Isolation

Welcome my darling… to your darkest hour. Your future self is writing here, sweetheart.

Daddy’s girl with no daddy.

Relationship with mother…complicated. And today is mother’s day.

Friends? Not today!

Love life? You fell in love for the first time and it ended not with sparks and fireworks, but with a hug that was meant to be him holding your hand as one of you passes into eternity.

You can’t deal and there is no one to deal with you. You have run out of options. No one can empathise. You can’t even tell people why you left a job you love, with a man you love because it almost ended in suicide…

How did life get so bad? Not in huge falls. But in steps. Everything can be traced back of course. But what about traced forward? Where does this end? Or does this end her?

In order to have the life you want, you must let go of the life you had.

The life I had was one of highly cultivated gentleness. Acts of self care where no one else cared for me. But my walls are also sky high. Or more like a bubble of “safety” created by me. But its only 6ft deep and 6 ft long… Not a prison cell. A grave. But I thought I was healing myself. Not burying myself. I genuinely had good intentions… Which the road to hell is paved with… And. I. Am. In. Hell.

Someone broke down those walls with a smile and quite literally “having my back” he is magnetic, and I felt no fear for the first time. I wasn’t even meant to be in love. I just wanted to heal. And a man not wanting anything from me was not just refreshing, it was a complete revelation. I was and am addicted to that purity of soul. I didn’t know how much that mattered.

Can we pause here?

Is it horrendous that the second safest memory of my entire adult life is of this man walking me to and from rooms? Why? This man did nothing special. He just wanted to make sure I got to my sessions without being lost. First place was my epic hug with my dad on the last christmas I ever had. But what does that say about a person if you have so few examples of safety? He would just be. There. In an indescribibly safe way. So much purity. Why am I so cut up? Because no one has ever given me that rest. My love language is acts of service and I have never been served. And it is the realisation of that, that hurts. I didn’t know what safety was between a man and a woman, until he showed me. So when he then smiled at me, used words of affirmation… it meant something, because the acts of service had been backed up. All of a sudden, I could understand the words he was using. It was like another language had been unlocked in my mind. For someone who lived in the prison cell of her own mind. Let me describe it to you in the words of Charles Wesley.

“Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin and nature's night
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light
My chains fell off, my heart was free
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee”

This describes me…exactly.

A few more months and years (forever) of being loved well and I would have been a different person. I didn’t actually know what the feeling of being “loved well” was. Its being walked to class. Its “laptop down” moments. Its a walk when I’m desperate for help. Everyone tells me I want too much, but actually that’s what I wanted. Its all I needed. I’m utterly bereft. It gave me hope. Of a different person. A different Anna. One who could be teased. One who could laugh, deeply. Often. Who could get stronger because she was given room to grow. Someone who was filled with joy. Actual joy. The levity he brought me was intoxicating. He got sick? I was in pain. He was in Manchester? I missed him. “No Joe” weeks? Horrible. My job became just my job. My interactions with him however…everything. I radiated exuberence. I mirrored him like the moon mirrors the sun. His exuberance was my exhilaration. I am drawn to him. I didn’t think that I was needy. I’m not. But my my my. I also didn’t know how deprived of the love I crave that I am. A love where I can just be. I honestly have no idea how much longer I can do this. This has been killing me for a while. At some point the heart will break permenantly and it will be over for me. I just have to pray I have my beloved before then. One kiss? A fairytale? Being loved well for the rest of my life? A testimony, a manifestation of bliss. A deep, intrinsic knowledge that life will be good, not easy. But good. I needed that. Think Maria Mckee’s “Show me Heaven” Love is deep, love is earthy, love is everything. An all consuming truth. “

Show me heaven… cover me…leave me breathless.”

He did show me heaven. The person I can be. The person I have been destined to be. “Inner leader?” No. Inner mother. Wife. Pregnant, delighted, grounded, safe. Wife, Mother, Daughter, All the things I actully value. In a world where I can allow someone else to take care of me, and still know I will be taken care of. Not neglected. Not insufficiently loved. Just wonderment, ecstasy, tenderness, intimacy, attentiveness. Its actually left me gasping, like someone who has forgotten how to breathe… learning. Greedy for air. Not knowing how to deal with it.

“Leave me breathless?”

He was never meant to leave me. Nor I him. Death was meant to part us.

I actually had no idea I was so threatened by men until I met him. I remember a man touched my shoulder in October, and I wrote a post about it. The person was friendly (a colleague, trying to get my attention) and I was scared. Why? Turns out, something I have always struggled with only manifests when I come into contact with healthy relationships. I know why. My body kept score. That’s how you know when you’re broken, when a healthy behaviours don’t make sense.

I don’t want to be broken. I want to be healed, healing. The past 4 months have broken me, spat me out as a triggered mess, remembering things I had repressed, and being shocked when “the body keeps the score”

Turns out, you never. Ever. Ever. Get.Away with anything. Your body does keep the score. And apparently mine is pissed off with all the abuse I have suffered. I have tortured myself trying to be good enough for people. I have faced things no one should. Yet I face it with “Grace and Courage”

Grace apparently means, “Courteous Good will” I have good will for all humanity.

Courage. means “strength in the face of pain or grief. or the ability to do something that frightens one;”

I have shown so much strength in the face of pain and grief. Now its time to do something that frightens me. Heal.

Here are some things I need to heal from.

Parents-my upbringing was wild. I need stability. I need to give myself that.

Relationships- I fell in love for the first time aged 31. It shocked me. I’m actually confused.

Work- I don’t hate Finance. I just hate going into work knowing I am some kind of emotional punchbag for every hatchet case who gets paid a lot.

Validation- why does my life depend on the mood swings of people? I don’t need your validation. I am worthy.

Here are some things I do care about.

Peace. Being peaceful.

Excitement. -Chasing joy. Not just happiness.

Knowledge. A lifelong pursuit.

Safety. Being my own safety.

Silliness. I will die soon. (yeah, even 60-100 years is “soon” if you think about it.) I want to be childlike for as long as possible. I want people to remember my smile, not my frown.

Vulnerability. I have been brave my whole life. And I am not sure how long I can do it. “a few more steps” I tell myself… Every.Single.Day. I’m not coping. Please, let me be vulnerable. For the love of God let there be someone I can hold my guard down with for even 5 minutes. The burden is too much to bear. I’m not tired. I’m exhausted.

Connection- I want a tribe. So when I feel like this I actually do have someone to talk to.

Its always cute to say a “call to action” but when you have a bout of poor mental health, its all you can do to get up the next day. So baby steps. Those are the steps I take. I take a step every day towards being everything I wanted. Instead of this trembling mess. Today. Healing looks like a good cry.

Welcome to the dark night of the soul.

But tomorrow always comes.

By the Grace of God Go I.

Grace and Courage.

Annetta Mother Smith