Righteous Anger

I haven’t been posting a lot of blogs recently and the main reason is that I’m angry, and I didn’t really want to push that anger out into the world. I’ve written plenty, and when I see the anger sneaking in with no way to say what I feel without revealing it, I close it out. It’s righteous anger though; it’s the anger that comes when you finally find respect for yourself, your abilities, and your own existence.

 

I find I’m most angry over all the losses, the loss of a education, the loss of the love and affection a child needs to become a well-rounded human being, the loss of a central nervous system that works correctly and isn’t constantly on high alert waiting for the next threat. I’m angry that I never had a mother I could trust, one who would protect me. I’m angry that as an adult I never had a mother who was a friend, one who would hold my secrets and stand up for me. I’m angry that through all the suffering I’ve endured in my life, my mother only viewed my pain as fodder for gossip, as a means to draw attention to herself.

 

I’m angry that I have suffered real brain damages from the concussions, the beatings, the threats, and the continuous and constant stress through my formative years. I am angry that every confidence I trusted with my mother was shared far and wide, and not just shared, but subtly changed to suit her wants and needs for attention. I’m angry that in my childhood every little thing was a dramatic, never-ending crisis. I’m angry that my mother never tried to be a good mother, never taught me anything useful or valuable, it was all about her, her feelings, her needs, her wants, her desires to be the focus of everyone in her world.  

 

I am angry that the only affection I received as a child was in front of an audience, and had no real feeling behind it, it was just a show for others. I am angry that I am the daughter of such a cold, heartless, unfeeling, and cruel (mean-girl) woman, and that I was never allowed to be my own person, I was simply a possession that was expected to mirror her feelings. I am angry that I had to struggle so hard to find little pieces of myself, that being a whole, separate person was discouraged, while being a pathetic, helpless mess was encouraged.

 

The anger ebbs and flows, some days better than others, and I know with time it will lessen, and I also know that the anger is righteous and needed. What I find I am the angriest with is that I put up with it for so damned long, that I wasted the majority of my life seeking a thing that simply doesn’t exist. I am angry that I exposed my only child to the gaslighting and confusion, and now so many odd things that he said over his lifetime are suddenly making sense and I know from where those words emerged. I am angry with myself that I continued to trust my mother, and the countless times I was hurt, deceived, and gossiped about. I am very angry with the way I was used as gossip fodder over the years, my life, my pains, my suffering at the hands of a narcissistic parent were only used for talk, as a means of damned entertainment for people who would have never survived what I have endured.

 

So yes, the reason I haven’t posted much in the last year or so is that I am mad as hell! And following my well-established training, I’ve kept that anger to myself, not wanting to be or put a burden on anyone. I can’t say much will change by my stating these truths, but posting this blog will be a start.

 

 

Momma Said Write A Book About It

Perhaps this new book is my own confession, an attempt to rid myself of the deeply ingrained shame that I imagine most abused children experience. When you grow up under continual threat, in survival mode, and then step out into the world, it’s not easy to shift gears, and when you are trained in abuse, abuse begins to feel familiar and safe.

 

I’ve been on a long journey in my quest to feel comfort in my own body and mind, and at first I began changing the basics. At first I removed the harmful pharmaceuticals, harsh grooming products, and toxic cleaning supplies, I began eating more healthfully, we moved out into the country away from the city’s chaos, I moved my body more, I got sober, and grew stronger in my relationship with God. But what happens when you change everything possible outside of you, yet you still feel like crap? Then you must look inside, and at your own history, to understand those triggers that keep you in fight and flight mode. They say that unaddressed traumas stay in the body until you address them, and I have found that that is the truth.

 

As an example: I’ve always had a complicated relationship with sleep, it took me hours to drift off, and if I was awakened unexpectedly my entire day would be ruined. Such a simple thing, sleep, yet as a child I still recall the dread I felt at bedtime. Whatever my issue with sleep was, it was still affecting me in my 50s. For a lot of people sleep is safety and comfort, for me it was something to dread and avoid. Looking deeper I found the problem. As a child sleep was never safe and comforting to me as I could be yanked out of it at any minute, and being dragged from sleep usually meant being yelled at, accused, and hit and hurt. There was no comfort in slipping off to sleep, only fear of when I’d be attacked. In facing that fear and acknowledging it, my sleeping schedule has shifted, and for the first time in my life I now feel that comfort and safety, but I would have continued to suffer had I not gone down the rabbit hole of my own miserable upbringing.

 

In the new novel there is a scene where my lead character, Dani Donnelly, is talking to her young neighbor. The 11-year-old, Crystal, had just experienced a traumatic event, the first of her young life, and was having trouble sleeping. Dani suggested art as a way to remove the flashbacks from her mind, and I suppose this new novel is my art. Sometimes taking those images from your mind, by painting or by writing them out, lessens the power they have over you, and eases that ever-present shame and fear.

 

The title of the new novel was the obvious choice; there could be no other title, as when I was a child and would complain of the treatment I received I was told I could write a book about it when I grew up. I was told to write a book about it many times, usually with a smirk and a chuckle, as my grades in English/Lit were always terrible. So finally that is what I have done, I have written a book about it.

 

I weaved my own story into the story of a fictional character, Dani Donnelly, an author on the run from a stalker. Dani has signed a contract to write her memoirs, and with just a few fictional twists and turns to blend my story with Dani’s, most of her written memoirs are the truth of my upbringing and the early years of my adulthood. I faced incredible fear writing this one, as fear and secrecy (what happens in the family, stays in the family) was a mainstay of my upbringing. The description of the anxiety attacks the author suffers is not much different than what I endured breaking the trauma bonds that have held me captive and suffering for over fifty years.

 

So with all that said, the new novel is available on Amazon.

 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BVKV59Z9