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Evanescence - Good Enough |
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Hi. I used to post on this page with a different name, I think it was shattered0x.
This is my story -
I haven't cut for over 2 years but it's still a part of me. I like to think that I'm in a healthier place now- emotionally and socially, but sometimes I truly can't tell. I like to visit this community every once in a while to see how everyone's doing, and to remind me of *that* part of me that I feel is lost for now. I have always been an internalizer...I have always kept my emotions inside and always took aggression out on myself when nobody was around. The earliest I can remember hurting myself was around age 9. If I was feeling sad or angry or aggrivated, I would go into the bathroom and punch myself until I bruised. Sometimes I would scratch myself so hard it left marks and bled. Overall, though...I kept all that in check until I was a freshman in high school. My little sister had been raped by a family member over the summer prior to my freshman year. She was 5 years old. I was 14 and was the first person she told. Even now I can remember that night like it was yesterday and it gives me chills. She gave me a detailed summary of what had happened. I was inconsolable. Though it hadn't happened to me, I felt that it was my fault. I should have been there and I should have protected her. She was all I had to protect. I told my sister's dad about what had happened, as he was the only person home at the time, and he screamed at us to go to bed and stop lying. My sister didn't understand what had happened to her...and why it was so bad. When I told my mom, she believed us and had my sister examined. Later that year my sister's grandmother wrote my mom a letter, blaming the rape on me, or maybe it was that I had made it up. I didn't understand at the time...and frankly I still don't. It was her brother who raped my sister, and I think that she wanted someone to blame to protect him. Like I wanted to protect my sister. In the following years I felt a constant anxiety, a constant guilt, plaguing my existence. My mood became one of constant depression, constant darkness. Not wanting to be around people, not wanting to do anything "fun". I had a great relationship with my dad that had started to diminish as I became more depressed. My relationship with my mom had never been anything healthy. The cycle was endless, everything suffered. When I was a junior in high school I started cutting almost daily. I started doing drugs with some of the notorious "druggies" at school. I had lost my friendships that I thought were lifelong, those few friends that I depended on for everything. People noticed, but they didn't help. They criticized me, pushed me away as I withdrew. Finally, I made a friend who understood. Someone who shared my pain. I loved her for that. Just for being there. In the summer before my senior year, I met a guy who changed my life. Or rather, helped me change my life. He lived 3 doors down from me. He was about 10 years older than me, which at the time posed a problem. That summer I spent every night with him, sharing a little bit of myself each time. He was compassionate, understanding, and intelligent. We laid on a hammock and stared at the stars, talking for hours. At that time, I felt normal. I felt like I was meant to be happy. I never did talk to him about my cutting that summer. He had never been exposed to it, so I didn't want to drop it on him so early in the relationship. As we got deeper into the relationship, I started slowly exposing him to the lie that I had been carefully concealing. I had cut less and less often since we had met and I had become more careful as to where and how I cut so I wasn't too obvious. Eventually, I flat-out told him, because he hadn't seemed to truly catch on. He was surprised by it, which I didn't quite understand. Maybe I was that good at hiding it...or maybe he was that good at denying it. He accepted it, but I felt an uneasiness at the topic on his end and mine. It was at that point that I decided that I was going to become healthier. Ultimately, it was my burden to bear and I couldn't let it hold me back from being happy, from being loved. I put my razors away (but not too far away) and I wore a rubber band around my wrist. When I felt the urge to cut I would snap it. Sometimes I snapped so hard it broke the skin, and so often that my wrist was bright red for hours. (This idea I had gotten from this community. Thanks to whoever that was, if you're still here!) It was by no means easy, and I had the occasional confrontation with my razor blade, but I found that for once in my life I was able to control it. I was a senior in high school by this time and was due to graduate in about 6 months. I wanted to leave it all behind. The depression, the cutting, the schoolbells, the part of me I knew so well. When it started to go, I missed the feeling. In the end, I knew who I was. I knew how to calm myself. When my depression was in full swing, I wrote beautifully, I played guitar with all the emotion I had in me. I miss that. I loved that feeling. The feeling of accomplishment and pride. The bond that I made with my poems and lyrics were priceless. I was in love with my writing, and that, in turn, helped me love myself in a way, even when I was depressed. By the time I graduated I no longer relied on my razors or on a rubber band. I was free. Free of school, free of lies, free of that pain. I thought I was. It never struck me until just now, a junior in college and married to the man who helped me get healthier, that I will never be completely free. It wasn't just a dream, or a time in my life that was rocky. It was Me . That is part of who I am. I fear the return of that sweet, sorrowful darkness , but I tempt its return with every day. I am happy, and proud for who I am today and for the life I have, but I know that I can't let myself get too far from that darkness, otherwise I might lose myself completely. At least I'll have something to fall back on if I need it. All the love and happiness in the world couldn't make me lose perspective of that. And that, my husband may never understand.
Some may say I've "recovered", but I don't feel that term applies. I have made myself healthier, and by my own will. I do not feel saved or recovered, but that I am at a different stage in my life. I feel that I have come a long way from how I was then to how I am now, but the journey is half the battle, as you all know. The journey is different for everyone. Don't feel guilty because you cut. Don't feel that you are weak or sick. Cutting is a stepping stone to a healthier lifestyle. If you need it, if it feels good, use it sparingly until you don't need it anymore. These are just suggestions and ideas. Work with it, don't let it work you!
Thanks for reading. Sorry if it was too long and boring. I just needed somewhere to write with an audience. I haven't talked about it in so long.
Thanks everyone!
Stay Safe-
Alicia
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lonely
frustrated
tired
crazy
indescribable
hopeful