Picture

Please bear with me as I continue to excavate my anger. Each level of acceptance and forgiveness unearths a new level of pain, and with it, more opportunity for healing. 

For the past week or so, I have been noticing old pictures of me in my memories on Facebook.  As they pop up,  I am struck with two thoughts. First, the memory of the photograph, which is always how self-conscious I felt in that moment.  How ugly, fat, and awkward I felt.

Then, my eyes see the picture. I was, in all of those pictures,  beautiful.  Far more than I ever saw or felt. Not hot, or supermodel perfect,  but certainly worthy of being comfortable in my own skin. Which I wasn't. 

Damn him, for squandering my youth and beauty.  Damn me, too.

This is a valuable,  painful,  and all too common lesson. 

I hope I don't forget.  I hope I never again  let someone else get in the way of me seeing myself. There simply isn't any room for anyone else in the mirror.

Dirty Little Secrets

Netflix just released the new season of Orange is the New Black,  and my Facebook feed has been filled with it. That and spoilers of Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. All shows I watched in another life. In this one, though, my TV addiction is Pretty Little Liars.  I binge watched the first five seasons this winter and missed the addition of season six until today. Five episodes in, and I finally realized the draw for me with this show. 

If you haven't seen it,  it centers around a group of teenaged girls who live in a state of constant terror and silence at the hands of an unseen enemy.  They are living in a state of fear and paranoia where whenever they relax, another threat arises. The emotions they are dealing with are all too familiar for me.

I can relate to their need to put on a false smile and pretend everything is okay, in order to save their loved ones.  They are suffering from PTSD while they remain in a war zone. This is the dramatization of what it's like to live in an emotionally abusive relationship. 

They have been beaten down and fight to remind themselves that they are worthy of love,  life, and peace.  It is by rooting for them  that I am learning to root for myself. 

I sometimes fear that I was too fragile, too battle weary to enter the new relationship that I am in. That may be true,  but it is also true that I am deserving of the love,  laughter, and peace that my current relationship provides.

Maybe it's possible to heal while moving forward.  Short of institutionalization,  we don't get to press pause and heal. Most of us bandage our wounds while we are still on the field. Life has no timeouts.