Broken mirrors

I was sitting in a big rocking chair worried I was losing yet again. My son was making his silly sounds in my ear and my lego set had me on my last set of patience. I had just found yet another issue with my car, my finances and my life.

So what happens when we lose? What parts of us are we willing to sacrifice for a healthy life and are we happier divorced?

I went to shop halloween makeup for my daughter in the midst of a crisis with my car. All I could think was "which makeup would be perfect for her?" She asked for nudes and browns and a white paint for the perfect makeup look at her high schools football game tonight. I wanted her to have the best. Not what I thought was the best but what she loved most mixed with my knowledge of color theory and meticulous attention to detail within art.

For a brain that never quits, focusing outward feels like flying. I dont ever think of helping, loving or supporting other people as a burden. As least not in the action. Sometimes in the work or what it takes to do so, but never in the action. When I ran from my marriage I was so sick. So depressed, so sad, so neglected and so ignored. The way I screamed to be seen, heard or even allowed to exist made me so frustrated I would burst into anger. Like saying HEY I MATTER TOO. Getting so angry that I couldnt move speak or even be a good mom. I was going through the emotions of losing my marriage I almost forgot why it happened.

The comfort of the home we built, destroyed. The care and attention I put into loving and healing my husband, ignored. The intimacy we shared, ended in violence, obligation and twice being left on the ground with him angry I wasnt good enough or doing the sex he wanted. I was an object he looked at for 13 years like a slave. If I would clean, he would trash it. If I planned something he would ignore it. If I accomplished something, he took the credit. He began psychologically manipulating me early. Sabotaging all the nice things i did with a pain he carried about himself. We got to the point that we couldnt tell where I started and he finished because I was carrying his pain, his mistakes and his own responsibility to the ending of our marriage. If it was financial, certainly my fault. If it was his family or me he always chose his family. Anytime I needed to leave for even a doctors appointment or time to take care of myself, he would sabotage it by not coming home on time.

If my daughter had practice, he would be late to come home. If we had an event at the school, well forget it we were late or never making it.

He would speak of me like I was his disposable choice and I dedicated my entire existence to his growth.

After I came up empty I looked behind me and said, maybe the things I did were stupid, or done out of convenience. A way to tolerate behavior so I did not have to start all over again.

The pain of that. Of leaving someone you love that much, plus all the beautiful things you built together, to start over. Oh man, I was doomed.

I laid down in my daughters bed and an unexplainable heaviness, A spiritual heaviness hit me like I was never going to be able to move or get up again. I was laying parallel from my baby girl watching her sleep so I wasn't experiencing sleep paralysis.

I had never considered running from my children or my life before but something was screaming at me that I could leave now, or she was going to find me hanging dead somewhere.

I did the only thing my battered body, neglected needs and broken heart could think. I wept, crawled on the cold floor to the door. Looked at her one more time and ran.

The one thing I never wanted to do but the only thing that would save her from a lifetime of a dead mother was the running away to heal.

I went to North Carolina, no warning. I was out of my entire mind still healing from psychosis due to not taking thyroid medication. My words, my actions, my life didnt look like me at all but it was exactly what saved me. The alter ego was that of I need freedom and wild adventures. If I do not risk my life in adrenaline and danger I will sit with myself and take myself out.

I quit taking my anti depressant at this time as well. I wanted to understand what I was numbing. I was at first running towards the safest people I could remember but they were scared of what was happening. Nobody quite understand what I saw, and fearful of the consequences of knowing me for all my social media truth telling. I am of the belief that misery loves company and hurt people hurt people.

I became that person. Never my intention as someone who is broken in their mind can not have the intention of ruining people. They are simply sucking people into their toxic orbit. Still not wrong, just not a good thing to do to people you care about.

Then something amazing happened. I started to clear the fog, study my way of thinking and found I had a type of psychic ability. Only knowing the future was causing me anxiety and depression. So I shed the gift. Every night I would lay down and say, I don't know anything but that which is within me and those around me only know what I am willing to share.

I began to see my own patterns and break them on purpose.

Instead of rebelling I was becoming.

Unbecoming all the things you were before can be labeled by a small town.

Most people heal in private a reclaim themselves the clean cut perfect curated version everyone loves. I had already sailed that ship into a bridge so I kept going.

The sexual wounds, the jealousy, the control the anger the resentment the need to be right or to prove I was good in any other space than privacy felt like a disappearing act I was not ready to give up.

I thought come hell and heaven both I had suffered in silence since I was a baby and that was never going to happen again.

I would try to find friends, or family to tell my suffering too, they would revert back to God.

I wasn't ready for God. All the things I saw of God people held me down into a hell that I wont relive another day. God people still consistently use him to justify pedophiles, racism, oppression and greed. They practice the sins they preach and pretend we all don't see it. I remember thinking why do these people get to exist in the community as a respected member but the people who don't look as if they don't have the intelligence to see why a God even exists.

Then I remembered a professor I studied with in private and in a 300 level theology class. I thought if I need God to find my heart maybe I will deconstruct the religion and reconstruct the idea of the theology so I can become a person who doesn't take down everyone with me.

So the craziest things started to happen. I would meet strangers and they would tell me stories that I had dreamed the night before. Spit warnings at me, and testify to their own struggle with modern religion. Tell me their faith, their philosophy their lack their of. Shockingly the people I met mostly said they don't participate in God or God people after Trump won office.

Ill write more about that later.

Am I happier divorced. Absolutely.

Even my daughter says shes glad its over. The peace in the relationship I have with my ex was hard fought battle but it is also not my obligation. I have a lot more freedom to move as an individual making my own decisions and I dont have to constantly be on the defense about why I do what I do. Which makes me an even better friend, lover and person. A sweeter one, a kinder one and a braver one. One that values my private left with an entirely new village over the performance I used to give to make the world believe I was worth seeing.

I never speak of where I have been or what I am doing outside of my past online. It has allowed me the freedom to exist there without worrying someone will manipulate it to align with me. I also spend more time resting and in quiet spaces so I can hear myself think.

Every spiritual belief shed, no dead people, no mediumship, no rituals, no witchcraft, no colors no numbers no predictions and no projections. No control or pressure or assumptions. Just a softness left.

I never got the chance to be a woman. I was always a child or immature within most of the eyes around me.

I had been fighting so long to have those around me respect me for my womanhood. In all of its maturity and realness I forgot sometimes to look back and realize I was always the most powerful woman I know. Despite the way people speak to me, or assume they can treat me, I have and forever will be expanding and maturing. Part of womanhood is surrounding yourself with like minded people while respecting the paths of other women.

So now my daughter sees her mom as she was before all the men came in and taught her who to be. My son has me fighting for him in intellect instead of emotion. My ex, he has my help but never my life.

Anger is never the root of your issue or mine. Love is.

Love is keeping promises, love is showing up, love is patience and kindness and generosity. Love is communication and holding space. Love is waiting and love is sometimes just boring texts that say you care. Love is breaking apart, and building over and over until its correct.

Love is leaving mistakes in the past and healing things for the future. Love is friendship, supporting the community, offering your time and attention or even your life if it helps. Love is making someone feel safe and seen. valued and appreciated.

Love is so much more than what anyone taught us. Not perfect, not without flaws, but withstands even the strongest doubt.

Why would I stay with my ex? Love

Why would I let people paint me as the problem? Love

Why would I let someone replace me? Love

Why would I stop holding grudges? Love

Why would I sit in the house that broke me? Love

Why would I give up every single position I own? Love

Why would I let people go and come back? Love

Why would I give up my career my goals and my dreams? Love

Why would I heal someone? Love

Why would I endure the worst? Love

Why would I walk away from my family? Love

The way I love that is infinite, in forgiveness and healing and faith.

So I could remember just how good at love I was. I had to be really bad at it first