Felt like I was going back in time!

I was counseling with a  young girl one time and the strangest thing happened. After we had talked for quite a while, and when I felt like she truly had understood where I had come from and what I had been through; and the same for me about her…then I felt like she needed a hug. It was one of the strangest feelings. I almost felt like I had gone back in time and was holding Little Lynn (yes, like a younger version of myself). I wanted her so much to believe that she would live through all this trauma she was going through. That she could believe that someday she would grow up and marry an incredible man,  and have a wonderful and safe home and family. As this sweet girl and I were hugging, I told her what I was feeling and then  she through her emotions said “ and I feel and hope that I am hugging my future self, I can only hope to grow up and have your life someday!” Wow, that was a weird but neat feeling. You couldn’t have told me when I was her age, that my life would have turned out like it did. I couldn’t imagine most of my young life, that anyone would want my life, much less me !

Yet here I was some 40 years later since my abuse, and I was helping another sweet girl who was trying to make sense and survive her own abusive home and relationships. Abuse comes in all different varieties, it comes in and out of families. It comes to rich and poor, from religious or non religious homes and families. It comes to young and old. The truth is Abuse should never happen and if it does, it is vital to seek help, take a stand if you can and set your boundaries. Once you finally see the light of day, your eyes start seeing clearer. It is amazing how your eyes just seem to adjust in the darkness over time. But when you finally see or feel the light, it is vital that you run toward it, stay close to it or whoever you feel you can trust, and who has that light inside them self. Light is powerful, it is enlightening, it is hopeful, and it helps you see a much broader perspective.

I found this article that talked about emotional abuse, here is a part of it! 

“There is not such thing as only being emotionally abused - I have heard many horrifying stories of physical abuse and the most damaging aspect of the physical abuse is the emotional abuse it causes - when we say "I was only emotionally abused" it is the disease minimizing the trauma we experienced.  Emotional abuse is underneath all other types of abuse - the most damaging aspect of physical, sexual, mental, etc. abuse is the trauma to our hearts and souls from being betrayed by the people that we love and trust.  The other types of abuse can add more levels to the healing necessary but the bottom line is the emotional abuse and it's effect on our ability to Love and trust ourselves.  In fact, being only emotionally abused can sometimes make it much harder to get in touch with our issues because it isn't always blatant and obvious. Some of it was very subtle - some of us were abused and shamed by the way they looked at us or said our name or did not see or hear us - on a daily basis." -

Emotions are a vital part of our being.  We can not be whole and healthy without having an emotionally honest relationship with our self.  We can not know who we Truly are if our relationship with our own emotional process is twisted, distorted, and repressed.  Body, mind, and spirit are three parts of a four part equation.  Emotions are the key to healing our broken hearts and wounded souls.” 

 

So if you are in an abusive situation, please know there is help out there. Please know there is someone out there that you can connect with, who like you has been there themselves. Then stay strong, keep trying and soon you will be free and happier than you could ever imagine. I know this  because I lived in the darkness of abuse for  years, this life and light I have now… have made the struggle and fight all worth it.

Good night dear friends!

“Information is light. Information in itself, about anything, is light.”   ~Tom Stoppard

“You don't develop courage by being happy in your relationships everyday. You develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity.”   ~Epicurus

  “As we do at such times I turned on my automatic pilot and went through the motions of normalcy on the outside, so that I could concentrate all my powers on surviving the near-mortal wound inside.”

Sonia Johnson