Random hopelessness

I'm meant to be working, I meant to be busy, but I find myself once again with that bubbling anger building up inside me. I hate that I have so little control over  my feelings, over my emotions, I'm meant to be getting better, when will that actually start though? I've been on meds for weeks now, but I don't feel the slightest bit different, the only thing that helped somewhat was the sleeping meds, but the anti-depressants don't seem to be doing much of anything. My life's just this crappy cycle of nothingness for most of the time. I wake up and I have to force myself to get out of bed every morning, I help the kids get ready for school, then, until the kids come back from school I mostly sit around lacking the motivation to go anywhere or do anything. It's the same day in, day out, I need to change my life but I don't have the motivation or inclination to change it, I'm at a point where I see that work don't need me, and my children, so long as they have their dad, also don't seem to need me. I feel like I'm just a burden to everyone, a miserable grump who's dragging my family down with my misery. They don't deserve to suffer, I shouldn't drag them down with me, but I don't know what else to do. Every day I think about taking the only way out that I can see available and every day I'm forced to dismiss the idea because I simply refuse to be the person who left their children that way. Every day I think about hurting myself because sometimes it feels like people will only understand physical wounds rather than the mental ones which I seem to suffering from. Every day I fight the urges to hurt myself in some way but then in doing so I only seem to feel more and more guilt instead because I'm making everyone around me suffer as a result of my moods and my feelings. I feel like no one will ever understand me and it's simply pointless me even trying to get them to understand. Life in general right now feels pretty pointless. I'm so angry with myself for letting this get the better of me. I don't know how much longer I can carry on the facade. I don't know where to find the will to live and the ability to fight my demons. Sometimes it just seems like it would be better to let them take me instead of trying to fight it any more. 

A letter to M

Dear M

I'm so annoyed with you today, so upset with myself because of you. I hate that I have given you so much power over me and I have no idea how I even begin to take it back. I hate that just seeing your picture can elicit such a strong physical response from me and I have no control over that and no idea how to prevent it. I hate the panic and fear that I experience when I see you in person, and I hate that I never know when or where that might happen. I hate the memory that bombards me when I see or think about you, like a video in my mind on continuous playback. I hate you so much for what you did, but most of all I hate me for not knowing how to deal with what you did, and for allowing this to build up then explode like a volcano disrupting my life constantly. 

I don't deserve to hurt like this, I never deserved to feel this way or to be hurt this way. You made me into a nervous wreck, constantly watching over my shoulder, constantly checking who is around me, constantly on high alert, checking my surroundings in case you might be there, it's draining, it's physically and it's mentally exhausting to feel and to act that way day in, day out. 

I don't want to feel like this anymore, I hate living this way, I hate that you turned me into a person that I hate so much, and I especially hate that I feel so much hate. It's poisonous, hate consumes you, you made me this way yet the way I feel, think or act have absolutely no impact on YOU or YOUR life - it only affects ME and MY life. I HATE YOU AND I HATE WHAT YOU DID AND I HATE HOW YOU MAKE ME FEEL ABOUT MYSELF. I have to change everything because of you, I have to deal with every tiny little feeling that you caused, and I hate that it's such a long and painful process because of you and what you did. But I have no choice, I have to figure this shit out because I refuse to let you take my life on top of everything else you've already taken. 

I wish I could make you see how much you've destroyed me and how hard it is to rebuild what you broke. I don't think you'll ever know, or care how you have affected me, but one day I will find the strength to take back that power I gave you, one day, not today, not tomorrow, but one day in the future I will hold that power again.  

Who am I?

Who am I? 

You see, I've spent around 15 years, desperately trying to get back the girl I was, the girl I was before I was raped.

desperately trying to remember that girl, find that girl inside me and be that girl again, then constantly punishing and belittling myself for not being able to achieve that goal. 

In all the time I was searching for who I once was, I forgot to embrace who I was now becoming, I forgot to nurture and care for that person in order to be the best I could be. I forgot to appreciate the person that was developing out of the trauma, instead, she was forgotten about, pushed to the side whilst I searched endlessly to find the person I was before. 

This constant belief that if I could just remember who I was, what I was, that I could be that girl again and everything would be healed. Never realising that she was gone forever, nothing but a memory anymore, being raped destroyed her, broke her into so many pieces it was impossible to fix. 

What I didn't realise, was that while I was so desperately trying collect those broken shards of myself, I was only hurting myself further. I didn't notice at the time, that a new self was appearing, rising from the broken parts, not the same person as before, changed by the trauma, changed by the rape, but a person nonetheless. 

Instead I spent 15 years hopelessly searching for and trying to fix my broken self, that I completely ignored the new self, not giving her time of day, refusing to listen to her, neglecting her and treating her like an outcast, constantly making her feel worthless. 

I punished her so much for not being the same as she once was that now she believes that she is hopeless, worthless, useless, she believes she is dirty and good for nothing, a burden on society and those she loves. 

Her only crime - not being the same person she was before she was raped. 

Maybe it's time to undo the hurt I've caused, to stop searching for who I was and instead learn to embrace who I am, who I am now, NOT who I was THEN. 

Yes I've changed, yes I'm different, I look at the world through different eyes now because I've experienced things that no person should ever experience, and those things changed my perspective, not just on life, but on everything, myself, the world in which I live and all those around me. 

The hardest part is learning to love and respect, listen to and nurture this person I've spent 15 years persecuting just for existing. Maybe one day she will forgive me for my mistakes and believe her true worth in the world.