This past August I turned 51 years old. I thought that I would be a little more bothered by this than I actually am. I feel fantastic. To be sure, I could stand to exercise more, eat better, do all the things that we're supposed to do. However, nah. I don't want to spend another moment doing things that I sincerely don't want to, regardless the reason.
I spent the first half of my life, living in fear. Fear of expectation, fear of attachments and commitments. I was scared to really truly live and let my light shine. I was anxious and distrustful. I routinely went around stating how very much I hated people. Then the pandamnit happened and I realized that what I was, was scared.
Like all of us, I am a product of my experiences and baby my first 18 years were filled with enough trauma to make an angel weep. From three and a half on, it was traumatic event after traumatic event. Trauma was my normal. Violence and abuse were my near constant companions. You either cut off your empathy, mask your pain with addiction, or you break and just submit to it. I chose to cut off my empathy and endure. My escape was reading and spending as much time as I could away. I survived and put it behind me. You can leave the location but the experiences stay with you. You can never leave the results.
So, three decades after the last physical trauma I am finally safe enough to break down. I had been away from the abuse and abuser long enough that the walls just crumbled. I couldn't pretend that the anger and anxiety wasn't anything other than what it was. It was terror. Terror of having to allow the monster back in. Welp, my 50 year old self said nope and away to the therapist I went.
One year later and I'm here. I'm moving towards healing and learning how to be me without the constant threat of assault. It is amazing and exciting. I laugh from deep within my belly. It starts as a chuckle and the next thing I know, I'm bent over at the waist just letting that joyous sound bell out. It is fucking great! I laugh until the tears roll down my face and I have to straighten up to seat my breast back into the bra firmly. I throw my head back, toss my hair and let my smile stretch so wide that you can see my fillings. Who would have thought that the absence of terror can produce a deep and abiding sense of peace and joy. I'm here to tell you that the sweet and innocent chortle I made as a baby is well on its way to becoming the free-spirited cackle of a woman who flung herself out of her prison and soared into a life so damn beautiful that those aforementioned angels sing of her release. It does get better.
