Thursday, August 09, 2007

Confronting the Past, the Present, and the Darkness Between


I’ve been working on myself for the past year plus, trying to deal with the demons of my past. I am confronting these demons from a number of different sides, with a number of different methods, and all have been moving me closer and closer to serenity and peace of mind. But to get there, I’ve had to confront so many very tough issues.

Today, that stepped up a level. My mother came into town today, to join with me in all those methods, and hopefully get to a resolution on so many of the issues that involve her. We spent multiple hours today working on our issues with a couple of support networks, that time will triple tomorrow and Friday. Definitely a long weekend.

Now don’t get me wrong, my mother is a very well intentioned woman. She cares for me and loves me, and wants to be as helpful as possible in my recovery and in my life. But she is also controlling, and wields a mighty sword to get her way: she utilizes guilt, and very effectively at that. Hell, she could be a professional guilt artist.

So today, we started discussing issues from our past, with help from professionals and amateurs. My mom brought up case after case of my not doing her will, and laid down guilt trip after guilt trip surrounding these issues. At one point, I lost my cool as she laid it on thicker and thicker. And the whole time I tried to urge her to accept me instead of trying to control me. Not surprisingly that fell on deaf ears.

At the end of one session, a professional made a very pertinent point; he said that there was no question of her manipulation and controlling behavior, but that I was exerting controlling behavior as well, by trying to urge her not to practice that behavior. The reality of that statement was like a slap in the face, and I walked away having learned perhaps the most valuable lesson of the day.

It was a rough day, reliving many memories I had hoped to put behind me. It was also hard to hear how much I had hurt my mom; I know that in many ways she hurt her self by maintaining the expectations that were never realized, and I need feel no guilt for them, but I love my mom very much, and hate to think I was the cause of her pain.

But as rough as the day was, the night is so much worse.

I tried to make calls, to contact the people in my local network, but they were all asleep or heading in that direction. I tried to contact people in my MySpace support network, but no one was around, no one was available to me. And as I shut out the lights to go to sleep, the demons descended upon me, a waking nightmare.

The memories of the past, long forgotten or more recent, are unable to be silenced in the darkness of my room. The fears of my childhood, even my adulthood, filling my every moment with a dread of not only what was done to me but of whom I am. And worst of all, the pain, guilt and shame of having hurt my mom, who I do care for. Real or imagined, that’s what hurts the most.

I got out of bed, unable to sleep, looking for the tool to help get out of my own head. I looked again for someone to talk to, preferably someone with less sobriety than I, and came up blank. I prayed again and again, but couldn’t focus as my thoughts kept drifting to this day. And finally, I decided to write, to get my thoughts on paper and out of my head.

I wish I had a friend to talk to, someone to hug or hold or just to tell me that it would all be alright. I wish I had my serenity more firmly intact, and that I could let these issues just roll off my back. I wish that this was a one day event, and that tomorrow I could have a stress free day. But this is God’s will, and I’m meant to live through it. And hopefully when it’s done, the demons that haunt me will allow me to rest, if only for a short time.

Posted by Scottage at 12:33 AM / | |