Half A Century??!!

[SunWorshipper]

I am 50 now. When I stop and think of my life, I am flabbergasted. I have had PTSD for 30 years. Most of that time it has gone untreated. I have struggled with suicidal thoughts constantly during those years. Luckily, last summer, I found a medication that is helping tremendously. It is the difference between day and night, really. I still feel sad, lonely, scared, hopeless, anxious, and full of self-loathing, but at least I no longer think of ending my life, nor do I have those impulses to harm myself in other ways. I am so very grateful.
I have experienced 7 sexual assaults, the first at age 8, the last at age 45. I feel like I am walking around with a vibrant target on my back. I now understand that since I grew up in an abusive family (my father was the first to assault me) I never developed the self-respect required to fend off further abuse. I truly was walking around with a target on me, an aura that told everyone I was vulnerable and ripe to be a victim all over again. I am now at the point where I know that will never happen again (at least without me trying to kill the attacker...)
I am basically a very happy person, compassionate (probably due to the fact that I know suffering so well and wish to relieve it in others), imaginative, highly creative, silly, a kid at heart. Perhaps these qualities have kept me alive through the pain.
My imagination has mostly been serving me in negative ways. It is very difficult to keep my mind from wandering to dark places, reliving past traumas, worrying intensely about what might trigger my PTSD next, etc. Lately, I have chosen to tap into the positive side of my imagination. In my head, I now go to healing places, visit with good imaginary people, and have a wonderful time. I think that the past year of meditation has helped me develop this skill.
I have always chosen 'losers' for male partners. No surprise, really. I did not feel I was worthy of anyone good. Then, two years ago I met a man and fell in love for the first time ever. We had a great deal in common, he was gentle, compassionate, wanting to change the world for the better, creative, full of hope, funny, tender, and lots of other great things. It was my first marriage. My first real trust in someone, especially a man.
I left him last fall. He is addicted to pornography. When we first met, he said 'I think I may be addicted...' Downplayed it very very much and I had never heard of such a thing, had no experience with addiction. (Well, except for my alcoholic father, but I never schooled myself on what that was all about.) My husband claimed that I was his first true love, that I was soooooo special that he would be able to stay away from his addiction once and for all because of that. Ignorant, I believed him.
Female nudity either full or partial has always been a huge trigger for me. Just seeing certain magazines at the supermarket checkout can send me into such dark places that I am prepared to wade into the river behind my house and allow the icy water to end my life. (Thank goodness my meds now prevent this, but for 30 years it was the case.) For the past 2 years I have dealt not only with my husband's obsession with female nudity, but also the intense betrayal of him wanting to see other women's bodies while 'leaving mine in the dust.' It has been pure Hell. I have never had a man cheat on my physically, but I will bet this is what it feels like. The combination of his addiction and my disease was positively lethal.
I am living hand-to-mouth at the moment, with two minimum wage part time jobs. It is a really tough time just now and I do worry. But I am trying to focus on what I have instead of what I do not have. Today, I have a roof over my head, heat, hot running water, food, (I get to take home lots of leftovers from where I waitress and have managed to spend a mere $50 for food in the past 4 months), wonderful silence of living in a country setting, my loving cat who is healthy and happy, a couple of good friends, an incredible angel of a daughter for whom my love is over the top.
I grew up in a very religious home. My father became a born-again when I was around 11. He 'dragged' us all to church where the pastor told us how horrible we were (I was a seriously good girl and could never understand why he was saying these things about me that were simply not true.) After the pious show where everyone ooohed and aaahed about what a model man my father was, he would bring us home where he treated us like shit for the rest of the week. He would occasionally go on business trips and I would lie in bed and pray that he would never come home. Ten years ago, my brother admitted to me that he did exactly the same thing.
So, God has been a very toxic word and concept for me all my life. And once, in my darkest hour, I reached out and had total faith that I would receive the grace and help I was taught to believe in as a child. Nothing happened. I completely abandoned any faith or belief I ever had at that point. However, when my husband's addiction became too much for me to handle, even with great therapy, I turned to a 12-step program for those dealing with living with an addict. At first, I bristled at the fact that they wanted me to believe in a higher power all over again (I heard the G word so many times in those meetings and nearly ran screaming from the room.) But the program was all I had to cling to where others knew the specific hell I was going through. When the sex addict meetings were too triggering for my PTSD, I switched over to an alcoholic related program and told the group why I was there. They did not care what addiction issue I was dealing with, they welcomed me with open arms and one woman who was there for the same reason as I finally had the courage to speak up about why she was there. Awesome!
So, I tried my damndest to accept the concept of a higher power and lo and behold I began to see miracles. It is the first time in my life that I believe in something bigger than myself. A for-instance: I cooked angel hair pasta the night before and there were several dried up pieces on the stove top. I poured myself my first cup of morning coffee and proceeded to spill it all over the stove. Of course I cursed a blue streak and went to get a sponge to mop up the mess. As I reached to clean it up, I did a double-take. The coffee had spilled all over the pasta, causing it to regenerate from its dried up state back to wet pasta. What I saw was unbelievable. The word LOVE was spelled out as clear as day IN PASTA!! I mean, in what world or reality can such a thing happen as a mere coincidence? I was floored. I took a picture of it and it is now my cell phone screen saver. PM me if you want to see that. Lots of other similar things have come up ever since I began to believe.
I am actually very very uncomfortable writing about this belief. Both because my disbelief has been so strong all my life and because I know that when I used to go to support forums and people in trauma would talk about how god was getting them through the tough times, I was so repelled. I do not want to repel others who now feel as I used to. But I guess it is what it is for me and you can take it or leave it.
I suppose I ought to leave it there for now, as I have written quite a bit here. Thanks for listening. I am happy to be here amongst friends.
Sun

[Delilah]

Good work, Sun!!

And angel hair pasta at that! Yeah, I'm a hardcore atheist, but believe in the power of Mother Nature, so go figure. Religion has done itself a great disservice and it can sort itself out without my help. I got enough on my plate.
Keep fighting the good fight. You're worth it...