Change my life/ way of thinking

I have been listening to a song that had the lyrics of, “Once you go great, you never go good.  Never go back, even if you could.” It explains exactly how I feel.  Once I get past this, I am never going back. 

To be truthful, it is so hard sometimes.  It is so hard to see the brightness in the darkness.  It is so hard to see that little twinkle of hope when you are drowning in the sea of sadness. It is hard to see the top when you are sinking into the inky blackness.

Something that I learned last week when I was in therapy is that God is the light.  I was talking about everything I lost and how I felt about it.  I lost who God was.  My rapist used God to control me.  He told me that because he asked for forgiveness I had to forgive him.  I would, but it never stopped.  It was a cycle and my idea of who God was tied into that. 

Another thing I lost was myself. One time there was a man from my church that came up to me and started telling me that I needed to get my life in order.  That I needed to repent for my sins.  I was 15, my only sin was reading John Grisham.  However, being the person that I was, I would spend hours trying to atone for the fact that someone I considered family, wouldn’t stop touching me.  It had nothing to do with that he COULDN’T.  He didn’t want to, in fact, he REFUSED to stop.  Being the person I was, I thought that it was me.  I wrapped my identity up in HIS sick fantasy.

I was stuck.  I was drowning.  I was slowly dying.  I shut down emotionally.  My family never could figure out why I didn’t get as attached to them as I should have been.  My thoughts, “Why would I?” In that situation, everyone had a choice.  He chose to hurt me, my mom chose to cover it up, my ‘sister’ chose to stay with him, and I chose to leave.

If leaving meant that I could live and staying meant that I would die (whether physically or spiritually)  I would leave all over again.  I am so not sorry that I left. 

My family has to go to bed every night laying their heads on their pillows KNOWING what they did to me.  Family is forever, just not mine.  My ‘sister’ has to lay her head on her pillow while she lays next to him wondering if he is cheating on her.  She has to wonder every day if he is raping their daughters, that are now at the age that he likes.  My mom has to lay her head down at night knowing that she is a horrible mother and that she will have to answer one day about not protecting me.  He has to lay there wondering when the police are coming, because they are going to come.  It might not be today, or tomorrow, but he will mess up.  Even if he never goes to jail, he has to answer to God.  He may have been able to groom my family, but you can’t groom God.  You can’t even hide your deepest secret from God.  God will give me justice.

The more I go through therapy, the more I can see the ripples of the effects that their negativity had on me.  Today, I break the cycle.  Today, they stop having an effect on me.  Tonight, when I lay my head on my pillow what I will be thinking about is my real forever family.  I will be thinking about my wonderful husband and how I want to make him proud, how I love and respect him so much.  I will be thinking about my cat-Chinny.  I will be thinking about how bright my future is.