When ever I see a kid/teen, most of the time I feel jealous, angry and depressed all at the same time. Jealous of the normal life the kid/teen has that I don't have, angry at my brother and God for doing this to me, and depressed that I'll never get that part of my life back. Anyone do anything that helps them get over this?
I perfectly understand how you feel. You express excactly what is a part of my healing process. Its a process of griveance and mourning ...the loss of innocense and a normal childhood. It hurts like hell and I have cried oceans of tears.
When I went to college I even made up "fairytale"-stories of my childhood and my parents....that were like I hoped it/they had been. I would not face how it really had been and what monsters they really were. No way I could handle that reality.
I do not lie anymore. The truth really stinks, but I have to face it.
I have some pictures of me when I was a boy. I liked the pictures of me BEFORE ...but it is painful to look at the pictures AFTER. I see the pain in my posture and the eyes of the boy I was. For some time I didnt like to see these pctures. But I have come to care so much for that broken boy, that is inside of me. I ask myself what he needs and try my best to meet his needs. Selfparenting I guess some would call it. Its ok for him to be angry and cry and ask why God allowed this to happen. I was a wictim but now I have to survive and take care of the sad boy inside of me. I can do it. I choose to do it. There are more good days than bad days.
It's tragic beyond words that the time we lost as boys can never be regained. Surely that's a loss to grieve for, and I think we do need to go through that process. That's probably what you are doing now.
But you ask how you can get past this. The hard truth - one of the hardest truths in recovery - is that at some point we just have to let go of the past, for the simple reason that we cannot do anything about the past. It is gone and beyond our reach now. We of course have every right to our anger and grief, but if we dwell on the past that's where we will remain. We won't be able to move forward.
What we CAN do, however, is change how the terrible events of the past affect us in the present - here and now. We can reject blame, see that we are not alone, reach out to safe people to seek their support, accept that we need help, ask for what we need, commit to recovery and regain our lives.
When our good friend and mod Mike Church was posting regularly here he used to remind us over and over again: "The present is where we will be spending the rest of our lives." He was so right, and that was a lesson I tried mightily to accept and finally did.
Jason, one thing I do that helps me a lot is that I look back at all the terrible things that happened to Little Larry, and I marvel that he was able to fight through and survive. I remember how he cried and suffered, but he got us through. That's actually a way of saying that I owe it to myself and everything I endured to give recovery my best effort. I deserve a good life, and if I work for it I know I can achieve it again.
So can you bro. Recovery isn't easy - in fact it may well be the most difficult thing you ever do. But in the end you will be able to live the life of joy and fulfillment that you were always meant to have. The abuser will have lost, and Little Jason's courage and guts will not have been in vain.
its like I lost what I am seeing in the child I see playing in abandon, but I see a lot of myself in watching kids playing, like I always wished I had a life like theirs.
The ability to just be yourself and find a girl without saying, hey, I am fucked up, do you still wanna know me!
Its a learning curve I missed out on when I really needed a mate, and abuse threw me out of all that.
When I see these teens having fun, I think, how many of you are going home to cry?
I was the fun loving teen with a big secret, and that is how I think when seeing teens.
I just wish that none of us were abused as kids, and had a wistful lifestyle just like our friends did, but I will never know in my lifetime,
there's one thing that gets me through moments like that call it heady optimism or denial, but its stood me in good stead: I feel lucky to bein recovery. Lucky that my abuse memories popped out of the blue and everything collapsed.
Its fucking painful yes, but a lot of people I think never get to deal with their shit. I could have lived a half-life, shut down, unconscious. But instead I get to shake, cry, mourn, and hopefully grow.
That's what keeps me going. Hope it'll help ya out.
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