TRIGGER WARNING -- GRAPHIC ACCOUNT OF TRAUMATIC MEMORY INTRUSION AND RELATED SELF-INJURY -- TAKE CARE!!!

I wrote about an incident of self-injury a while back. Yeah, I was very 'cloaked' and vague about the whole thing. Anyone who just stumbled in here off the street with no background info probably wouldn't have known what I was talking about. That was the first such incident in quite a long time and I have not done it since. Later that night after writing that blog post, I understood what I had done and why I had done it. If I had understood beforehand, it probably would not have happened at all, because then I would not have had the heart to do it.

My (past) usual M.O. would have been burning with a lighter, but it was a razor blade on that occasion. The memory of a birth made traumatic by human cruelty and abuse had finally come for me with all of its elements. When I say it had finally come for me, I don't mean that I had 'forgotten' it as I have with other traumatic material. I never forgot that trauma, I simply never had the emotions, the full view of the brutality, and access to the memory of some of the more gruesome details all together in a complete package before. I have recently been recalling many times in the past when I had the emotions that came from that trauma, but I had no idea where they were coming from at the time. Now I know. I know a lot of stuff now that I didn't know then.

I know why I cut myself that night. I did it to scare away the intense memory that I was having trouble withstanding. Here -- I'll make it easier for you to understand. I (the Rambo me, really) wrote the following in an email to my therapist while I was holed up in my room with that particular ordeal:

“I still hate those two cunts. I hate them like you wouldn't even believe. I would not shed a tear if someone tied them down, injected them with drugs, and sliced their vaginas open with a scalpel. It wouldn't bother me a bit. As a matter of fact, I could probably eat a sandwich while the whole thing went down.”

Rambo is a genius! He told me EXACTLY what happened to me (the teenage girl) without negating the brutality of it with excuses and false niceties. I was tied down and injected with drugs against my will. My vagina was mutilated with a scalpel and the nurses ate their lunch undisturbed by my screams. And that’s the truth.

Maybe you can begin to understand the horror that descended on me when the brunt of this hit. My legs and arms would not be still when I tried to sleep. My body wanted to fight off attackers who were no longer there, so I let it. My mind was a screaming hell. The light from the overhead fluorescent lights in my bathroom suddenly looked eerily similar to the ghastly lighting found in hospitals. All the while, I knew intellectually that I was still in my bedroom in my home in the present, yet I couldn't make it stop. At the height of the ordeal, there wasn't any way to find comfort. The concept of comfort felt ludicrous. Can you imagine someone walking up to somebody in a situation like that one? What would the comforting person say? "I know you are tied down and being horribly assaulted, but I've brought you a scented candle to make you feel better while your reproductive organs are being mutilated." ???? Umm... Somehow I don't think that would have helped me much. And it is exactly at times like that when the presence of a therapist would make me go ballistic. It would have been a disaster. There are times when you don't hand somebody a happy stick unless you want them to beat the hell out of you with it, you know? Sometimes enthusiastic grounding efforts are another way of saying, "that was then, so don't think about it (get over it)." If anything, I not only needed to let my body fight off the ghosts, I needed to scream and rage at them as well.

So, you see, my savage protector was absolutely correct in the things he had done to chase the therapist away and lock things down. And his rage, which told so honestly what had been done to me, brought the teenage girl right to my doorstep. But... I didn't know what to do with her, so I shoved her face right into the horror she had endured. I sliced my shoulder open and I made her look right into the bloody gashes. She was horrified. Did she run away? Faint? I don't know. I only know that she was shocked and then gone in an instant. My intention did not involve her at all. I didn't realize the exact why or what until it was all over. I only knew that if I did it, I could make it all stop. At that point, I just wanted it to stop. I had reached the end of knowing what to do in that situation.

Strangely, I am better off for having endured those memories. It might be because I so fully accept, appreciate and understand the 'Rambo' aspect of me now. Maybe it's also because I have realized why I cut and ended up able to feel some compassion for the teenage victim (me) of that old atrocity. There has been no need for pills, my appetite is good, and my sleep is much improved. Starting my period is usually very upsetting. Not this time. Maybe I'm slightly less grossed out by body things now? I don't even seem to need the therapist to the extent that I did before I was confronted by this recent ordeal of memory. It's too bad that all the 'help' in my past has been geared toward keeping me away from my self, my memories and my reality in favor of throwing the false blanket of comfort, affirmations and optimism over the top of everything in an effort to keep it covered up. It seems that staying away from myself and the brutal reality of my past has been the problem all along.

Could I have done this before? Yes, but maybe not before the autumn of 2005 when I moved into this house and away from my mother's neighborhood. I spent many years creating the safety that culminated then. I'm safe now and my mind knows it's okay to remember and feel. There is no contaminated and sickening family in my life. There is no toxic 'helper' who might try to poison me with drugs or hospitalize me for feeling things. There are no abusers. There are no big financial problems which could worsen if I get a little stuck. I don't have a 'normal' job that I could lose if need time to myself. My children are bigger and have friends and a father right here who cares for them. Yeah. I guess it's finally safe to remember. I worked my ass off to get here, and it was difficult and sporadic because I did it with a ton of bricks strapped to my back. Funny, I've been 'here' for more than three years, but it is only now that I can see where 'here' really is. 'Here' is safe. Now, when the bricks threaten to topple, I will let them. Because I'm here.