Waking The Wounds Read online

  One day she arrived to our home on her day off, in the afternoon. I should have told her to leave right then, and I might have but then I saw what she had in a paper bag. It was none other than Fireball whiskey, and oh how I loved my whiskey. All common sense was lost, as I cracked open that bottle for her and helped myself. Oh you brought me whiskey? Don’t mind if I do! She of course joined me… I would quickly learn how very little alcohol this girl could handle. Within a short time, she was drunk, stumbling and falling down drunk, not just tipsy. She’s one of those people who thinks she can handle way more than she can, and wants to prove it by out drinking you. Before I knew it I had drank about ¾ of the bottle, mainly so she couldn’t. I was quite functional, as my tolerance had come a long way over the years.

  Things were about to get crazy real fast. Nurse A decided to walk out of my bathroom without her pants, underwear at her feet. Yes, and she was concerned if anyone saw her “va-j-j” in her words. And then she reached forward and grabbed my chest. Yes, it really was that bad. I was never so thankful for my husband as I was that evening. The prison guard in him kicked into high alert, and this amazing ability came from him I didn’t even know he possessed. I wanted to kill nurse A, or at least cause her great physical pain. He managed to keep her safely both on, and off her feet. And, he was nice to her, sweet and caring even. He babysat her until she sobered up a bit and we were able to get her back home later that night. It turned out the whiskey was not worth all that after all, and of course the whole thing was all my own fault.

  It was a problem, growing bigger day by day. I noticed my health was deteriorating the more I drank, I began showing signs of alcohol induced heart disease. The irony was I was eating very healthy because I cared so much about my health, the whole while I was destroying my body every day with alcohol. And while I hated what I was doing to myself I simply could not stop. I felt powerless and once again found myself in a downward spiral. My anxiety and depression were worse than ever, it was as if the monster within me wanted out, and was winning the battle, and I simply could not stop it.

  Chapter 8

  Waking The Wounds

  Life continued on along this same path of self destruction, and my marriage failing. I was now a grandmother, and loving this new role, and had just turned forty-two. Our marriage just needed to change, and in a big way if we were going to stay married at all. I was never one to give up easily on something I wanted, and I had invested way too much time and energy into this man to walk away without a fight. I pleaded with him to change, and to try setting goals with me, better communication and more time together just to start. He wanted us to work too, and seemed to agree with me on the changes we needed to make. But, within about six months, nothing was changing. It felt like we were just spinning in circles over and over, getting nowhere. And then the breaking point came.

  That was the day I discovered he was once again using pornography. Just like the previous times, I was completely devastated, but far worse this time. I experienced a breaking like nothing I had ever felt or gone through before. After so much investment in him, WHY was I still not enough? I was the mother of his five children, I had done everything for this man, and loved him through so many disappointments, only to get hurt like this once again. I had forgiven him before, but I simply could not this time, the pain was just too great. My mind went crazy, I became convinced he was actually cheating on me as well, and refused to believe this was not an ongoing addiction throughout our entire marriage. I hated him with everything in me, and wanted so much to hurt him, I wanted him to feel the level of hurt and rejection he made me feel. I screamed and yelled hurtful things at him, told him there was no fixing this, we could not survive this one more time. And then I broke even more, and I just wept as I never had before. We truly had reached the end of our marriage as we had known it, I was done. I wanted nothing more to do with this man who had hurt me so deeply yet again.

  But some part of me decided I had to give him the chance to try counseling as a last resort. I gave him an ultimatum of going to counseling with me or a divorce. He agreed to go to counseling with me and do whatever he needed to do so we could save our marriage. Then the search began for a counselor, but I had no idea who. I got on the web, and looked for counselors near us who dealt with childhood trauma and addiction. I had believed for a while our issues stemmed from unresolved childhood wounds we were both still dealing with. I found Bethesda Family Services, and I think the following week we started going for sessions.

  I was scared at first, the idea of talking to a man about so much personal stuff was intimidating for sure, and then there was the part about it being a Christian based approach. I knew from past experience with religion that this could be a really bad thing, who knew what kind of well intended advice we would receive. Would I be further shamed and made to feel like I was falling short as a wife, that his porn use was a result of me not meeting his needs? Or that we both just needed more God, more church, more faith, and everything would get better. I resolved to go, and just not go back if that were the case, but I was at rock bottom and was ready and willing to hear what this new counselor had to say.

  The first session with this guy named Joseph went better than I had thought it would. I found that it wasn’t hard talking to him, or being heard. I felt some much needed validation from him, but not judgement or criticism. He introduced us to the program he would be walking us through called Restoring Relationships. It was a workbook we both would be doing, individually at the same time. He explained to us about how everything we were struggling with in our lives was in fact the fruit of unresolved childhood wounds. And that we would have to go back to the root and heal those wounds, before we could heal and fix our marriage. I felt relieved and excited, and hopeful because I knew this was exactly what we needed, it was what I needed for sure. I knew we were in the right place, if it was possible to heal our marriage, this would be the guy to help us. BUT, it was sooo hard, I was already at that place of complete brokenness, Im talking crushing chest pain that never left, and it was just going to get a whole lot harder. I had no idea just how hard, and that I would remain in this broken, devastated place for several months to come.

  I became stuck in a cycle of distrust and anger toward my husband, desperate to know the truth about what he was hiding from me, what else I didn’t know about him, because he had proven to me I could not believe anything he had ever told me. Had our whole marriage been a lie? I was such a fool to have forgiven him the other times. I felt like I was losing my mind as I went back and forth between trying to prove through sex I was enough for him, then pushing him away out of anger and disgust that I was even in the place of wanting or needing his approval at all. I found myself NEEDING to know who he was talking to, and of course whether he was still viewing porn. This turned into frequent checks on his phone and laptop, I had internet accountability software installed on all of his devices, yet still could not trust him. I was a mess, constantly accusing him, then apologizing for my behavior. I was trying so hard to at least be kind to him through my hurt and anger so we could move forward together and begin to heal.

  Keeping it together and just doing the everyday things that needed done seemed impossible. I still had three special needs teenagers that required so much of my energy and focus. The pain just wouldn’t leave, I’d wake each day hoping it was gone, only to realize it was still there just as strong and determined to break me. I turned to drinking now more than ever, trying hard to drown the pain, to no avail. I was not the person I used to be at all, but was just a shell, barely functioning.

  As the counseling sessions progressed, It became clear why I was in so much pain. All of the wounds I had been running from for so long, were being ripped open at once. My husband’s porn use was the trigger that opened those wounds. My oldest and closest friend, my rejection wound being the biggest. Yes, rejection, I had felt so much of it for so many years. I ran from it, blocked it out, or hid the pain deep within me, but no
more. My rejection wound would finally be dealt with and was roaring like a lion, and there was no putting it back. It’s faithful companions, fear and shame would get their turn to be heard too.

  Joseph had me write my childhood history as the first big assignment in the workbook. Phew, just the thought was completely overwhelming. I was in so much pain already, yet I knew I had to go there, to the source of everything. I remember him telling me to keep it around three pages… I cried in my mind, because there was just soo much, so much pain, so much that had happened, to put it into words on paper seemed impossible, and to narrow it down to three pages seemed even more impossible. I think I said to him “you have no idea everything I’ve been through”.

  And so I prepared to write my history, it was really hard because I had no idea how old I was during certain memories, and I had a lot of big gaps too. It felt like one big collage of painful, dirty, shame filled memories, with nothing standing out as a starting point and no specific memories along the way to create a timeline. The task overwhelmed me completely. I waited until I felt strong enough to face it, then began writing my story.

  The goal was to focus on painful memories including who had hurt me? at what age? how I was affected ? etc...gosh there was just so much. So I started writing from as far back as I could remember, guessing what ages I would have been, moving forward through each painful memory. Writing brought to the surface so much shame, I carried the shame from what others had done to me and blamed myself for so much. The more I wrote, the more I found myself able to cry and grieve for that little girl. I felt myself allowing her to finally have a voice. The little girl nobody loved, and never had a choice about anything that happened to her, she would finally be heard.

  The next part in this journey was writing confrontation letters to my abusers. And oh my this was hard! I did NOT want to go there. I was asked to write letters to both my parents, my ex husband, and my brother. Could I even do it? Here comes the fear part! The thought of confronting them even just on paper had me shaking. It took me several weeks, as I had to process and prepare so much in between writing each one. But I just had to confront them for what they had done to me. This was that moment I had always known needed to happen. One by one I wrote the letters, I remember trembling and crying while writing them. I had so much anger and rage still inside, and hate. I told each one of them exactly how they hurt me, told them what I had needed from them and never received, I was as raw and honest with each of them as I could be.

  As I went through this process of confronting them, I started allowing myself to both feel and release the rage and the anger. Finally, that little girl was getting her voice, the voice she was never allowed to have. I cried, and screamed, and gave her a voice. And I learned a lot through writing these letters, I had held the most anger and bitterness towards my mother. The whole time I had thought my brother had wounded me the most, but really I just had the most shame regarding him. Her letter was the hardest to write, and to read out loud. The absolute betrayal I felt from her, for never protecting me, and for knowing what was happening to me and doing nothing about it. I hated her more than the other three. I felt like her lack of protection was responsible for all three of the others being able to abuse me in the first place. Had she been a real mother, I’d have been spared all of it, or at least most of it had she done something after the first time. But until I wrote the letters, I didn’t realize this was how I felt. These letters would never be received and read by them, they were written for the purpose of me healing my wounds only.

  After finishing the letters, the next step was to write an accountability letter to God. The purpose for this was to recognise that I had sinned against Him by holding onto all that bitterness and unforgiveness for so long. Remember, I was determined to never forgive any of them, and felt justified in holding onto that anger towards them for as long as I wanted. I thought by doing so I was punishing them, I was NOT going to let them off the hook for what they had done by forgiving them. But the problem with that was I was destroying myself, and my relationship with God. I was standing in God’s place of judgment, and I wasn’t punishing them, I was punishing ME! All that anger and bitterness was hurting me, not them. And ultimately it not only affected my relationship with God, but had deeply affected all of my personal relationships as well. So I wrote a letter to God, and acknowledged this sin against Him, and asked for forgiveness, and even though I was sure I never would, I forgave my abusers. Not for them, but for me, so I could finally be free.

  The more I wrote, and cried, and processed everything I was feeling, the lighter I began to feel. Day by day, I started feeling that crushing pain lift. I felt closer to God, His presence in my life was growing more real than it had ever been. I felt completely humbled by the experience, that after everything I had done, everything I had been through God still loved me, and hadn’t turned His back on me. As the pain left, and I felt lighter, I began to notice changes within myself. Those chains of fear and shame were coming off! I could handle things I couldn't before, fear was no longer keeping me from doing tasks I needed to do. I was finally able to confront people in a healthy way when I needed to. I didn't enjoy doing it, but I COULD and did do it.

  The anxiety and depression that held me captive for so many years had now lost their power over me as well. Within a short time I felt strong enough to give up alcohol, and I did. The desire had left, and it wasn’t the struggle I thought it would be. I noticed while I was still having some anxiety and depression, it was much less often than before, it was circumstantial, not a constant way of life and it wasn’t keeping me from living and thriving.

  I didn’t realize it yet, but grieving and healing for me would happen over several stages. The first one was the biggest, and the most dramatic. But I would go through several more stages over the next few months. I feel like this is because I was walking around for so much of my life with several wounds, which were all infected. The first and biggest being equivalent to a gunshot wound, with major infection going on there. The others, while still bad, were not as bad as that one. Once my gunshot wound was cleaned out and could start healing, then one by one the other wounds began to surface, or something like that anyways. I felt lighter, and free for a few weeks after that initial major broken state ended.

  Then, it felt like I was hit again with grief, once again I was knocked off my feet. This time, it was the need to grieve my parents. For so long, I had carried such hate, and bitterness towards them. That hate kept me from being able to grieve the loss of them, or the loss of the parents I SHOULD have had and never would. That period lasted a little while, then again I felt lighter. And again, more pain started to surface. When would this end? It was really getting frustrating, I felt like I was taking steps back rather than moving forward through the healing process. Joseph assured me that this was a part of moving forward, and was a good thing.

  This time, I had a tremendous amount of shame and guilt, and a need to confess things I had never told my husband. I wanted everything in me to be revealed, so the enemy had no power over me ever again. So I told him about the time when I was twenty-one and had almost cheated on him, and some other things from before we were married he didn’t know. My words hurt him deeply, but he did forgive me, and I kept moving forward allowing myself to grieve and heal.

  After going to counseling six months, we had finished Restoring Relationships and counseling ended. It was a bittersweet feeling for me, while the work was very hard, I had experienced so many amazing changes, and I just didn’t know what to do next. Nothing else seemed like it held much significance after going through such a drastic change. I felt like I had to help others somehow, like I wanted so much for other women to experience what I had. Also, I felt like everything I had gone through in my childhood would be for nothing if not used to help someone else.

  After a few months I was invited to go through Restoring Relationships again, this time as part of a group of women. Initially I thought “oh heck no!”
because you know, I had made great progress, but not when it came to groups of people, especially groups of other women. That old rejection wound was trying to make itself at home once again. After giving it some thought, I decided to set aside my fears, and do it anyways. I saw it as an opportunity to grow even more and maybe fill my desire to help someone else. At first I really had to fight my “flight” urge, I'm not gonna lie, I strongly disliked the whole thing and was even angry at Joseph for “throwing me in the deep end of the pool”, it felt like that anyways. But after going a few times, I felt more confident, and as I worked through those same lessons again, I found more healing happening for me. I was gaining more clarity, and more and more freedom. I felt that deep dark void no more, it’s presence completely gone, finally...

  I became excited and filled with hope of who I saw myself becoming, but at the same time I felt terrified because so much about me had changed so quickly that I didn’t even recognize myself. I didn’t know who I was becoming, I began praying to God asking Him to show me who I am to Him. One thing was certain, there was no going back to who I once was, scared or not I HAD to keep moving forward along this new journey. The changes just kept coming. Along with being able to completely quit drinking alcohol, I started running, something I had always wanted to do but could never commit to. But now I was doing it, and often. I was setting goals, running 5k’s and 10k’s and preparing for even bigger races. I finally had my health under control, and began feeling amazing. It was becoming easier to handle my daily tasks, even taking care of three special needs teenagers.