Living With Pain.....

[Jude]

Just a brief post because I need to say "I'm hurting" out loud.

Its not that saying it out loud makes it better, but doing anything else with it definitely makes it worse.

I've tried burying it, denying it, hiding it, running from it, medicating it, sexing it, and drinking & drugging it away. It took me years to understand that if I just face it, and feel it, it won't kill me. It can't. Its just a feeling. It will pass.

Still, there are times when I just wish I could be the guy with the "Life Is Good" t-shirt, and never have to feel this.

 

[justplainme]

That guy does not exist, the one with the t-shirt. You only stop feeling pain the day you die. I know what you mean about numbing the pain out, you know that is often said just a way we become cold, and bitter in our hearts, when we avoid our own pain, we often avoid the pain of others.
I know it hurts. Cry it away man. But at the same time allow me to share a bit of wisdom i've learn't, don't give in completely to pain. Otherwise fear will take possession of your spirit. We become impotent when we fear life for fear of getting hurt. Believe in love, in the truth that come from your own heart. That guy in the shirt , the one that doesn't exist, he would not recognize it himself if you told him he was the one with the good life. He would just see his life for what it is and accept it. And be happy about it.
I know it sounds corny to say be happy when your sad, but happiness is closer than you think.

 

[traveler]

(((((((jude)))))))

i hear you. i wish i could tell you that the pain will go away and never come back - or at least diminish very significantly. i hope that is true but i can't promise it. you are right when you say that is will pass. but chances are it may return. it is also a pretty good bet that it will not be as bad as it has in the past. but i think you are doing the right thing by acknowledging it and owning it. it is part of who we are. at least you know that there are many others who share your experience and your pain. hopefully that is helpful.

 

[kcinohio]

Thanks for the reminder Jude. This too shall pass is something that helps during the hard times.

 

[Sven]

Wise words Judd & everyone else.
Thanks
Hard to believe those words though 'this too shall pass' etc when you're so in the middle of the pain but.. intellectually I know it's probably true.

 

[lapchinj]

Hey Jude

Venting is just as good and is a more healthy way of relieving the built up stress of the past and getting to the level of "this too shall pass"

Peace, Rainbows, Love, Healing & Hope

 

[Winhamness]

Still, there are times when I just wish I could be the guy with the "Life Is Good" t-shirt, and never have to feel this.

Quoted for truth.

It is very frustrating to have to deal with this, and look at other people who are outwardly happy and care free and just wonder why I can't be like them.....

 

[LinEar]

Thanks for saying it out loud. I hurt too.

 

[lapchinj]

Hey Jude

I've tried burying it, denying it, hiding it, running from it, medicating it, sexing it, and drinking & drugging it away. It took me years to understand that if I just face it, and feel it, it won't kill me. It can't. Its just a feeling. It will pass.

Still, there are times when I just wish I could be the guy with the "Life Is Good" t-shirt, and never have to feel this.

I kept being drawn back to this thread you started because it describes my life pretty close to a tee.

When I went into the USAF at 18-1/2 I went into hiding my pre teen and teen years. After I got out at 21 I started hiding the fact that I was in the USAF also. So for almost the next 40 years I hid my previous life. I even moved out of the county I lived in and moved to a place in another county where nobody knew anything about me. I started building a new life around myself that started at 22. As far as I was concerned I didn't exist before the age of 23. I walked away from friends, drugs, prostitution, etc. I went cold turkey on "that life", I went completely into hiding. I never had more than this one friend in all those years.

Then almost 40 years later my past came roaring back to me in January 2011 at around 6pm when I accidently walked back into the village and stood on the corner of Bleecker and Minetta streets. I couldn't move for 45 minutes saying to myself that I did exist here as a kid. Then I ran uptown to catch a bus home. Once I got home I started more or less what you did like drinking, drugging, crawling deeper into my shell and being paranoid that someone would find out something about my past. I was falling deeper and deeper into black pit with no way out. That May I was screaming to myself that I needed help and quickly before I self destruct. I opened up to the only friend I had since I went into the USAF. He got me to the Oprah show "200 men". I saw a bunch of men, young and old, holding up pictures of themselves at the time of their abuse. I wondered how these men could go on national TV showing the most guilt ridden and personal part of their lives. I was surprised at how many children besides myself are abused each year from the interviews done on those 2 segments of the show. The resources from that show got me to here MS in the afternoon of June 7, 2011.

Being here on MS has let me learn how telling my story will not hurt me. Aside from a few guys here that I now know personally the rest of the guys here are anonymous so it makes telling my story easier. Maybe one day I will be able to come out publicly of what went all those years ago. Being here on MS has been a big journey into putting together my past and reading other men's stories of abuse. It has shown me that I was not the only person going through this painful time in our healing.

Then there is the time when I wake up each morning wishing I was "normal" but realizing that my past is not going away. All that is left me to do is "to understand that if I just face it, and feel it, it won't kill me".

Thanks so much Jude for this thread, I must have read your post more than a dozen times. It just hits a cord of what I'm going through.

Peace, Rainbows, Love, Healing & Hope