Redesigned Bereavement Blog

Click here to visit the newly-designed blog on grief/parental bereavement.  I hope you find it helpful and comforting.

Long, Dark Nights

I don’t want to believe in SRA.  Nope.  Never happened.  This funny looking scar on my arm happened when I fell on a pyramid-shaped toy that happened to be rather hot.

Here’s the problem with that logic– it doesn’t change what happened to me or all of the other SRA survivors out there.  Neither our attempts at disbelief nor the disbelief of those who haven’t experienced it first hand changes even a minute of what happened to me and what is still happening to others.  As I said in this post I don’t feel the need to defend myself.  After all, I’ve faced much worse than criticism.

Consider that a blanket message to everyone.  I will discuss SRA via email or on this blog, but respect *must*  be given on all sides at all times.  And I will not argue the point of whether SRA exists.  If you are not interested in, are upset by, or have some twisted need to harass people who *have* dealt with SRA, feel free not to read this blog.

Let the Festivties Begin!

Enjoy the fireworks and bonfires this Guy Fawkes night!  And will someone *please* have a bit of bonfire toffee for me?

To my friends back home (especially you, D) don’t get carried away by mischief but do, by all means, make as much as you can. 

Dream States

My father said he never dreamed.  I don’t know if he simply didn’t remember his dreams, or if he never truly reached the sleep state needed to have dreams.  Interesting concept, regardless.  I haven’t heard that from anyone else.

As for me, my dreams are typically very vivid.  They can range from blissful to average to absolutely horrifying.  Last night’s dream (or something) was incredibly disorienting.  I remember waking up early in the morning, getting out of bed to pick up something that had fallen into the floor at some point in the night, and then going back to bed.  Then there was nothing.

It wasn’t so much a deep sleep as a total lack of existence.  When I woke up, or whatever it was that I did, I was incredibly disoriented.  I didn’t know where I was, what time it was, or anything remotely concrete.  My first lucid thought was that I’d slept through my shift.  Considering I work afternoons, that would be highly unlikely.  For a minute there, I truly had only a vague idea of my self and absolutely no idea at all of my surroundings.  Everything was unfamiliar.  Yes, I know that all comes with the multiplicity bit, but this is the first time I’ve ever been aware of being, well, unaware.  That was not a comfortable feeling.

Things have settled back to average now, and I’m thankful for that.  Being disoriented to my own life was a bit on the strange side.

Andy’s Blog

As many of you have probably noticed, I’ve closed Andy’s blog.  I have all of the text and am doing some major overhauls.  The blog will reopen in the near (hopefully) future.  Just bear with me!

To all of you who have become my ‘family’ of people also dealing with this loss, thanks so much.  Please feel free to email me any time, and I’m in the process of setting Yahoo IM up again– was having a bit of trouble with that before.  I’ll post the information when it’s available.

My best and warmest thoughts to all of you.  We’re in this together!

The Thinnest of Veils

Since I’ve been able to start learning from the Wiccan Way again, life has become a bit easier, if only because I have another coping mechanism in place.  Samhain (Halloween) is completely perverted by satanists and has always been a terrible day for me and mine.  Last year was much better, and this year I was able to appreciate it for what it really is– the day the veil between this world and the Otherworld is thinnest.  It’s a great time for divination, and the best time of the year for communicating with the dead.

And communicate with the dead I did.  Or rather, he communicated with me.  I’d had this odd feeling all day, like my movements were being observed.  It wasn’t a bad feeling, really.  Just an odd feeling.  Driving along a busy road with my best friend last night, I heard a comforting voice and felt the warmest touch on my shoulder.  Looking in the rearview mirror, I saw Alan leaning towards me from the back seat.  Alan was and will always be the love of my life.  He was my one true love, and even though he married after I left England, there was always something special between us.  He was the father of my child and the only man who ever comforted me completely.  Given my background, that wasn’t an easy task.  He manged to do it, though.

He also managed to find his way back to me last night, and I’m thankful for every minute.  I didn’t say anything to my best friend about it– it just seemed like a very private experience, and telling someone you’re spending time with your dead love is a bit odd anyway.  I say that because my best friend reads this blog and will probably get a bit of a laugh out of our unseen guest. 

We sat beside a river, my best friend and I, and Alan stayed with me through the rest of the night.  I could hear him and feel his touch.  I could see him there, and even though he had a bit of a fuzzy glare surrounding him, he looked the same in every other way.  As it neared midnight, he faded away.  I’ve felt him many, many times before, but last night I got the chance to communicate with him directly.  I am so very fortunate.

This morning, I phoned the lady who became his wife, and she was glad to hear of the experience, even though it didn’t happen to her.  We have an odd sort of agreement between the two of us.  I’ve talked to one other person who understands the odd relationship we have with the loves we lose, and she had similar feelings.  Alan’s former wife (I’ll not give her name, since she is living) knew he and I shared a bond and always would.  Andy was proof of that.  Alan did love her, of course, and they had a lovely marriage.  Unfortunately for her, though, she didn’t have all of him.  She told me he had been honest and straightforward about that all along.  I won’t debate the right or wrong of that.  It simply was as is it was.

Last night, then, I spent time with my love and cherished every minute of it.  He wanted to let me know he was settled and that he watched me.  He and our son look over my life.  Spirits are recycled, but part of their essence remains.  A spirit is changed with every living thing it inhabits.  I’m comforted to know that the spirits of Alan and our son are travelling near each other, and that they are able to communicate with each other still.  And I’m comforted beyond words by having spent even a few brief hours with the person who will always have my heart and soul completely.  Death really can’t break love, and as a friend always tells me, we never truly lose those we love.  They just move on before us.

So There!

My former therapist was amazing.  She let me talk at my own pace.  She pushed just enough, but for the most part, she just let me talk.  She let me tell my story as best I could.  I can’t thank her enough for that.  Unfortunately, I go to a subsidised mental health clinic.  My old therapist went to work at a crisis centre so she would have a more organised, stable schedule.  I wish I was being sarcastic, but I’m quite serious.  So was she.

The current therapist is ok.  She’s much younger than my last therapist, and I can tell she’s still by-the-book.  I am *not* comfortable discussing SRA with her, but as the winter solstice approaches, things get a bit mad for me.  I always need a few external folks to help with that one.  At my last therapy session, I explained to the new therapist that this was a difficult time of year for me.  She got a bit miffed and literally yelled that I should say *anything* other than difficult time of year.  She said my saying it was difficult was *making* it difficult.

I understand her point– if I keep telling myself it’s an awful time, my mind will focus on that.  But it’s an awful time.

At my session on Tuesday, the new therapist actually asked me how the time of year bit was going.  I talked briefly about my anxiety over the approaching solstice and my plans to get through it.  Not once did she take issue with me.  After the session, she happened to mention that my old therapist had popped by and asked her how I was doing.  She had been thinking of me and was concerned about how the solstice was affecting me.  *smiles* I don’t think the new therapist’s change of heart would have come without my old therapist stepping in.  I’m just lucky she took the leap and talked with my current therapist.

I truly miss working with her.  I’m not certain I’ll ever have that strong of a relationship with a therapist again.  She is amazing.  Simply knowing she’s thinking of me makes the time of year easier.  Even though we’re no longer working together, she gives me confidence and hope.  Just being around her brings peace.  She puts off such wonderful, healing energy, and I could never thank her enough.

To the many good therapists out there, please know that your work continues in the minds of your clients long after the therapeutic relationship is done.

Masks

I’m feeling a bit out of sorts today.  It’s one of those days when everything seems to swirl about and take me down in some sort of magnetic spiral.  I feel like the sum total of the bad stuff in me outweighs the good by a great amount.

There are two sides of me– the person who functions in day-to-day life with a rewritten, relatively average history and the person whose family lineage traces back hundreds of years in what is quite possibly the most evil cult in the world.  Those two lives don’t often mix.  I wear a mask that protects me by distancing acquaintances from the SRA in my past.  It gets heavy, though, and sometimes I just want to throw it away.  In the past few years, I *have* dropped the mask a bit more than usual, and it’s caused negative repercussions in my life every single time.

Latelty, though, I’ve remembered why I need to keep people at more of an arm’s length.  I’d become a bit more trusting.  I’d given people a glimpse at my emotions and my faults.  I thought that perhaps I’d come to a point in my life where being guarded all the time wasn’t as necessary.  As it turns out, though, given my history and the leadership role I was to take, staying distant and on guard should be lifelong.

New people who come into my life will never hear about SRA.  For the most part, they’ll not know about my childhood trauma at all.  I *knew* being more open about what is behind my mask was a bad idea, but I did it anyway.  It’s hard to trust, and it’s hard to let people get close.  For SRA survivors, though, sometimes it’s safest not to let people in that far.  I’m so fortunate, as I wrote a couple of posts ago, to have wonderful people in my life who know my background well but love me anyway.  That circle isn’t likely to grow soon.  I’ve been reminded quite recently of the reason I built that mask in the first place.

Welcome to Debtor’s Prison

I can’t afford to file bankruptcy.  That’s one rather frightening realisation I came to during my Wednesday morning meeting with a bankruptcy lawyer.  Mind you, I’m pressing on through this lovely little process.  For those of you (the many, many of you) who are considering this journey, let me take you along mine for a bit.

A few years ago, I was quite successful.  I was in school full time, working almost full time, and paying my bills with money left over.  At the beginning of this year, I was fighting my way through debt.  In April, I gave up entirely and stopped paying certain bills.  Last week, the lovely folks at Discover card let me know they’d be taking legal action at the end of this month.  This week, I went to see a lawyer.

I can’t quite claim to understand the American governmental system, even though I’ve lived her quite some time now. I do know, though, that the losing party in a legal case pays all court costs.  I did *not* know that that included paying the fees for lawyers arguing the other side.  Lovely.  If credit card companies take people who can’t pay the balance to court, do they really think those people will be able to pay court costs?  I don’t quite understand how that process works.  I do understand, however, that it makes my head hurt.

Bankruptcy, for someone with the sort of debt I have, is relatively simply.  I haven’t any assets or anything else, really, of great value.  I have got a loan on my car and a few student loans, but the whole process affects neither of those (in my case, at least).

The packet of paperwork is daunting.  Page after page of list this and sign that.  I feel like a child who has been bad and needs her wrist slapped.  The lawyer told me I’d go through something similar to that.  I’m guessing that will come with the $100 dollar financial counselling process that comes before and after filing.  My favourite part of the process, though, is the $1500 dollar fee that comes along with it.  $1399 is needed up front.  That’s understandable– a bankruptcy lawyer won’t quite expect their clients to pay them unless they collect the money up front.  It’s still a bit of a stiff price for someone filing bankruptcy to start.  Argh.  As I told my best friend, I’m saving up to buy myself my very own bankruptcy lawyer.

In the meantime, I’m gathering up all the information needed and speaking to the most wonderful creditors one has ever spoken with before.  Here’s a note to collections agencies *and* credit card companies:  most of us who are in debt are not people who have neglected their finances.  We’re people who lost jobs and decided basic essentials were more important.  I rather enjoy having soap, you know.  Electricity is nice, too.  It’s winter.  Things get cold without heat.  In truth, I guess I should apologise to the lovely people who answer phones at these organisations.  I didn’t realise I was stealing money directly from their pockets.  I must be, though, considering how many of them have told me about people like me making this country morally and financially bankrupt.  I didn’t realise I was so important.

I’ve read quite alot of 18th-Century literature and, being a Brit by birth, I understand well history of the class system, including the start of the proletariat .  Communism is starting to make sense.

Strawberry Fields Forever

I’ve had that song stuck in my head for several days now, and that’s not particularly unpleasant.  It’s a lovely song.  Listening to it today, though, I conceptualised the lyrics in a new way.  There’s a bit that resounds with me and will likely resound with other SRA survivors–

Always, know sometimes think it’s me

But you know I know when it’s a dream

I think I know I mean ah yes

but it’s all wrong

That is I think I disagree.

Coming out of SRA means learning how to live in a whole new world.  It’s definitely a much *better* world, but it’s still different.  Sometimes I’ve felt like a complete and utter failure in this new world.  That’s something the cult counts on– survivors who make it out really do feel disoriented at first, which can send you screaming back to what you know.  It’s the same with ‘regular’ abuse.  You go with what you know.  That’s how the world makes sense to you.  Leaving means creating a whole new world, and I am so glad to have had the opportunity.  I like my new little world, and I love the people who are a part of it. 

Back to the song, then.  Sometimes I *have* thought it was me– I’ve thought that I will always belong to the cult simply because it’s what I deserve, like it’s what my life *should* be like.  When I feel like that, though, my FOC are always there to help me see otherwise.  And learning that it isn’t a dream– the good or the bad– is a struggle all survivors deal with.

After all this time, though, I’d like to think I’ve at least *started* to live my own life.  I know I disagree with what I was taught and the treatment all those hurt by SRA had to endure.  The outside world is life.  Friends and family are love.  The world, overall, really is a good place.  Reality is life outside of the cult.  Reality is breaking free from programming to live in this world.

And I know I know when it’s a dream.