My Healing Journey
In addition to sharing healing techniques, therapies, books and other resources with you, I want to share my personal story of healing from childhood sexual, physical, emotional and ritualistic abuse. Mine has been a long journey and I do not want to mislead anyone into thinking that it was easy, because it certainly was not. But, I do want to emphasize how important I believe embarking and participating in this journey is to any survivor of abuse, domestic violence or any other form of trauma. I firmly believe that if a survivor refuses to acknowledge their own deep wounds from abuse, they are more likely to repeat the cycle and become an abuser themselves. When we lose our power due to heinous assault/abuse/trauma, it is human nature to want to get it back. We can do this in one of two ways: we can turn around and abuse someone else, demonstrating what we believe is our power over them; or we can re-gain our TRUE power by acknowledging the hurt, healing our wounds, getting the appropriate outside professional help we may need and take back our lives -- ENDING THE ABUSE CYCLE. I chose the latter and I pray that you will also.
Hitting Rock Bottom - 1983
Unfortunately, my healing journey began at an absolute lowest, rock bottom point. For about four years during college, I was careening down a slippery slope trying to find love in the eyes of numerous sexual partners and trying to numb my senses with drugs and alcohol. Instead of focusing on my studies and my future, my activities were focused on one of two goals: 1) Finding a man that would love me; or
2) Numbing/blocking the flashbacks of my abuse.During this time, I started having horrific nightmares and flashbacks about my earlier childhood abuse. I was absolutely TERRIFIED of these memories and at first, pushed them away with all the strength I could muster. I would not even let myself acknowledge that they were memories at first. I just tried to convince myself that I had an active imagination!
The more I tried to meet these goals, the more I hated myself inside. One of the bad things about making yourself unconscious with drugs and alcohol is that unless you overdose, you always eventually wake up! When you wake up, nothing has changed. The abuse still happened. But, now you potentially have a whole new host of problems to deal with. There were times that I woke up next to some guy I didn't remember knowing. There were times that I woke up and didn't know where I was. There were many times I woke up feeling worse than when I passed out! Physical feelings of nausea, headache, dizziness, etc. were preferable to the feelings of self-hatred I felt for doing the things that resulted in my not knowing where I was or how I got there.
One day, I hit rock bottom. After refusing to leave my bed for days and crying until I felt like I had no tears left, I jumped into my boyfriend's car and started to drive. I had no destination in mind. I took with me anything I thought I could slit my wrists with...a razor blade, a sharp steak knife and a broken glass bottle. I drove for about an hour and then turned off the main highway, drove several more miles, taking many turns to who knows where and finally parked in an empty parking lot. At first I sat there frozen, staring at the weapons I had brought with me. Eventually, I picked up a shard of glass. I held it with my right hand and started to slowly, lightly rub it across my left wrist. I drew some blood, but concluded that the glass was not sharp enough to do the job.
Next, I picked up the razor blade and tested it's sharpness on one of the fingers of my left hand. Quickly and efficiently, the razor blade made a small gash on my fingertip. Warm blood oozed and dripped off the end of my finger. Surprisingly, I don't remember it hurting. At this moment, I realized that if I gashed my wrist open with the razor blade, I would bleed to death rather quickly. I had driven in a fog of tears and I had no idea where I was. I was in an empty parking lot and no one was around. It might be hours before anyone discovered my body. I was relatively certain that any deep wounds I would inflict with the razor blade would result in my death.
That thought...DEATH hung in the air for what seemed to be hours. This is when my faith saved me. If I had not already become a Christian, I am certain that I would have ended my life that night. But, I was a Christian. Some where along the way, I had fallen away from Christ. I had not attended church in a long time. I had forgotten how to pray and I had not read my Bible in months. I had made the choice to turn from Christ, but I knew in my heart that He had NOT turned away from me. My life had been hell so far, but one thought drove me that night. I was NOT willing to spend eternity in the real hell!
I firmly believed that suicide was the only unforgivable sin. If I killed myself I would be taking the gift of life that God gave me and since I would be dead, I would be unable to ask God for forgiveness. I would be lost forever. I would be separated from God FOREVER. Forever is a long time! I was not willing to suffer that. I believed there was a place for me in heaven, since I belonged to Christ. I was still desperate to get there! I had to get there. I threw the bloody razor blade to the floor board.
The year was 1983 and there were no cell phones back then. I was emotionally, mentally and physically exhausted. I knew I could not drive myself back home. Luckily, there was a phone booth across the parking lot. I stumbled over to it, dug in to my pocket for some change, found none, so I called my best friend collect. Shortly thereafter, I checked myself in to a psych ward at a hospital. My long journey to wholeness had begun.
© 2006 Hope Forus
August 15, 2006
This is only the first chapter of my healing story. Please check back often as I share with you the rest of my journey. Thank you and God bless, Hope
I had emerged from my dark cocoon. I was not yet ready to fly, run or even walk. I started out crawling, like a caterpillar, but at least I was alive and on my way... slowly, but surely!
Hope Forus
TRIGGER WARNING:
This account and the accompanying graphic can be triggering! Please use caution when deciding if you want to read it! This page is NOT meant for children or PTSD/Sexual Abuse Survivors who are
easily triggered!
