Buckle up, Buttercups

 There’s a lot to think about when one is locked inside their home for nearly a year and being as I’m the type of person to mull over, dissect, piece together, ponder and analyze all the things, that’s a year full of free therapy, right there. Sure, heaps more junk has piled on but that stuff is in the “DRAWER” for the time being. That’s how these things work.

I’m working on this documentary. Or, it’s working on me, maybe. Either way, the thinking... Think Think Think... Says Pooh.... is exceptionally difficult, painful and also enlightening and freeing. 

I had this moment a couple of days ago, talking to the brother of Rob... NOT, Robb, but my teen first love Rob. The one who came to propose when he didn’t know that I was married and five months pregnant. That fork in the road that you didn’t know you were passing at 100 mph. 

How many of those are there?

And the conversation got me to doing some of that thinking stuff and we wrapped up our conversation. Think.

The moment of realization. Loud, like a clap of thunder yet, damp and misty like the fog on a cold day.....an uncomfortable feeling. Yet, also the realization that there is a reason for why you think think think and it’s because you are trying to understand what’s off. What’s different. Why you struggle even when there is no outward reason for you to feel the way you do except... there is.

I AM BROKEN. 

I joke about me being a turtle and lugging around a shell but the reality is.... I do that BECAUSE I am broken. 

I’ve always been embarrassed to think of myself as broken but my God, how do you survive being sexually molested by your mother in the ways that she abused me and not come out the other side, broken? Why should I carry the burden of shame for that? Why have I been? I didn’t break me. 

Something I’ve never told anyone until I told my husband this past week....hold on....

I don’t remember the first time I had sex. Or the second. Or who that person was. In that way, my memory starts on the day I conceived my oldest son.  I mean, obviously there are bits and pieces and memories of the abuse and I know who was used to facilitate the abuse so I can GUESS who it was but I have no memory of ever thinking... “This is my first time having sex.”

I don’t even remember my first.... Kiss. 

Gone. Taken from me. These stages of life that people always remember. I’m missing those.

People live with being broken all the time. There’s nothing for me to be embarrassed about. It doesn’t mean that I’m not strong, in fact, it shows that I am strong.  I live while broken. I thrive while broken. I have persisted while broken. I have been the storm, while broken. I’ve been my own champion. I’ve been my own advocate. I’ve never been weak. 

Despite being broken. In SPITE of being broken.

It suddenly came to me after I’d finished that conversation that it’s very likely that every choice, every decision, every situation, I’ve made since I was a young teen or found myself in, was because I was broken. We see life through our own experiences. Some people have never been broken. How can they not have a different viewpoint than someone who has experienced being broken? 

Who I allowed into my life.

Where I lived

The way I feel empathy, understanding or compassion 

How I guard myself

The person that I am, quirks and all.

Because of my life experiences.

It’s not embarrassing. I wasn’t the person or people who stole parts of me. Who broke that baby girl, born open and whole on March 16th. 

I am the warrior who also happens to stand while broken. 

I felt a sense of pride when that clap of thunder sounded. 

I feel a sense of pride today.

Night,

Tracy