enquiry (which often feels more like a confrontation or an interrogation) down, I feel compelled to defend myself by sharing more than I otherwise would have; not that I had anything to hide, but whatever else it is that I have ended up sharing, results in me feeling over-exposed and emotionally raw... so perhaps it is not the wish to with-hold information, but the wish to protect myself from unnecessarily touching upon the emotionally volatile... and to put down boundaries?

Naturally, I take responsibility for my part in this... I haven't said 'No' when I should have... I haven't stood up for myself when I have felt interrogated and confronted... I haven't defined or enforced boundaries...

And at first... at the beginning of our friendship... I didn't have to

There was mutual respect... There was gentleness... There was trust

I fully understand that her issues with abandonment in just about every area of her life have been off the charts for quite some time now (and I totally get that me having taken some steps back from our friendship - even though I was clear it was because of my own mental health deterioration and not her, and that it would be for a limited time - has certainly made that worse)... Just as I understand that the 'fight or flight' instinct that that kind of issue can trigger is strong... I even get that the almost 10 year age gap we share accounts, at times, albeit rarely, for the huge differences in the stages of our emotional development (which is easy to forget at times because, to her credit, she is incredibly mature for her age, in most ways)...

But if what that results in is an emotional aggressiveness (by which I mean confrontation and demand as opposed to abuse - which is certainly not what I am talking about here)... and if what me facing that emotional aggressiveness and demand results in is me dissembling, repeating old patterns and getting sicker and sicker... then what am I to do? How do I continue a friendship where her dysfunction and my own dysfunction are sending us both on a downward spiral where one is triggering off the other and feeding the cycle? The more she fears being abandoned, the more emotionally aggressive and demanding she becomes in order to try to gain a sense of control over her own fear of being abandoned... The more she becomes emotionally aggressive and demanding, the faster and further I want and need to run... And the more I brave it and stay regardless, the sicker I become...

I don't see a way out :'(

She is a lovely girl...

I have nothing left...

I want to say 'I'm done'

:'(

Cassie...

Almost out of nowhere I have suddenly had a flashback about Cassie...

Cassie was a blonde haired doll I had as a child... She had more of a small child's face than a baby's face... And she wore a purply lilac knitted dress and bonnet... We were inseparable...

My last memory of her is touching her matted hair and wishing I could make it beautiful and get all of the knots out of it for her... although I don't remember her hair ever being another way...

As my memory fades quickly to black, my ears ring; deafeningly loudly...

I split...

My connection to her is darkened by someone and something horrific...

Deep inside of Me, I know this... I feel it...

Even now... as I think of her... my ears are ringing... and my eyesight is beginning to fail as the screaming inside reaches a crescendo...

It is time to let this memory go again... for now

It is time to forget...

And to allow my mind to re-bury Cassie and everything she means to Me...

I miss her so much! :'(

Maybe... if I am feeling brave and strong... I will ask my mother more about her... but not tonight

I have touched too many blackouts tonight already, before Cassie even appeared...

It is time to rest now

Something I am grateful for...

From one of My precious Littles (a couple of weeks ago)...

Sometimes it is the simplest things that keep Me alive... and this is one of them xxxx

Lies and misdirection...

I am sick to death of these cryptic entries!

And yet it is in their cryptic nature that my current safety and space from the world and those around me, lays...

My world is so full of lies and misdirection lately... from others... Others who profess to care, when really they don't... Not in any way that truly exists outside of their own need and their desperation for Me to fill it for them, anyway... and that is not real... not by any stretch of the imagination

I have made some incredibly brave and tough decisions lately... Decisions which leave me completely alone in this world, unless and until I choose to rebuild via new friendships and relationships...

Only, apparently, I have waited too long to implement them... I wish I had acted faster... I wish I had not allowed other things to get in the way of me burning these bridges forever, before this new and confusing information surfaced... because now I am just as lost as I was before I ever made the decisions...

I have a 'friend' who, without warning or explanation or any specific or definable predicating circumstance, put me on a 'restricted' feed on her facebook page (which means we were technically still friends, only all I could see were her public posts)... I took the huge and painful step (although not quite as painful as continuing to see her on my friends list, knowing that we were really only still friends in name only), of actually un-friending her...

I took action...

I didn't just take it; the way I have in the past, and in other ways for so long now that I have lost count of the weeks and months (it has possibly even been over a year now)...

And then this morning, I get a text message... reconnection on some level... communication that would suggest there was not, in fact, a great gaping chasm between us...

I don't know what to think...

I am deeply hurt... and I am angry... and I know that I have been lied to; to my face (not necessarily right now, but in the past for sure) and via deliberate misdirection...

Was the text today a co-incidence? Was it genuine? Was it a way of testing whether or not I would confront the problem in person? Was it a way of burying this issue so that she can continue to walk completely away from me, supposedly, without any ill feelings hanging over her head?

And what of the content of her text message today? She has something for me??? Why? Why now? And how and why did everything fall apart between us in the first place? For god's sake! She is the one who drove me (when I couldn't drive), to go and get my belongings back from an ex-partner who had been cheating on me, then took me to lunch and strawberry picking on the way home (which was such a sweet gesture)... And then out of nowhere - the chasm... I just don't get it!

I honestly don't know...

And then there is the friend who saw fit to actively try to stand between my reconciliation with her, after she walked away last time... Who also sees fit to be regularly passive aggressive toward me... Who constantly misdirects (particularly lately) by saying all of the so-called right words... and most likely even meaning them on some level... but who will not trust me with her anger; the one thing that is literally/has literally tearing/torn (I really don't know) us apart... How could she do that?

And without trust and honesty, what do we even have left?

And why should I have to be the one to demand it, when I freely give it? I lead by example... Her trust and honesty should be a symptom of our friendship, not something I have to ask for... And the bottom line is that it simply isn't there...

Perhaps it is an understandable aberration...

Perhaps, when she was at her most drowning and I could no longer drown with her (but had to take an explained, temporary step back), her trust in me always being there no matter what, and always being so much more indestructible than her, was destroyed...

I can feel her anger... And I have felt it so strongly since then...

Maybe some of her anger is even for my part in her eventual realisation that the relationship that she eventually left (that was killing her at the time), had to end... Maybe it is safer to hate me on some level for that, than to hate him for how he was treating her... I don't know...

But the fact remains, that despite protestations of love and honesty and trust... I feel the anger, the hatred (at times - which for the record, you cannot have without underlying love), the mistrust... and I know about the dishonesty...

She has never recovered...

And neither... have I

Countless times, she has been there for me in the most beautiful ways... and I have truly felt and believed in her love... It really was real... and in some ways, I am sure, still is... but it is now distorted by these unresolved issues and she is unreachable to me...

She is not a bad person... She is not a part of 'the nightmare'... She has given so much of herself to me... And been so incredibly generous in so many other ways too... She is an amazing person...

I simply do not know how or where to find her again... The words are there... they physicality is even there... and sometimes even a tiny little piece of her is there... but most of the time... she is gone

I don't know what to do...

I am too exhausted by paths my own life has taken of late, to be able to keep fighting for something that becomes more and more painful by the day; something that may never truly be able to be healed...

Perhaps our time in one another's lives has simply come and gone?

Perhaps I am exhausted and running away?

I don't know... I've never known where that line should be... I've never had the chance to experience it in a healthy way, in order to have a healthy marker against which to measure this situation...

In my mind, I keep hearing my own internal monologue... Real love stays and fights, no matter what... Until you are dead, you could be fighting harder... If you love her, it doesn't matter that it is killing you... you need to stay... and see it through...

And yet, despite not being able to define where that healthy 'walk away' line is, I know that staying until I am dead is not healthy or an acceptable option either...

If it were just Me, perhaps I would not be challenging this line of thinking (even though I most certainly should be)... But it is not just Me; there are two innocent little girls who need their mother... who need... Me...

And I have been far too close to death for far too long now... Not just because of the issues within this friendship... but for a lot of reasons

Added to these two floundering (or possibly already dead) friendships, is yet another... We had become so incredibly close... and then her life took a couple of major turns and all of a sudden, not only do I no longer see her, but whenever we are in the same room together, I get the distinct impression, she would rather be anywhere but there with me... My attempts at conversation fall flat, despite neither of us having been able to shut up when we were together before... She has suddenly developed extremely close friendships with a couple of people she had not been close to previously (there is more to that story, but it is not mine to tell)... and I have simply ceased to exist in her life

I have a theory or two on how and why this possibly happened... but again, there is very little I am able to say here as that becomes a part of a story that is not mine to tell... Either way, there is not a single thing I can do about it... I am still here; pathetically hoping that the friendship we had, still exists somewhere inside of her... But to be honest... I am no longer able to believe :'(

Then there is... or more to the point, was... My Safe Place (which is now no longer a Safe Place, but a clique in which I do not feel or believe I am welcome)

I shared this place (I now wish I never had) with two people from my 'real life'; one of whom I even encouraged to 'give it and the people within it, another chance'... and very quickly after that... it began to fall apart... well, for Me anyway...

These two people have since gone on to become beloved and valued members... while I have felt more and more unwanted and unwelcome to the point where even when I did still brave attending, (all the while trying to convince myself that I was just crazy and that of course this wasn't really happening), I simply ceased to exist... I still do not know why...

Just as I still do not know why someone else in that safe place (who knew better and had a responsibility to behave better), saw fit to have a go at me and humiliate me in front of everyone there!

There has been no apology... only an increase in the alienation...

The part I cannot even begin to understand is the hypocrisy...

This person had been directly threatened and attacked by another member of this 'Safe Place' and yet welcomed that person back in with open arms... Her whole dream had been seriously threatened by this person, and yet this person was welcomed back! And yet I, who had strongly supported her (when that issue had arisen and whenever it was appropriate to do so, since, including helping out a few times in a personal capacity), and who had not attacked or humiliated her, nor threatened her dream, got attacked and humiliated and was then made to feel unwelcome (with the exception of once socially - at someone else's birthday, and one time after I had sent her an email asking if we could bridge the distance I could feel between us)...

Now I can fully understand, that perhaps she was having an off day when the initial incident occurred... As a matter of fact, I know she was having a really tough time that day... And despite the unfairness of how and where the attack (and the resulting humiliation I felt in front of everyone it happened in front of) happened, I accept, that everyone is human and that maybe she was at breaking point and I was in the wrong place at the wrong time in the wrong way...

I can even accept that she was having such a tough time (and chances are that I covered my own hurt and humiliation pretty well because having shown it would have risked hurting her feelings and would have also made the situation even more painful and humiliating than it already was), that she never apologised because she never even realised that anything along these lines had even happened... And if that were all it was, then, yes it would have hurt... but... I could have found my way past it... I really could have

But to then be ostracised more and more over the weeks and months that passed??? That is personal... That is unethical... Unprofessional... Hurtful... Humiliating... and NOT FAIR!

Still reprimanding myself for being so paranoid about how this person appeared to feel about me, I logged into my facebook page to find, that despite having about a gazillion friends she doesn't even know personally on her friends list, she had specifically unfriended me...

It was heartbreaking confirmation that I was not, in fact, paranoid or crazy... :'(

I can honestly say that I wish that things between these four people and I were not the way they are right now... I can also honestly say that I wish there was a way to fix this... I just don't know how or even that there is a way at all...

All four have been un-friended on my facebook account...

I simply couldn't handle watching them all interact on one another's pages so freely (it came up on my newsfeed, I wasn't specifically looking for it) and then to see the contrast of the nothingness that was left on mine, where once, the same level of interaction they continue to share with one another, existed...

It hurt too much... and it was adding significantly to my feelings of despair and suicidal ideation...

I accept that I simply need to let go of what I cannot fix or change and to move on...

What I need is to find friendships and a love that will be good for Me... Only how and where to find that when I am stuck almost completely immobilised and unable to sleep properly, I really do not know...

I am more than ready to give; and give a lot...

I simply no longer want to be giving into what is essentially (although not completely in every case), a void... I have so little left that I keep drowning in waves of deep despair... Being alone with my thoughts has become dangerous... And the imbalance in my life has begun to lead to behaviours that are leaving me more and more drained and depleted than ever before...

I just can't seem to see straight anymore (when I am feeling like this)... And when I cannot see straight, I cannot make those behaviours stop...

Already, I have found myself wearing a certain item of clothing I have had as an emergency comfort for years (but not ever made use of until recently), intermittently... When I am alone, I am dissembling in ways I am ceasing to even recognise until after it is all over... And my tolerance where it comes to the girls having arguments and hurting one another deliberately, is at an all time low; I feel completely overwhelmed and although it has not resulted in them being treated poorly or abused, I know they know I am not okay... I know they worry... And that... is NOT okay

This needs to END... and now

Now, I guess, all that is left to decide is whether or not I break a promise I once made; a promise to never leave (one particular friendship) without first talking things out :'(

But to be able to talk it out, I would have to be able to have a clear enough head to know what I want...

Everything and everyone inside of Me, right now, is pushing for a complete shut-down...

Not facing things though, is not the way to go... And complete shut-down really is running away... even if it is essential to my survival right now...

The thing I don't know is... What will be left after the need for shut-down has passed? Will I still want this friendship? Or will I have wished I'd walked away while it still hurt enough to make walking away make sense (and in doing so, not allow me to justify away all of the valid reasons I have been so unhappy for so long)?

Until I have that answer, I guess I can neither fulfil nor break my promise anyway...

She doesn't deserve to 'wait' like this... but I have nothing... no answers... no coping skills... nothing

I am so sorry :'(

A piece... when there is still no peace

I have so much more to say...

But no other words to say it right now... except... perhaps, these

Lost objectivity... Silent intensity...
Nothingness grows...
Meaningless yearning beneath everlasting loss...
I escape; forcing it nearer...
Layers of vulnerability, erased

And that is... of any kind

Just for Me...

Last night, once again, I did something I had to do for Me...

Naturally, only I will understand the significance of this photograph but that's okay; it's okay for some things to be publicly private...

I don't know whether or not this is a good idea... or where I go from here... I only know that staying alive and coping on at least a basic level is absolutely essential right now...

I hope I find my way back out... before its too late to save Me from myself...

:'(

Fate and the cruel cosmic joke...

Once more, through no fault of my own, my fate lays in the hands of another...

Well part of it does anyway :'(

How does this keep happening?

And added to this, I have come to some emotionally devastating realisations; realisations that have left me more desolate and lonely inside than ever...

I am hoping that things will go the way I want them to (whatever that even is, I don't know)... but in the end, this situation exists regardless... and that it exists at all is the problem...

Wow! What a cruel cosmic joke... It was exactly last night the last time I had my week off that this exact same situation happened!

Whether or not things work out differently this time, while my faith in myself and my ability to survive remains unshaken and is possibly even stronger (if that is even possible), my faith in ever having a deeply happy, safe, loving future, full of wonder, is close to (if not already), completely non-existent...

And once again, I will survive it all... whether I want to or not :'(

Whirlwind...

What a whirlwind today has been!

And yet, in so many ways it has been very quiet...

The problem is that it is now quiet here... which means that I can hear everything that is in my head... and loudly

I want, so badly, to truly fall in love... a real love... One where we match... and deeply connect... and where I am safe from being used and abused... One where I want to be... where I am... Happy

But I don't want it, in order to be saved from being alone... (Yuck!) I quite enjoy the quiet... and the peace... I just get this sense, deep down inside, that right now in particular, it is time for me to enjoy the world with someone...

There are potentially so many people I could pretend, could be 'it'... but so far, I have not found whatever it is, in whomever it is I am apparently searching for... (because more and more I find myself beginning to actually actively pay attention in this way)... Where are these people even found??? Where on earth do I begin looking?

It is true, that in this world full of lonely people, all I would have to do is snap my fingers and I could be literally surrounded by people clamouring for my attention... but 'he' is none of them... 'He' stands apart from all of them; quiet and confident and serene; untouched by their desperation...

'He' stands alone... waiting for Me

He is neither above, nor beneath Me... He is Me... and I am Him

I spend so much time these days, avoiding the silences, in order to not have to hear what is in them... and yet the voices of the demons in those silences are only echoes of demons long since dead to Me and gone from my Life... What is the source of their power over Me currently? Why do I fear them the way I do? Why am I still awake at 5:33am because I am not yet quite (although I am certainly close) tired enough to be at the point where I do not 'go' to sleep, but where I just pass out instead? Why?

They are echoes!

*sigh*

I may not know what the solution is... but I do know that it is time this thing ended... And so now continues the process of defining and taking this 'monster' apart piece by piece...

No longer will I allow my life to be ruled by anyone... but Me!




God damn it! Not once in all of this drivel have I said a single thing I truly wanted to say! I am so frustrated!!!!

Out of the darkness, a new dawn approaches...

Today has ended well...

My mother and her girlfriend came over tonight and throughout the course of the night, I noticed brief moments here and there, where life almost felt 'normal' for the first time in a very long time...

I was out of my bedroom... I occasionally smiled and laughed genuinely for the first time in ages... The pain finally let up enough for me to be able to actually sit, instead of having to constantly lay flat... I even ate a little (it wasn't easy and it didn't last long, but I actually had slight, transient feelings of hunger, so I went with it while I could)... And inside, I could feel the Me who is able to feel feelings of peace and happiness, just beginning to cautiously re-emerge...

Again, it is still early days... and I am still very fragile... but I can feel the shifting and changing inside of me slowly and quietly happening... Hell, the fact that I can feel at all, is progress... :)

I have decided to stay enrolled in the Art Therapy course and to take it one day and one lecture at a time... I even found out tonight, that, not only will I have 19 days to recover from my operation before my first post-operation tutorial but that all three of the scheduled 4 day intensives for my course are on weekends when I don't have my girls; truly great news, indeed... and a great deal less stressful than what I had first imagined...

I believe I still have quite a bit of mental and emotional purging to do yet, before I can begin rebuilding my Life and my self, from a more safe, stable and solid foundation... but there is time... Although I must admit, I can feel that most of it is going to happen over the next few days or possibly even weeks... I just get a sense that now is the time and that now the place in my life for Me to be doing this...

Baby steps though...

Some things, I have decided, I am simply leaving up to fate... Actually no, that is not accurate... Some things, (or more to the point, people) I am allowing to just find their own places in (or out of) my life... I want things to be as they truly are, not as they so-called should be... I do not want something that, or someone who does not truly belong to me... I never have... And more and more lately, I am able to see who and what does not belong to me...

It is (and has been) painful... but it is a clean pain; the kind that comes from lancing an infected wound...

I will heal... I will move on... And who and what does belong to me will finally begin to fill my life, maybe for the first time ever...

Now however, it is time to make the most of this (currently) rare opportunity, to try and get to sleep before dawn (as I am actually feeling sleepy right now... yay!)...

Goodnight x

Clawing my way back up out of the Abyss...

Once again, I have experienced a continuation of the slight internal upswing that began yesterday, today...

Well, perhaps there has not been quite enough momentum for it to be considered a 'swing' as such... but there has been improvement... and really... that is all that counts right now

I think that last night's entry actually helped to a certain degree...

Yes, I was deeply disturbed and very much not okay, as I recounted what had happened... but no longer having to hold and constantly re-swallow that secret, really has helped too... And thankfully the amount that it has helped was enough (although only just, at this stage - the realisation and the positive effects have yet to filter down but will continue to, gradually over the days and weeks to come) to outweigh the damage it did, dragging it all back up again and having to relive it all, in such minute detail in order to transcribe my experience...

Remembering, in detail like this, has also unfortunately unlocked even more memories about my time with 'him' that I had essentially managed to leave buried until now... bad memories...

It is not that I had banished these memories in their totality and am now remembering things I had completely forgotten (although there have been a couple of memories like that, that have resurfaced)... It is more, that I had successfully, albeit temporarily, banished the emotional connection I had to them...

Recalling those memories (until now), had been more like looking at a series of photographs that did not belong to me... or seeing words upon a page, made up of letters, which had meanings, of course, but to which I could not attribute or comprehend the concepts or true depth of...

In short... I had managed to dissociate from them

I am trying to do two things, simultaneously, with those memories right now; process them... and lock them back down...

There is no point, therapeutic or otherwise, in going back over them... They are simply the same transgressions, along the same themes, that I have survived my whole life; only, once again, they have been committed by yet another different face, is all... In this case... his face...

I just need to let it all go again now...

Please... just let me make it all go away again... I don't want to look at it or re-live it anymore! :'(

On the physical pain front, levels are such that I have decided to take codeine tonight...

The Fentanyl finally kicked in around 5am and began to take the edge off of the pain but it is still nowhere near enough... *sigh* I hate taking these drugs... but what choice do I have right now?

Without them, I am not only in pain, but also dangerously suicidal and (from what I can tell at this stage) also in danger of a serious psychiatric breakdown...

The pain has been so severe and for so long now that I am often not even able to recognise when I am in pain and when I am not anymore... I know that I can barely move... and I know that I am often in tears as the direct result of something that has not been triggered emotionally... but I no longer understand what the feeling of 'pain' is; perhaps because it has become so constant that I have nothing pain-free to compare it to anymore... I don't know

A girlfriend of mine dropped by for a little while last night... I was surprised by how relieved I was to see her... The visit certainly wasn't easy... but I was grateful

Last night I also came to the realisation (all by myself) that what has felt like months already, had, in fact, only been one week and two days...

Having that tiny, precious piece of logic to hold onto, was world-changing...

Only... one week... and... two days... not months...

Just a small amount of time... a manageable amount of time... an understandable amount of time...

Not a betrayal of trust...

Not the end of the world...

Just one week... and two days

It was a way out of the excruciatingly painful insanity that had begun to take hold of my mind... Just one week and two days... who would have possibly thought that such a simple realisation could have been so freeing???

I think perhaps, above anything else, this may be why I am finally on my way back out of this hellish fog...

And you know what? It has not even been about the situation itself... It has been about trust and potential complete loss, not the loss of what was

I am not okay just yet... I still have a long way to go before my general mental state is anything close to stable and safe and okay... (and it hasn't all been about this 'one week and two days' thing either, that was really only a catalyst)... but I seem to have found just enough undeniable logic and sanity with which to fight the rest of this... I hope

Add to that, the fact I am now back on pain killers, which are hopefully going to help me improve my quality of life and my ability to think straight (and not have everything so badly warped by pain)... and I think that, just maybe I might be finding my way back out...

I am exhausted... and extremely fragile still (it doesn't take much for me to end up in tears and feeling completely overwhelmed)... but on a much deeper level, I am feeling a little more solidification beginning to happen as the ground begins to re-form beneath my feet and my free-fall into the abyss begins to slow...

I am going to be okay... and I am making that happen... Alone

Setting the record straight...

Today has been horrible...

There are many, many reasons... but as I seem to be beginning (I hope) to come out of it, I think I am going to leave well enough alone and just let the darkness slip back into the abyss, without risking the recounting of it, dragging me down with it...

I still don't really know what is going on with Me...

On doctor's orders, I am to go back on all three of the drugs I came off of on my own earlier this week... So far, I am only back on the Fentanyl... but I haven't been back on that long enough for it to be making a difference just yet, so I am not really sure that has anything to do with this slight upward turn I am experiencing internally...

Something, that if I wasn't so numb right now, I know I would find both deeply sad and also possibly vaguely amusing, on some level, is what my 'stats' page has been showing me lately...

Sad because I feel for this person (or possibly people - as there may be two people)... If it is 'his' sister, then I feel sad for her, not only because I can empathise with how it must have felt to have read about some of the experiences I have suffered at the hands of her brother, and her natural wish to disbelieve what I have written and to defend him... But also because, for her to still be 'stalking me online' like this in the first place, she must really have cared about me at one point... of course, there are other potential reasons too I suppose...

I cared about her... deeply... And in a lot of ways I still do... She was incredibly funny... and loyal... and she was such a caring and generous person too... But continuing to wish we were still friends now is pointless... It is clear to me that that is not something she wants... and so I have simply come to terms with it and let all hope of a friendship with her go... She is his sister... and so of course, her loyalty will lay with her brother... He needs her, too (but that is part of another story that it not mine to tell and so does not belong in here)...

I feel deeply saddened that she ever read about the horrible things her brother chose to do to me...

But I did not lead her... in any way... to this journal...

As a matter of fact, I went out of my way to make sure I didn't leave any references to my journal anywhere that she (or pretty much anyone else in my life) would find them... And considering that with only one or two exceptions, no-one I know even knows where this journal is (or that it exists)... and that out of those two people I know who have found it, one of them found it through a deliberate google search of a username I have used on another site before... well, let's just say... on her own head be it!

The part that I think is potentially vaguely amusing, are the search enquiries this person has been putting in, in order to access this journal...

Here is just the current list that shows up... (Unfortunately I have missed some of the earlier ones)

ameythestist butterfly hope
amethys makes me feel tired
happy birthday my butterfly
shallow amethyst blogger profile
shallow definition
amethyst sick

The spelling is appalling... which I guess is good advertising for google, as obviously even the most illiterate of people are able to use it with quite a bit of success... But what surprises me the most is the search phrases she (as I am assuming it was her... or his other friend) has used... Why use such obscure search criteria? Why personalise a search with your own feelings on a subject, when you are actually looking for something specific... How could you possibly expect a search like that to work??? (although, apparently it has worked as it has shown up in my 'search keywords stats' section)

But even more than that... Why invest anything at all emotionally in your brother's ex-girlfriend??? (Keeping in mind she searched this journal out before she knew I had written anything about her brother and I - and I know this for sure as she has called me and told me herself, as well as having made threats over the phone and via abusive texts)

Why would you even bother????

Which I guess, brings me to why I am bothering with this entry...

At first, I made the mistake of feeling incredibly sorry for her (despite her threats and abusive texts - I figured they were bad behaviour but I understood her motivation and I decided to just let it go) and out of consideration for her (as I highly doubt she had expected to find anything quite as upsetting as what she found), I seriously considered, once again, moving my journal... for a little while I even felt incredibly anxious and torn every time I went to write an entry...

That quickly passed however, when I remembered that she had searched me out... maliciously... After that, all I felt was threatened (although not in a way that made me feel afraid; simply in a way that anyone attempting to control another person is threatening) and more determined than ever to keep my journal and its integrity... safe

So being that I have obviously, so far managed, to varying degrees, to do that... why write this entry???

I am writing it because I have had enough of being silent on this issue... If she and his other friend are going to stalk me online and send me hateful, threatening text messages, then I am going to set the record straight on just exactly what did happen... At least then everyone will be clear on what I have and have not implied, happened... And any lies that 'he' is telling in order to fuel their sympathy will no longer hold any weight... and just maybe, these people will finally grow the hell up and go back to living their own lives...

Don't get me wrong...

I am still not going to respond to threatening or abusive phone calls or text messages... As a matter of fact, I don't even bother responding verbally or reading them anymore (and haven't bothered for a while now)... I am simply sick and tired of staying silent in order to protect those who have abused me (and then, to add insult to injury, lied about it) and the people who are deliberately attacking me...

So, here it is... in plain english... what actually happened:

'He' is well aware (as is anyone I have been sexually involved with) that I struggle to allow my partner to go down on me... It is one of the main ways my father used to sexually abuse me when I was little... 'He' also knows (because he was always hassling me to let him do it to me and I ALWAYS SAID 'NO' and explained why) that I did NOT want anal oral being performed on me... I do not like the sensation... and I have also been raped (on more than one occasion), anally... I DO NOT LIKE MY ANUS BEING TOUCHED!

On more than one occasion, when 'He' wanted to go down on me (vaginally), I MADE IT CLEAR that I DID NOT WANT him to extend that activity to include anal oral... HE PROMISED ME HE WOULDN'T PERFORM ANAL ORAL ON ME and begged me to just let him go down on me (vaginally)... HE PROMISED ME I COULD TRUST HIM...

There were some occasions on which I could trust him... and that was great... I was slowly beginning to overcome my fear of having my partner go down on me (vaginally)...

There were, however, two distinct occasions on which I could not trust him... :'(

The first time it happened, he had promised me (once again), immediately before going down on me (vaginally), that he would NOT perform anal oral on me... He told me I should just trust him... So, I trusted him... At first, he stayed true to his word... but then he reached up and held my thighs firmly apart and DELIBERATELY began to perform anal oral on me! It was NOT an innocent slip of his tongue... It was deliberate... It was aimed (as he also tried to insert his tongue into my anus)... and it was prolonged... I cried out 'HEY!' and tried to close my thighs as fast as I could, but I couldn't at first, as he was holding them quite firmly apart and he fought me on it... So when that failed, I attempted to sit up and in doing so, managed to throw him off balance enough so that I could manoeuvre my bottom away from his mouth and successfully close my legs shut tight...

After I had escaped the position he had had me trapped in, he tried to laugh it off and make some excuse about how it was just a bit of fun and how I'd love it if I just let him do it properly... He threw in a cursory 'I love you' when he saw I was still upset despite him trying to make a joke of it, as though 'I love you' would make it alright... Not once did he apologise... (not that that would have made what he did okay anyway)

(God! I feel sick even re-telling this story)...

I remember the feel of everything exploding inside of my head as I tried to make this have un-happened... I kept telling myself that I should just grow up; it was just a sexual thing I didn't like that had happened; it wasn't like he had hit me or held a knife to my throat... Maybe it wasn't sexual assault... And he said he loved me... Someone who loves you doesn't sexually assault you... It must have been ME who was crazy... Yeah, that had to be it... I was just CRAZY :'(

Only I wasn't crazy... And it was a SEXUAL ASSAULT! :'(

But I am very good at protecting my abusers (thanks to conditioning that happened at the hands of abusers in childhood, which has also been re-enforced throughout my life up until the present day)... I made it 'go away' inside... I made ME the crazy one who was just being over-sensitive... I made ME the one at fault for not being 'grown up enough' to be sexually normal... I made it (in my mind), MY FAULT...

In truth, I should have left him then... I should have found a way to hold onto the truth that I saw for such a brief moment before I instinctively began the process of un-seeing it... I wish I had :'(

It was quite some time before it happened again...

The sexual remarks and 'playful' threats to do it again, the first chance he got, continued, just as they always had, multiple times a day... I always told him 'No'... I always felt incredibly uncomfortable when he would say things like that... but I didn't think that it was my right to tell him to stop saying those things... Very occasionally, it would get the point where I would feel so uncomfortable that I would quietly say something to him about feeling afraid when he would say it so much... But again, he would laugh it off and just tell me that I should know he was only joking and that he wouldn't really do that to me...

Then one night, toward the end of our relationship, we were in bed again and he had been making his 'jokes' about performing anal oral on me but had asked me to trust him to go down on me... We had the same discussion we almost always had and he promised me (the way he always did before I could feel comfortable allowing him to go down on me vaginally), that he would NOT perform anal oral on me...

I trusted him...

He did it to me AGAIN!

It happened much the same way as the first time... and I extricated myself as fast as I could, again, much the same as the first time... only this time, I cried... :'(

Too many other things (sexually related and not sexually related) had been happening around that time for me to be able to un-see this one in time for me to be able to essentially almost erase it from my consciousness and to bury it deep enough so that I could make everything normal and okay between us again... And it was after this that I began to have huge problems being able to sexually interact with him without huge internal fallout...

Although it was not officially how our relationship ended... it was certainly the beginning of the end of it... For him; because he no longer had such free and guiltless sexual access to me... For me; because there was this horrible fear of having to survive having sex with him, that my mind would not allow me to bury but that it would also not allow me to see the full truth of (at the time)... I kept telling myself that it was just my own old sexual abuse issues becoming an issue in the present day... that I was defective... that I should just get over it... that I should just make myself be 'normal' sexually... that my fear of him sexually was my fault...

But in actual fact...

THIS WAS SEXUAL ASSAULT!

THIS WAS NOT MY FAULT!

I AM NOT CRAZY!

THIS REALLY HAPPENED!

And worst of all... HE KNEW EXACTLY WHAT HE WAS DOING!

So... now you have it... The truth of what really happened... The truth of what I really meant when I mentioned the sexual assaults... Whether you choose to believe it or not, I really do not care... How you choose to interpret it, again, I really do not care... Whether or not 'He' ever tells the truth about this, I do not care... (Most abusers lie and never admit what they have done anyway)... Both he and I KNOW what happened... I KNOW THIS... and that is ALL that matters to me!

And now... I AM DONE... With YOU... With your BULLSHIT... With CARING about how you feel... With EVERYTHING!

As far as I am concerned, none of you exist anymore... You are of NO further consequence in my life... And I will not be wasting another single second on any of you in any way anymore...

WE... ARE... DONE.

(Real time and date of entry: Friday June 7, 10:49pm)

Strip it all bare? Or attempt to re-build, despite it all?

I want to strip my bedroom back down to almost nothing...

Nothing but the bare essentials anyway...

Basic black and white... Empty... Soul-less... Dead... and done

Am I switching? Am I changing? Am I simply reacting?

And more to the point... should I actually do it? Should I strip it back to nothing and see if that brings me any peace?

Why am I so not Me right now?

Right now I am even looking seriously at the possibility of walking away from everyone I know...

I remember loving my time alone... but now, alone or with somebody, I feel so incredibly lonely and empty... to the extent that it is causing me physical pain... particularly when I am alone though...

None of this makes any sense whatsoever...

And why can I suddenly not shake this fear that if I have this surgery, I either might not or won't, make it through, alive?

What the hell is wrong with Me?

I feel so incredibly dis-satisfied...

Everything has become... meaningless

I am seriously considering un-enrolling in my art therapy course...

If I am completely honest... I am also seriously considering un-enrolling from Life right now... yes, suicide... And yet I have no intention of killing myself... or dying...

Again, none of it makes any sense!

The physical pain I have been experiencing is still severe... Added to that, I suspect that I am in withdrawal as two days ago now (I think), I simply stopped taking any pain medication... Perhaps this latest wave of 'insanity' is down to that; intense pain, dissociation and withdrawal... Who knows?

But whether I can sleep or not, I guess it is time to at least try...

I wonder if any of this is down to the fact that there is now so much everything in the world... Maybe I am so overstimulated that I have blown a fuse in my head and now nothing means anything anymore...

Perhaps I will recover as mysteriously as I have taken this nose-dive... Perhaps I won't...

Gah! Enough!

How is it that this stupid journal seems to mean something... when nothing does?!

More fucking contradictions!

Apparently, I am fighting this... despite seemingly giving up... and giving up so convincingly, that even I am surprised to have briefly recognised the evidence that I actually am fighting for my life here...

I really just don't get it!

Is this multiplicity? Am I even multiple?

What the hell is going on?!?!?!

Oh, and I am sick and tired of being objectified... And I am sick and tired of GIVING and only getting just enough in return for the person I am giving to, to feel secure that I will keep giving... and they keep taking even more than I have been giving, too!!!!

I... am... so... fucking... ANGRY!

So... how do I fix this? (and stop the instability that keeps sabotaging the attempts I am making to fix it... and Me?)

To be known by you... even when I do not know you, myself

My ghost is back...

And has been for a few weeks now...

I can't believe the timing...

Hmm... Timing seems to have been playing an awfully big role in my life of late... As a matter of fact, timing and co-incidence have been out of control for quite some time now... Thankfully, most of the time, in a good way...

I don't know what to read into all of this timing and co-incidence stuff... if anything...

I do know that I am grateful my ghost is back, for however long it will be this time... I need something and someone right now, who is completely separate from my day to day life here in Adelaide; someone whose life runs parallel to mine but is not greatly effected one way or another, no matter what is going on (or isn't)...

It is strange, having someone in my life who knows so much more about me than I do about them... Strange... but even more strangely, my ghost (M) is not the only person like this in my life... There are two others; both here in Adelaide... One is someone I have occasional phone and email contact with, who has been reading my journals since the beginning and who has known about journals that no-one else in the whole world knew about; my 'Winniet' (R)... And the other is someone who entered my life more recently (B); someone I connect with on levels that are different to the levels I am able to connect with anyone else in my life with...

In some ways, it is refreshing to be better known by someone else than I know them... It gives me a fresh perspective on many things, including myself... And for that I am grateful... especially right now

It is lonely and disconcerting and unfulfilling at times too...

There are so many times that I wish that I too, could truly know the person with which I am interacting (where it comes to these three)... That they would share their hearts with me, the way that I do with them... That I knew where I stood... by being able to tell, myself, instead of having to depend almost solely on whatever information they volunteer (which at times is precious little)... That in knowing them better, I could give better to them...

But overall... I think that relationships like these, where I am not able to predict every move before it is ever made, are good for me... They give me hope that 'the One' is still out there; someone who just might understand and love me... who is my equal... someone I can love and trust and respect and admire...

I do not necessarily believe that there is only one perfect match for each person 'out there'... I do, however, believe that my matches, in particular, are few and far between... and in all honesty, as much as I hate to admit it... I do not believe I have found any of my potential 'Ones' yet...

If I had, we would be together now... and happy

I care about all three of these people... in very different ways... for very different reasons...

It makes me sad, that their presence in my life is so unpredictable and transient... but perhaps that is the way it is meant to be...

Perhaps the kind of relationship I need actually doesn't exist at all... and I will always only find precious fragments of it scattered throughout the friendships I hold most dear... Maybe that is just the way it is...

I do not know...

I only know that I want to love and be loved... and I want, at last... to be safe

Court...

So...

I have just spoken to my lawyer and he has informed me that I still have to attend court tomorrow but that, for the most part, it should not end up being anything much more than a formality...

On the whole, I feel fairly confident that this will all finally be over tomorrow...

There is no sense in Andrew wasting money by going to trial over the one glitch (I want it to continue to be part of a formal order that the non-custodial parent has the right to call the girls three times a week) that stands in the way of me signing off on final orders, especially when it is highly likely that the judge will side with me anyway...

Having said that... Andrew has never been known to be reasonable... so it's hard to be completely sure of anything... The one thing I do know about Andrew though, is that money talks... and much louder than his pettiness or his pride at this stage...

I will continue to hope...

Now all I have to work out is what on earth to do with the girls while I am in court as I am due in court only 15 minutes before school gets out...

Oh... and what to wear to court, of course ;)

Another piece completed...

This is a piece I began writing almost 10 years ago now and only finally sat down and finished today...

I am not yet completely sure I am 100% happy with this piece, so this may still only serve as a near-final draft... I don't know

Its timing has not been accidental... For a while now, I have been noticing the warning signs... And so, for the time being at least, I am doing all I can to stay well away from any situations in which I might find myself particularly vulnerable in this way...

I have no intention of allowing history to repeat itself... yet again

(As yet untitled)

He watches me as I perform for him
Like a little girl playing 'dress up'
In front of a full-length mirror…
Beguiled by the contradictions he sees before him;
The child...
The virginal girl on the cusp of womanhood...
The fully grown woman's body they exist within...
I seduce him with innocence
And he is mesmerised...
He tries… but he can't tear his eyes away
Holding his breath, unable to move
He stands there... Just out of sight
He thinks I can't see him…
But I know he is there
I know he is watching
I take out a brush and run it through my hair
Long... even... perfect strokes
And he waits...
I undo the zip on the back of my dress
It falls to the floor... and I am naked
Still he watches... And he waits
Running my hands down over my naked flesh
I enjoy the warm, soft and creamy texture
As he watches
Taking another dress from its hanger
I slip it over my head
I shiver as the cool satin glides down over my skin
Silently, he steps out of the shadows and appears behind me
I smile...
His arms are around me now… And I lean back against him
He gently moves my hair aside and kisses my neck,
Watching my reactions closely as our reflections dance slowly before us in the mirror
I moan softly and close my eyes
This game... so erotic
His touch... electric
Arching my head back, I kiss him
Full on the mouth... intense... passionate
I watch... as he touches me… softly… gently… slowly
He watches us too
I sigh... as my eyes flutter closed
And the final scene in this perfect movie fades to black..
Then suddenly his hands are everywhere
Terrified, my eyes fly open… meeting his for just one moment

My whole body stiffens in his embrace..

Frenzied now, his kisses cover me all over
His excitement… spiralling higher and higher… out of control
He spins me around, roughly tearing my dress from my shoulders
Then sweeping me up in his arms, he tosses me on the bed
There is no more game in the mirror now
It's just us... It is real
Panic rises in my stomach... and I want to vomit
As the role I was playing; whoever I truly was just now, quickly dissolves
Inside I am screaming
I'm not ready for this;
For the adult world
I am just a girl
I was just playing
I didn't understand it would lead to this!
I'm NOT ready!
PLEASE! STOP!
No! No! No! No! NO!
But it is too late
My words… My screams… My tears
Never make it to the outside world
And as my mind frantically tries to run from this reality
A single tear escapes…
One last hope for deliverance
But he either does not see… or does not care
He abandons himself to his own desire; his own passion
Trapped now… I look down and watch as my own body betrays me;
Mimicking perfectly, all of the right moves
I hear a voice that sounds like mine, but cannot possibly be…
Moaning in ecstasy
The perfect lover
Just like Daddy taught me
I cannot take anymore...
The room goes black
I am blind...
And I am gone
Hours later I 'awake' to find myself naked
My bed... now, a mess of tangled sheets…
My limbs entwined with his; this stranger that I allowed into my home
I go to scream… but swallow it just in time
I dare not wake him...
As the realisation hits me
It has happened again…
And once more, I do not know who to blame
My mind is spinning...
I know he saw my panic
I know that on some level he knew
And that just like the others... He simply did not care
And then there was my part in all of this
My traitorous body…
All at once paralysed… and obliging
Protecting him from the gravity of his own decision
Sacrificing me… so that he might be spared the terror and the pain he, himself, created in me
Being a good little girl
Making Daddy proud
And dying inside just a little more… at my very own hand in the process

The winds of change...

Having the courage to face something I just didn't think I could face today, set off a chain of events which has resulted in huge internal shifts and a whole new world order being established...

I can feel my strength and sanity and clarity beginning to return... It is fragile... but it is on its way

God, so much has happened today that it is all going to take a while to sink in... So I guess I should start from the beginning...

I have not hidden the fact that I have really not been well lately... But believe it or not, I have hidden just how unwell I have been, as it goes so much deeper than anything I have so far had the courage to express in here... but to be honest, I am still finding my way back to this journal, so complete transparency is going to take some time...

Anyway...

The first decision I made today was to allow myself to go straight back to bed after I had made sure that the girls had arrived safely at school (despite a nagging feeling that there was something really important I needed to take care of today)... I didn't wake up until 2pm! Apparently I had really needed the sleep... I remember dreaming vividly... the dreams were strange but I woke up just as they had begun to become disturbing...

Upon waking up, I remembered there had been a letter mid-late last week from my lawyer that I had opened and skim-read but not really had the headspace to look at in detail... I decided to face it... and this is when everything really changed!

The cover letter itself mentioned something about a copy of old custody orders being enclosed but didn't really explain why (a part of the reason I had not thought it important enough to pay much attention to earlier than today)... but upon turning the page and reading further I found out that Andrew had informed his lawyer that he no longer had the funds to continue to fight for the changes in custody he was demanding (he was trying to bully me using the girls and wanted all manner of unreasonable things) and so as a result he was now willing to settle the matter by agreeing that he would sign off on the current arrangements for custody (where we both have 50% custody of the girls each)...

I couldn't believe it!

The second great thing that happened, happened as a direct result of getting such overwhelmingly great news...

I had not planned to face the situation that has had me so messed up lately, head-on... I had planned to wait it out and to allow whatever was to be, to simply be... but I was so excited and also, to a certain extent, so buoyed by such great news, that I broke my silence and shared it with the one person I wanted to the most in the world at that moment... I also found myself gently but assertively confronting the situation that had had me so upset and unwell itself by voicing my confusion and asking point-blank where things stood and what expectations this person had... I even had the courage to give a voice to my own needs too!

That in itself was huge for Me... but it gets even better

This person actually engaged... properly...

I felt as though what this person was saying was genuine... And although they have yet to back their words up with actions, I actually believe they will... I also believe that the only reason it hasn't happened so far really is simply a timing issue (which makes so much sense but I do not wish to expand on this any further here, as it is a private matter between the two of us)...

I have tried hard to listen to my gut... I have tried to separate what is feelings of intense fear from what my gut feels like... I still can't... at least not reliably... not yet

Today, however, I think that I have begun to feel the beginnings of peace growing inside of me on this issue because I am being told the truth...

As always, time will tell... only now I am not feeling so terrified by what that result is going to be...

For the first time in what feels like forever (but has really only been about a week), I am beginning to feel hope seeping back into my Life... and clarity... The confusion and the darkness and the internal screaming are ebbing away... leaving a gently growing... peace

Now after having exercised the huge courage it took to confront both of these situations, I held my breath and crossed my fingers... and even sort of prayed a little... and I faced checking my bank account... (I have had less than $10 in it for almost a week now and still had to make it through to Friday - when I get paid again, feeding my two girls and the food I had in the house was fast running out)... The maintenance payment was IN (slightly early)!

It was the last thing I needed to go right today to take out all three of the major stressors I am facing right now...

I am so relieved...

I still need to tie up a few loose ends with regard to signing off on the custody agreement, but although I am 'not counting my chickens before they have hatched', it looks like smooth sailing from here on in...

The girls and I decided to celebrate by going past my favourite art supply store (Art to Art in Harbour Town here in Adelaide) and we got a couple of bits and pieces for an art session we are planning to have as a family this weekend... (below is a photograph of what I got... the girls got 1kg of clay each)

A brush wallet for my ink brushes, a pallet that the paint peels off of once it dries, some gesso (for priming canvases, ready for painting) and a gesso brush

Oh and that is another thing I have recently decided... I want to begin to add photographs to my entries...

There is so much more I want to say in this entry tonight, including how the girls and I also went grocery shopping and managed to get so many of the groceries we needed for only $40... and about how great it was to be able to take them out for (an extremely cheap) dinner on the way to see my grandmother... and how well that went too... and about so many other things I am thinking and revelations I am having...

but...

At long last, I find myself in a position where, yes, I certainly have a long way to go yet... BUT... right now... in this very moment... I am not running from sleep... I have found, for now (and hopefully for longer than just now - but I am grateful for whatever peace I find right now), enough peace so that I am not so terrified of being alone with my own thoughts, that I cannot voluntarily try to sleep...

Sleep will bring my body and my mind healing... and so the rest of whatever I feel the urge to say in here can wait...

I am still taking desperately needed time away from the world around me... and I am still on chronic overload and extremely fragile... but I am getting clearer and stronger... and I am on my way back out of the hell I have been living in, inside of my head...

I just need a little more time... a little more space... and a little more Me

The price of being Me...

My back is slowly improving...

My mental health, on the other hand... is dangerously unstable :'(

As always, the only person I am a risk to is myself... I haven't cut... I am not going to... and I have no desire to either...

The risk lays internally...

I cannot really put into words what is happening inside of me... I only know that sometimes I feel almost lucid and 'okay'... then the next, I am in so much pain I don't know what to do with myself... and it feels like it is never going to end...

If I just knew... one way or another...

Whether it ends well or in a way that will feel world-ending... I will find a way to deal with it... and to move on... but this limbo.........

This limbo is killing me...

Why am I allowing this situation to matter like this? Why do I keep deciding to force myself to stay open and emotionally honest? Why do I continue to refuse to just shut down... and walk away???

Logically, I feel as though I have little or nothing to worry about... I have no tangible reason to panic...

My gut (or is it perhaps my panic/insanity?), on the other hand... is telling me that the world is already never going to be the same... that those words were not true... and that all of the fears (or observations?) I have hidden (for quite some time now) in entries in an offline journal, were right... (Some of them have already come to fruition)...

I keep asking Myself: 'At what point am I going to simply trust my gut?'

Over and over and over again, I keep asking myself that same question... to the point where it is starting to drive me crazy...

But... how can I??? How can I act on what I feel like I know (but maybe actually don't) when I have so much to lose? This temporary pain will be so worth it, if my 'trust' has not been misplaced and everything works out the way I have been promised... If that promise was a lie, I will be devastated... but having remained respectful and silent and still, despite the pain, will still have been worth it... because I will have remained true to who I am and I will have proven, once again, that I can be trusted... no matter what

On some level, I actually do understand that this pain I am feeling is redundant... I mean, if it is panic and not actually my gut that has me feeling this way, and everything turns out to be fine... there will have been no reason to be in pain like this... And if my trust has been misplaced and I have, in fact, been lied to... then this person will not have been worth the pain I have been feeling... Or more to the point, the person over which I have been feeling this pain, will never really have existed...

None of this changes the fact that despite the logic... I feel what I feel... And no matter what happens in this situation... I will have, once more, said and done every single thing I could... I will have given all that I am... I will have behaved honestly and with integrity...

I will have been true... to Me

I hate hurting like this... but in the end... in a situation like this... that is the price of being Me

Please let it be over (one way or another)... soon :'(

Sleep.........

It is now three minutes to six in the morning and I am finally laying in bed, hoping sleep will come soon...

I did end up changing my sheets and making my bed properly...

I am exhausted... but I am still awake because I am afraid of what will happen if I allow my mind to slow down...

I badly need sleep... I am just not sure of how to allow it to come...

Hopefully, soon I will no longer have the choice and will simply find myself suddenly asleep without even realizing it...

One good thing is that I am back down at 85kg again (or possibly less)... and falling (I hope)

Please sleep... Come soon... and fast

Holding on...

Codeine, Valium and Fentanyl...

:(

I am now waiting for them to take effect... I am hoping, that along with pain relief, they may also bring me some mental and emotional relief...

... and sleep

It has been a huge day... well, a few huge days now really... and I am exhausted

I am still waiting for fresh sheets to come out of the dryer but I suspect I may just end up curling up on my bed wrapped in a quilt tonight instead of sleeping on a properly made bed...

It is true... I am tired... but I have rested and slept so much of my life away these past 8 or so weeks (largely due to the pain) that I continually find myself trying to avoid it at all costs...

Right now, there are potentially huge cracks appearing in my psyche... that, or I am seeing things exactly as they are... and they are really not good... But once again, fear is clouding things too much for me to achieve the clarity I need to move on any of these situations with any real confidence...

In an effort to claw my way back to a place of some internal relief from all of this, I have gone about finishing my bedroom... Aesthetically it was finished days ago... What I have been doing tonight is taking care of the finer details and sorting all of the bits and pieces that didn't fit anywhere initially, into where they will now belong... It has been simple... and satisfying

I still do not know exactly how it is that I have found myself in this place mentally and emotionally... The events leading up to this current emotional landscape, make no sense, when held up against the fallout...

I am feeling panicked about the current state of one particular relationship and the honesty and integrity of the other person involved... but all I can do at this point... is wait...

Time will tell whether or not what I am feeling is panic or my gut...

I have weighed up the pros and cons however, and I have come to the conclusion that acting now, leaves me in danger of losing something and someone I hold incredibly precious... whereas waiting... no matter how much it is currently doing my head in... could result in everything actually being okay...

And should my love and trust have been misplaced? Well, the risk and the pain are worth it... because this person... is worth it

I so desperately need for this to work out right now...

Please, let this work out... please

I am holding on... and I am keeping my heart soft and open...

Please... :'(

And the hits just keep on coming...

Of all things and of all nights...

Tonight...

Wonder Woman is on television right now... :'(

Naturally only I completely understand the true significance of this... And the true significance of finding that flier underneath my windscreen wiper blade the other day...

Completely random happenings... happenings I have no control whatsoever over... and once again, they line up, painfully precisely, with exactly what is going on in my life...

Many would claim they are 'signs'; signs I should heed and head in the direction of...

To Me, however, these happenstances feel more like the universe laughing at me... and shoving in my face, all that I so desperately wish to turn away from; situations, devastating emotions, constant reminders...

I am working so hard... to find happiness... to find my centre... to be okay

Added to this most recent 'hit' is that my way out tonight, once again, in ways I had no control over... has fallen through...

I really have... just... had... enough... :'(

My Life is so silent...

Lost...

Lost little girls should not be allowed out into the world of grown ups to look for answers, alone...

They only ever end up getting hurt...

... And more lost than ever

:'(

The Void...

There exists, within Me, a deep void right now...

To be honest, I do not even know why... or what has caused it...

Yes, there are lots of  'obvious' possible reasons, but in reality, none of them actually fit... not really... This void goes deeper than anything that has been taking place in my life of late... It is simply that it has now become inescapable...

I am aware of peripheral reasons and rather simplistic possible solutions... but they are all external... and unless and until I can fix what is happening deep inside, any solutions will be temporary and only transiently effective...

My answers need to come from inside...

I have tried... so hard... but I cannot draw right now

This is frightening, in and of itself...

I cannot draw because I have been shut out by 'the others'... or at least some of them... I don't know why... I don't know what I have done wrong... and I don't know how to fix it...

Where once was 'chatter' and activity, there is now only silence and the void... and with every exit from my life, of people and things that are so dear to me, both the silence and the void deepen, gradually eroding away at even the very few healthy connections to the world I have left and taking with them the last fragile vestiges of my hope...

I find myself literally writhing; not only in the physical pain I am currently in (which is quite substantial) but from the mental pain and the pain and terror of knowing that I will survive... no matter how excruciating it becomes

How do I find my Centre again?

How do I rise above the fear (of having potentially just lost something very precious to me), in order to be able to tell whether these feelings are coming from my gut or just my terrified mind?

How do I find what it is I am truly searching for, when I do not even truly know where to begin looking?

How do I stay 'safe' when I am switching in and out so randomly and when the switches are from one extreme to its complete opposite (and I cannot count on the alter who made the decision, sticking around to see it through... but I can count on the alter making the decision to 'promise' to 'stay' and become more and more intense, driving me crazy until I do give them what they want, knowing it is going to be a game of Russian Roulette as to 'who' is going to be there once it is too late to stop whatever is happening)... :'(

And then there is the... guilt

How can I cry out for help and at the injustice of all of this (and expect to be taken seriously in the 'real world')... when in essence... I am doing this to Myself??? It is... my own mind... And yet, this is NOT what I want... And I am fighting so hard against it...

I... HATE... THIS!

:'(