Sundrip Journals
I’ve been finishing work in my books. I set a goal this year to finish work I started but there was an interruption that put me behind. I decided after I got out of the hospital to pick up where I left off with finishing work. Here is one of the key pieces I wanted to work on. It’s a story line about my aunt’s life and the affect she had on mine.
She Sings, from the journal entry called Wide.
fma
A person can’t live in this world and be innocent. It took me a long time to understand what innocence means. The day it was taken from me I understood the meaning of fear and began to question trust. The day it was taken from me and the subsequent assaults that held it before me like a worm on a hook, I began to understand what it means to be vulnerable and without control over my environment, helpless, completely dependent on others for my safety. I understood what it meant to be worthless and bad. When I was innocent I had no concept of these things. That’s what innocence is, having no reason to doubt, fear or question the stability of your little world.
Innocent is a mirror before it’s broken.
This is a borrowed conversation.
I listened to the first 3 min of a video where a person was talking about how well they treated their significant other, but it wasn’t appreciated. I could only bear a few min of it. What got me the most was that she said, I’m not perfect but, you guys know me, ……..” I figure, if a person starts a conversation with, “I’m not perfect but…” then you can be pretty sure they’ve done something they need to apologize for. What she said in those few minutes got me thinking about the way I think and the way I communicate.
My first and most intimate lessons in communication had to do with figuring out what was expected of me from a woman who had a singular agenda that did not include me. My first and most intimate lessons in communication included weaving in and around insults or crafting my statements to avoid being accused of disobedience. My chief instructor, the person responsible for every aspect of my life, was crazy.
I walked thin lines and broke them repeatedly. I’d go over in my head how to do it better, say it better, how to keep from being a disappointment. I was one of those kids that tried all sorts of creative ways to be who she needed to be. I couldn’t figure it out because I was missing one piece of information; her agenda doesn’t include you.
It is clear to me that youth was nothing more than a performance lacking true emotion and conviction.
After taking my freedom, after being in therapy half of my life, I still struggle to show on my face what I’m feeling inside. I use words or I paint to explain myself. I can be suicidal and laugh in the same conversation, but this time I know to tell the person ahead of time that I’ve not broken the conditioning in this area. I have to tell them to listen to what I’m saying, please don’t look at my smiling face.
Continue reading “My first and most intimate lessons in communication”
I paint with my heart and all but bleed on canvas. Painting is a powerful way to release anxiety and thoughts that pound my skull. While art as a whole is therapeutic for me, there are certain pieces that were created specifically as therapy with my psychologist. As I thin out the amount of art in my home, I’d like to make available on a continued basis, some of the art pieces created during my therapy sessions or at a later time.
As I said, art therapy has been one of the most powerful tools in my healing process. I can’t explain to you the relief I feel knowing that some of my abuse memories have lost their sting when I was professionally guided with the tool of art therapy.