Laughter IS the Best Medicine

During the last few weeks, I frequently asked my friend Katie to tell me jokes.  She is the queen of bad jokes - and good ones.  For instance, "A white horse fell in a mud puddle."  While for some, that would not constitute as  high humor, it was just what I needed.  She never tired of being put on the spot as I would often just demand "tell me a joke".

I usually lie in bed thinking about the day and analyzing what coping skills worked and what didn't.  The one that never fails is humor and sarcasm.  I am an incredibly sarcastic person by nature and thankfully, all my friends are too.  They get me - gallows humor, political, satire, sarcasm - all of it.  I think that Tina Fey and I would be bff's if she would just return my phone calls.  Amy Poehler and Jim Gaffigan would also be great friends of mine....if they would just return the phone calls.  I haven't hit stalker status yet but if I don't get some response soon, I may have to resort to mass mailings.

I cannot imagine going through everything I do without a sense of humor.  My friend's jokes and stories are always enough to break up the thoughts running through my head or give me a diversion to the physical pain and allow me to put everything on the back burner for a few hours until I can gather strength to handle it again.  I wish that I could just pop out with sarcastic observations in my blog and have you all laughing out loud and spraying your screens with whatever liquid you are ingesting but I am more of an "observational sarcasm" kind of gal.  My children are already honing their sarcastic skills which will either make the teenage years super fun or will turn them into a massive shamble.

While reading jokes is never as good as hearing them (in my opinion) I am going to share my favorite joke that Katie told me from our friend Jim:

An Irish lad comes to America and after going through customs, looks for an Irish bar.  He goes in, sits at the bar and orders 3 guinness beers at once.  He lines them up and drinks them one at a time.  The bartender watches this curiously but doesn't comment.  The next week, the Irish lad is back and orders 3 beers at once. He lines them up and drinks them one at a time.  Again, the bartender watches but doesn't comment.  This goes on for weeks and finally the bartender asks the lad why he orders 3 beers at once.  The lad replies, "When I left Ireland I left behind two brothers.  Every week we would get together and have a beer.  I am continuing the tradition here in their honor."  So, the bartender and the lad fall into this ritual easily.  One day, the lad says "two beers please".  The bartender is saddened thinking that one of the lad's brothers has died.  He decides to offer his condolences. "I am so sorry about your brother."  "My brother!  What do you mean?" "Well, you ordered two beers so I assumed that something had happened to one of your brothers."  "No, I gave up drinking for Lent."

May you find the distraction you need to face your day.  For me, Phil Hartman will always be one of my favorite distractions.  May you enjoy as well.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/6819/newsradio-smoking#s-p1-n1-sa-i0

Trenches

When you are in the emotional or physical trenches, life switches into survival mode.  Dusting doesn't get done.  Cooking is a necessity that occurs only because you have children.  Emails don't get returned promptly - if at all - and work/volunteering falls to the wayside.  Every molecule of your body spends it's energy on surviving the current minute.  After that minute passes, it does a quick re-evaluation to decide if the next minute is worth living.

I switched into survival mode on March 30th and am just now slowly returning to "normal".  It was not pretty for the last while.  There were many kleenex involved, words that would make a sailor blush, lots of faking in front of my kids to keep their life generally normal, heart palpitations, and painful memories and emotions that I didn't think I could survive.  My friends jumped in and kept me alive. They fed me (literally and spiritually), they gave me shelter, and they never tired of reminding me that I needed to keep going.  They went without sleep, took phone calls at all hours, and kept pushing me when I was resisting.

Survival mode is not pretty.  My every emotion was raw...as if every nerve ending was just hanging outside of my body and constantly getting bumped sending me into never-ending tailspins of emotional and physical pain.  Clinically, I was dealing with post traumatic stress disorder however I think of it as hell.  I did all the things one is supposed to do upon an emotional crash - saw my therapist (numerous times), saw my doctor (numerous times), and trusted friends with my deepest emotions but yet all those things didn't fix "it".  The problem was bigger than myself, my friends, and my team of professionals.  Hurts that occur as children are permanent.  They can scab over, they might even scar but there are moments in our life when those hurts become larger than life.  The hurt takes over and crushes us at our deepest level.

In these moments, I believe that all one can do is use professional resources, grab onto friends, and buckle in because it is going to be a bumpy ride.  Thankfully, I survived the last few weeks and my kids weren't scarred in the process.  In general, they were sheltered other than knowing that I was going through some "tough stuff" and they never seemed worried as they knew I was with friends who they trusted.

If I could offer advice to those who have suffered severe childhood abuse and trauma it would be; find a qualified therapist - someone who specializes in childhood trauma and post traumatic stress disorder, share what is going on with your doctor as emotional pain often manifests itself as physical pain, and to share your life story with a few very trusted friends.  Don't give up.  Call someone at 2 a.m. if you need to.  While you will feel guilty for waking a friend, they would rather you wake them then make a permanent bad choice.  Go to public places even though you just want to stay in bed under the covers.  Getting up, showering, and getting out of the house changes the brain chemistry.  (There are studies on this but at the moment, I am too lazy to look them up but if you are interested, email me.)

It is critical that we have safe spaces to deal with the issues.  Whether that be a friends home, the hospital or public places these all make you less likely to make bad decisions i.e. you probably won't get smashing drunk at the local coffeehouse nor will you choose to overdose while having dinner at a great deli.  Trust me, I have been there and I get it.

I wrote about Redemption last week and am looking forward to "redeeming" myself to my family, my friends, and to myself.  I don't believe I did anything wrong to bring about my crash and am proud that I survived (there were some critical moments).  When, as adults, we are crushed by childhood trauma and it's memories we can't control our emotions very well - if at all.  However, when the crisis abates, we can thank those who held our hands, stayed by our side, and didn't give up when we wanted to.  In that, we redeem ourselves, take back control, and begin to live again.

Redemption

The chance to do something differently than we would have before.  This is not the Oxford or Webster dictionary definition but mine.  A definition that, for me, was formed and made true and revealed over the last few weeks.

We all make ruts in our lives and live within them.  There are times we try to get out but usually it is not long before we are back in the same habits and rituals: 4 cups of coffee to start the day when we said we would cut back to one, scanning the front page of the newspaper though we keep saying we are going to read the whole thing (minus the classifieds), purchasing a nice eco-friendly lunch box and then never finding time to make lunch, deciding that the kids need to broaden their vegetable palates and then realizing we just don't have the energy to argue about Brussels sprouts.

For me, redemption is an active choice - a verb if you will - and verbs take energy.  At a time when we are all faced with extreme financial, ecological, emotional and sometimes physical stress, we don't have time to bring new verbs into our lives, we don't have time for redemption.  However, we expect it out of others: the partner who promises to make more time for the relationship, the boss who stated that they would implement changes we offered, the friend who agreed to exercise with us.  Yet, all these people let us down and we are silently angry, disappointed, hurt and are craving their redemption.  Desiring, hoping desperately that they will redeem themselves to us.

What has become crystal clear to me during my emotional journey of late is that redemption must come from within before it can be seen in anyone else.  It is up to me to redeem myself daily.  To chose to make the changes however painful they may be.

Physically, it is excruciating to get up every morning, shower, and get going.  Emotionally, it is extremely challenging to refocus my mind and chose to focus on this moment and tomorrow, not allowing my past memories to dictate my days.

The thought of redemption can conjure up images of one who has done wrong and needs to redeem themselves to be worthy of love, affection, respect - even worth.  However, I am looking at redemption as a chance to break old habits, get out of my personal ruts and allow my whole spirit to shine forth and guide me - versus my ruts to drag me along.

Abraham Verghese said in his book Cutting for Stone "Life, too, is like that.  You live it forward, but understand it backward.  It is only when you stop and look to the rear that you see the corpse caught under your wheel."

This resonated loudly for me when I read it today.  Without the benefit of introspection and retrospection there would be no need for redemption and without redemption there would be no growth, no forward movement, no chances to make a difference - to do it again better.  Redemption is ultimately the flow of life.  In every apology,  in every decision that we make; the alcoholic that chooses not to take that drink, the parent that doesn't yell at their child but patiently explains for the 50th time the situation at hand, the doctor that instead of grabbing the prescription pad and writing away the problem listens and offers a tender ear.
Each moment that we "redeem" ourselves we grow to love ourselves a little more - to like ourselves a little more, to appreciate the great and complicated human, to realize that there is always hope if we are all working toward redemption.  It's in the cars we choose to drive, in the food we choose to purchase from a local farmer, in the way we treat people who are different from ourselves, in the simple acts of offering a please and thank you.

Try living Redemption as a verb for a day.  I would be surprised if you didn't sleep a little better at the end of the day.

Top 10 Reasons to Love a Chiarian

10.  You appreciate any food that wasn't cooked at the hospital.
9.  You get to meet lots of doctors.
8.  Showing off the scar is a super cool party trick.
7.  Tinnitus means that the rock music gets played loudly.
6.  Shopping w/ a Chiarian is great because you get to park in the handicapped spot.
5.  Memory issues play to the partners/kids favor.  You don't remember me telling you I was going to start dating other women?  Mom, don't you remember me telling you I ate an entire bag of oreos?
4.  The tremors make for hilarious games of "Operation"
3.  They predict the weather more accurately than the meteorologists.
2.  They fall over everything.
1.  Their brain is HUGE. (or as Tim likes to say, "Their brain could come flying out of the back of their head at any moment!")

Interruption

My health is always interrupting my day to day activities.  Sometimes it is something minor like only doing 2 loads of laundry instead of 4 and sometimes it something major like having to reschedule meetings or appointments.  I have come to accept it and know that having chiari, fibromyalgia, and arthritis makes life difficult and if nothing else, interesting.

However, I was supposed to be going to Madison, Wisconsin with Mary on a fun mother/daughter trip next week.  We had to postpone the trip because I am in the midst of major medication changes among other things and my doctors feel it best for me to stay here.  The guilt that I feel is immense.  I am letting my daughter down and I hate that my body gets to dictate so much of my life.

I miss my friends terribly - they really are family and I know that though they understand, they have taken vacation days and planned next week around Mary and I.  My inability to go changes not just my life but many others.  This in turn causes massive guilt which is an ever constant by-product of a chronic illness.

So next week, Mary and I will be here in Cooperstown.  Hopefully, friends will have time to do some fun things and won't mind helping keep me propped up for a few more weeks until all the medication changes are done and life is calm again.  My friends here deserve a vacation from me that I was most happy to give them.  However, I think that the doctors are correct and they do have my best interest in mind.

Life has once again thrown me a curve ball but I am determined to stay positive, do something fun, and somehow make it up to my friends here who are stuck with me and my friends who I miss terribly.

Awakening

While receiving reiki the other day, I felt awakened.  What does that mean?  It means that as I have worked for years to shed the skin of my past and start anew, my hard work is paying off.  I have done (and am doing) the therapy.  I have changed the cycle.  I have come to appreciate my uniqueness and celebrate myself.  However, there were things I was still holding on to.  For instance, the need to clean.  Constantly.  As I sat in the chair feeling the energy flow through me, my mind drifted to how clean my home is going to look in a few years when the kids are gone and how sad I will be.  Awakened to how wonderful my life is now.  It isn't that I haven't realized or thought these things before.  However, the thoughts seem to be inhabiting me where before they would flutter in and out.

Life is not perfect and I am in pain but that isn't the point.  The importance of being awake in this life is to be present in the moment we are given.  Whether that be in horrific pain and realizing that you are strong enough to handle it or sitting at the dinner table appreciating the love of your partner and children.  I think that it is a concept that we all want to utelize but we don't.  The demands of work, partners, children, and friends have us thinking into next month while today whittles away.  As we lay in bed trying to sleep, the day is measured in what we accomplished, a mental list is made of what was missed, and there usually isn't time in those listings for gratitude and peace in that we had a day.  We were given one more spin on the earth.  One more hug from our children, loved one, friend...

As I have lived through the last 8 years, much of my time was spent regretting the things I wasn't able to or couldn't do.  I allowed times of my life to be consumed with guilt, frustration, loneliness, and anger.  While I think that all of that is perfectly reasonable and expected, I missed out a bit on myself and those around me.  The awakening I am speaking of now isn't just one of appreciating what I have in this life, it is the discovery of who I am and what brings me joy.  It is understanding and believing that I bring joy to others.  

Today, I spent a little while in the garden and felt alive and grateful.  I was able to focus on that moment and let everything else I was trying to accomplish today sit on the back shelf.  I have been trying to practice this for awhile now and am just beginning to realize the joy that can come from being in the moment.  Sometimes it isn't joy - it is pain, frustration, and sadness that comes to us as we live in the present and that is okay!  Each moment of our lives is not going to be filled with joy - it isn't possible.  However, if we learn to live in the moment we will find peace.  We will find joy.  We will realize that being present is more important than planning the future because even in the sadness or frustration, we are experiencing life as it is.  Those imperfect moments make the wonderful, joyful moments even better.

Emerging

So after a rough 10 days, it feels great to share that I had a wonderful day.  I spent the day doing hospice training and was so at peace.  I think that knowing, deep within my core, that I am doing exactly what I am meant to be has brought profound peace and acceptance.  It makes me sad to think back on some of the more difficult times in the last week or so when I questioned whether or not I wanted to be a part of this world as I know how much I would have lost - my children singing last night in the talent show, my partner's wonderful sense of humor and amazing talent, and knowing that I have a purpose greater than just coping with pain.
It is a wonderful experience to emerge out of the darkness and into the light.  I am not naive enough to believe that there will not be another bump in the road but I know that with each hurdle, my resolve strengthens and my tools sharpen as I cope with my life.
I am immensely grateful for my friends who have stood by me and have lifted me up, reminded me to laugh, and filled my heart with love.

Fear, Depression, and Recovery Part III

I am sitting in the crisis center with a friend and going through all the medical things that must happen before they even begin to decide how crazy I am.  While this is taking place the overwhelming-stop me in my tracks-fear of being back in the hospital hits me.  The doctor has written for blood to be drawn and here comes the lab to do it.  I explain I am a difficult stick.  (the record for sticking me is 12 times - my veins roll, blow, and disappear)  I explain that even the I.V. team has difficulty getting in a tiny 24 gauge.  The gentleman listens but I can see that he doesn't quite believe me.  I look my friend, E, in the eye and I tell her that this is the literal embodiment of what I fear.

Over the next hour (no joke, it took an hour to get a vein and get just 2 vials of blood - they wanted 3 but couldn't do it) she sees firsthand why before I even looked at the paperwork from my childhood last Wednesday I was living each moment terrified and worried that it would be my last day up and about before having to be back in the hospital or bed.  She saw the ridiculous questions doctors ask me. (One doctor explained to me what chiari is.  Seriously.)  She saw firsthand what others only read in the blog or know from talking to me.  I am not an adequate enough writer to begin to convey the tension, emotions, frustration, and exhaustion that come from sitting there for an hour being poked over and over again just to get 2 tiny vials of blood that in the end, they weren't even sure would work as they were clotting too fast since there was so little blood in the vials.
This is my life in technicolor.  Parts of it are beautiful - children, Tim, friends, Mom but there are also parts that are too vivid for most people to handle.  Thankfully, E handled everything like she had been there a thousand times on this journey with me.

She and I talk constantly between the medical staff coming and asking medical history questions and drawing blood etc.  I realize how exhausted my body and mind are.  Finally, a psych nurse asks me if I can contract to stay safe and they will send me home.  I say that I can, sign it and I am out of there....except that I am not sure I can.
As I sign out of the hospital, E senses how conflicted and overwhelmed I am.  I share that though I love my children more than anything in the world, I cannot be Mom right now and take care of myself.  It is too overwhelming.  It breaks my heart to admit that.  As a mother there should never be a time that I cannot set aside whatever I am dealing with to take care of the kids.  But I just cannot do it.  We talk about options - calling friends etc. and I am reticent to do so.  What friend needs 'Debby Downer' coming over to spend the night?  After a half hour, I decide to just go home and all will be fine I assure her.  It does feel great to be home and embraced by my wonderful children and husband.  However, it also increases the guilt that I feel for not wanting to be on this planet any longer which sends me into another tailspin and circular thinking.  Guilt = Bad = No worth = Depressed = Pain = Suicide which leads me back to guilt.
I manage to survive the night and awake Monday around noon.  My body was exhausted and I guess needed the sleep.  However, I still don't have a plan on how to get through all of this and I am desperate.  I wait for Tim to come home and we talk.  He assures me that I am not a horrible parent for not being able to be a Mom right now and encourages me to call a friend.

So I end up spending Monday night at R's and then amble between appointments on Tuesday.  I am still feeling suicidal but I don't have a plan.  I drop by my dear friend K's house and have a great conversation.  Some things become clear.  First, I am not a horrible Mom for needing a break.  Second, there are things in life that I am looking forward to achieving and doing.  Third, being overwhelmed is understandable.  However, in all of this, the most important piece that became clear to me is that my friends love me.  They are not keeping track that in February they chose to help with dinners while I was in the hospital and recovering and I now need them again.  There is no scoreboard in friendship.  I confess that while I don't keep a scorecard for my friends, I guess I always assumed they did with me as I have so much going on.  It is a great relief.
I end up going home on Tuesday night and spending a little time with the kids before bed.  Tim and I talk a bit too but I am wiped out.  Turning a corner was wonderful and yet it sent my body into raging pain as some of the anxiety I had been living with ebbed and in it's place physical pain flowed in.
My therapist and I had a session which hit the nail on the head and while I am not ready to share it, I acknowledge that I have some work to do.  I always thought that by the time I was 37 my past wouldn't really matter much but I am wrong.  It matters greatly and influences so much of my thinking and actions - both positive and negative.  I take amazing care of others and go out of my way to love my children, partner and friends.  However, I take horrible care of myself and don't recognize my worth.  This needs to change.
Since Tuesday, I am still seeing my therapist frequently, talking to my doctor everyday, reaching out to friends, and trying to enjoy my family and not clean the house (for those who haven't been reading or know me - I clean constantly.  It is instant gratification.)  I am too tired to clean or do much more than exist but as a friend told me last night, at least you are existing.

The moral of this story is that sometimes you are going to get knocked on your ass when you least expect it.  You are going to fall hard and it is going to leave your breathless and gasping for air.  Reach out to your friends and allow them to love you.  It isn't easy (I am still wrestling with it) but they will help keep you balanced and walking until you can do it on your own.  I am not there yet but am determined to make it.  Having chiari, fibromyalgia and arthritis make everything worse.  So does my childhood.  However, having friends like Katie, Karen, Carol, Roe, Elsie, Kim and Kerri who remind me I am loved has made all the difference.  Thank you also to my long distance friends who could only be here via email and facebook - your love was and is felt.  I wrote this on facebook last week and though it was true then, it has become more real since.  "Sometimes bravery cannot be seen in the wielding of a sword, a public fight for justice or shown in a tangible way such as a plaque or decree. Rather, bravery is in the consistent determination to not give up despite the consuming exhaustion."  

Fear, Depression, and Recovery Part II

So after the emotional bomb that was dropped on my lap last Wednesday I was extremely fragile.  Thursday I spent most of the day in bed or reading the documents again.  I was so miserable emotionally and physically that I was losing the ability to care.  That isn't to say that I don't love my children more than anything or that I don't love Tim - sometimes the heart just cannot bear the burden it is expected to carry.  Our life became more complicated on Friday morning around 3:00 a.m. when the oil burner for our furnace began leaking oil into our home.  We all immediately got dressed and grabbed our stuff and were off to Tim's parents for a few hours to try and make a game plan.
At this point, though I was not sharing my emotions with Tim or anyone else, I was completely spent and done.  First the car dies and now this.  Who did I piss off in a past life?  I know that Karma is a bitch but seriously, what did I ever do to anyone?  I was at the lowest point I had been since I was 19....and sinking fast.
The kids and I went to a friends house on Friday and hung out for the afternoon and I spent the night.  The nurturing I received from K&C was exactly what I needed.  They knew about the papers (I had sent them a copy), they felt and understood my pain, they fed me both literally and spiritually but it didn't seem to matter.  I was still sinking.  That I could be so loved and still sinking terrified me but I kept my thoughts to myself.  How could I explain to everyone who loves me that suicide seemed like the most logical decision?
I spent Saturday with D&J and they were a great distraction.  Laughter rang from me but I admit that most of it was hollow.  It was as if my body was there but my mind was 10 feet away watching everything unfold and wanting to run faster and faster away from everything and everyone.
Sunday morning I came home and (through the horrible smell of oil that Tim had been furiously trying to rid) told Tim that I was overwhelmed in every sense.  I shared where my thought patterns were going.  Most of which he knew from living with me for almost 17 years and what I had shared with him over the last few days but he had no idea that I had become suicidal.  We talked about what options I had - should I call my therapist? doctor? go to the hospital?  I decided that I would call my doctor and therapist.
My therapist told me on the phone that she would meet with me in 40 minutes.  She also told me "use your brain Tamara!".  I must admit to being angry about that.  I was using my brain and every cell said that your friends and family would be much better off if my crazy ass were not here.  They would not have to deal with all this garbage that I carry on my heart, they wouldn't have to deal with chiari, fibromyalgia or arthritis, they wouldn't have to take care of me if I end up in bed again or in the hospital - they could have a normal life which is what I want for them.
When I saw her 40 minutes later I asked her about the comment (I was offended) and she said that she was referring to the documents: how could I have expected to read them and NOT be completely knocked off my foundation for a few days?  Though that should have made me feel better it only made me angrier.  I thought I could handle it.  I believed with the very core of my being that reading those would be no different than reading the paper.  They were words on a page that I had lived.  If I come across paperwork from when I had my children, I don't think of the horrible, burning, pushing pain of childbirth....
I admit that I am suicidal.  She calls my doctor who gets on the phone with me and asks me if I have a plan.  I plead the fifth.  In case you are wondering, that does NOT work with doctors who think you are suicidal and tends to make them even more worried.  I am not given a choice and told to go to the crisis center.  I try and bargain but needless to say, I end up at the crisis center.  Having a doctor that you respect more than almost anyone in the world is wonderful and can also suck.  If she had been anyone else, I would have told them where to get on the next train to screw yourself and would have walked out of the office.  Instead, I call a friend and head to the crisis center.

Fear, Depression, and Recovery Part I

For the last few weeks, I have lived almost every moment in fear.  No, there isn't anything abusive going on in my home or with friends.  I worry and am constantly fearful that the chiari-fibromyalgia-arthritis pain will come on so strong that I will end up back in bed or in the hospital and I won't be able to accomplish the goals I have placed before me.
It is incredibly difficult to explain to someone who has never been chronically ill or severely sick for a prolonged time what it is like to live in bed while the world continues on without you.  I would never want my family and friends to all stop their lives and sit in bed with me (that would be a rather crowded bed) but I need them to remember that I am in bed and perhaps stop by for a chat or a cup of tea.  This past January and February that is exactly what happened and I am immensely grateful for those who popped over to see me or came to the hospital to visit.  However, even with their wonderful love and support, I still had to stop doing the things that were important to me and allow my body to just exist until I could push it along and get it going again.
I have not been handling living in fear well.  It causes me to do much more than I probably should at a given moment because there is that voice in my head reminding me that I could lose it all again and be back in bed.
I have great plans for myself for this year.  I have commitments to various volunteering activities that I find to be extremely important.  I have to be healthy.  I have to be okay.  What if the next time I end up in bed with a bad flair of pain the people that I work with decide that it isn't worth working with me because there are times I cannot be there?  What if they decide that it would be easier to replace me than to work around this ridiculous body of mine that can shut down without notice?  These are the fears playing constantly in my mind.

For weeks now I have been dealing with this, mentioning it here and there but never really talking about it.  Then a series of things happened in my life that caused the fear to increase and sent me into a total emotional tailspin.  First, our car died.  I realize that this seems relatively innocuous but it was the first in a string of events that eventually became too much to handle.  The car only has 87K miles on it and the engine froze.  It was paid off.  Finding a new engine and trying to get the work done has been stressful.  Not to mention the financial burden but hey, this kind of crap happens to everyone at some point so I was able to let that go relatively easily.

Then, there was last week or what I will call the 'week from hell'.  First, let me explain something: I think I am super strong.  I think that there is nothing I cannot handle.  For the record, I was wrong.
I had decided to write the book that so many have encouraged over the years and to do so, I wanted to have the legal documents from my childhood regarding the indictments, plea bargains, sentencing etc. so that I would have the facts absolutely indisputable.  I know them as I have lived them but I wanted to make sure that my dates were correct etc.  On Wednesday, I phoned the courthouse in Wood County Ohio and inquired about getting those records.  According to the information I had, I believed I would have to go in person and get these materials so I was planning on going to Ohio with my Mom and retrieving them.  As it turned out, they were able to be emailed to me.  I thought, "Great!  Now I won't have to make a trip just to go get those".  So I asked the court to email them to me.

I proceeded to open them and the first document was the grand jury indictment.  Let's just say without all the gory details that it went downhill from there.  Every document showing my childhood in black and white was suddenly appearing on my computer screen.  The words that I knew and had heard spoken became real again and along with that, intense emotional pain.  Crushing my heart and inability to breathe pain.  What I thought were just words was actually my horrific childhood staring me in the face. I saw the 14 year old me having to deal with all of this.  I felt her pain and anxiety.  I felt and saw the words with a different perspective than ever before: the perspective of time.  The appreciation of what it took to be a kid going through that, the knowledge that those papers (though ending in 1991) caused issues that I still deal with, the understanding of the bravery it took, and the part of my soul that I have never been able to retrieve from that horrible childhood.   Time does not, in fact, heal all wounds.  It allows us to move forward but some wounds never heal, they just scab over.  Receiving those documents forced the scab off and the searing pain to erupt from me.
The breakdown that I had been cautiously avoiding (from fear of illness) hit me as though I had driven 100 miles an hour into a brick wall...leaving me to pick up the pieces, sew them back together and become whole once again.