My life has been torn apart leaving my 20yr marriage. I had been violently taken out in handcuffs, accused of breaking things and throwing things around the room, as the Police bullied me about being “crazy!”

I had slammed a door or two during my 20yr marriage, but never what appeared to be broken furniture and other things strewn around my home upon arriving back from my Mothers one evening looking for answers.

Confused and sinking further into a deep, dark place I didn’t know at the time was shock and old trauma and on top of that new trauma from the violence unfolding all around me.

Waves of old trauma as a child and 20yrs of ongoing Financial and what I would learn later Coercive Control, would keep me struggling to survive for the next decade along with the homelessness I was forced into.

It was like sorting through endless boxes of his Aunts things and finding nothing. Promises of a bright future turned into empty dreams. She had mental illness, had been Bipolar, but then it was called manic depression and had often had a dark side—her “spells.” One time towards the end she even had credited us with getting her out of the Hospital after she might have been forced into a more permanent stay at a Psych Ward.

Boxes and piles of her things were everywhere, closets crammed with what seemed to be so much ended up being things that were useless, falling apart or worthless. I saved all the Crosses tucked everywhere; in-between sheets and towels, in cupboards, and inside old papers. I packed them all up for the Catholic church she talked about often and had recently written letters to the hospital that the Crosses there weren’t big enough.

It had all been a house of cards, in the same way I was to find out my marriage was, but I had to pack it all up and put it in the attic. In the end, most of it thrown away. No fancy linens or china. No real mementos or keepsakes, it was the same deprivation they had all shown me during the marriage.

There were boxes of photos, but I couldn’t look at them. After seeing my ex-husband’s face in quite a few and his eye-rolling, awful looks or sitting with me and something being off. I never saw these photos during my marriage. I couldn’t look at them because like so much else if I lingered too long I would get sick, dizzy and need to lay down.

Knowing today those were part of the secrets they shared. Photos were often taken to humiliate me. Ones of me cleaning or not at my best. It was the same as when a child, my cousin whipping out the camera to take an ugly shot of me after daring me to do something silly, but I was often ridiculed after taking a nice portrait of her to do better. Mine always had her finger in them or I could not wear the new shirt or clothes I had to save up to buy because she had to wear my clothes, ruin them or I was often uncomfortable always seeing her in the nice photos I took wearing my clothes!

I felt their presence and secrets laughing at me as I sorted, cleaned and planted another garden in the Aunts house we still weren’t sure we would not sell and live full-time at the Lake-home we had remolded for retirement. I had been exhausted and not wanting to move, but like everything else, it was always a whirlwind of other people’s demands. Often done with that Cheshire Cat-like grin, knowing something and yet secretive and aloof as they all often were. I was young, from a Divorced family and didn’t often see my Mother, which had often been used as an excuse to bully me, make snide remarks and keep me confused. “Why don’t you see your Mother?” was a constant.

The psychologist they forced me to see after they locked me up and had mixed up my records with my Ex-husband’s Aunt, wanted to know if I heard voices? I said no, but couldn’t help mentioning we had just gotten his Aunt out of a Psych Ward and it felt like some kind of awful mistake, but he told me that was part of my delusion and dismissed my concerns as he recommended meds to help with my anxiety about getting my dog and all my personal belongings in storage back when they removed me from my home.

She often with-held things; affection, validation and care, but in the early years, before I understood what Manic depressive was, I was told she just had these spells—wasn’t right. Often said in hushed tones or quips made by my Sister-n-law that often asked why I didn’t see my Mother and insinuated from the start I had problems because of it.

The Aunt could be spiteful and I had just went through her entire home and there was nothing of value, just like all her promises. I thought at least there would be some keepsakes, but like my marriage and the relationship with her, it all ended up being empty; a ruse, a horrible sinister game I thought after all the build-up of being told for years that after all the deprivation it would “all pay off” and I would have both their homes in exchange for their care; “rental income” they would always say.

My Mother-n-law and her sisters for years seemingly enjoying the deception I thought, as I looked around another empty apartment picking up the broken pieces of my life and trying yet again to move on with my life and what was left of it.

I had gone through similar feelings cleaning and sorting their homes. They all passed pretty much together and my Sister-n-law was quick to pick over anything valuable. Empty boxes, bric-brac disintegrating from age; crumbling, broken figurines, trinkets from their many travels, dusty, old and falling apart in my hands, but there was nothing for me after years of promises and finding out they weren’t the poor spinsters they all pretended to be!

In spite of all their promises and reassurances, things were all setup legally behind my back, to keep me from anything and to allege that I was crazy from the start! All the times I had tried to protect myself denied!

Their revenge seeping in from all around me! I had a long way to go before I would piece some of it together. Most of it I put together myself because everywhere I went they were having people call the Police to do “Wellness checks,” and making things up about me and I was still struggling to survive it all along with being told that now I was the crazy one! I had believed so many lies for so long.

I sat at my black, folding table meant for camping along with my broken camp chair I was using as a desk and chair to write and eat at and was slowly putting it all together now that I was no longer in shock. Five years of shock had finally let go.

I had no furniture, but I was alive! I was writing and I had survived—the shock had saved me in many ways. I shuddered to think how close I had come to not being here. Waves of old trauma came back along with updating new memories with what I was finding out. Things were starting to make more sense. The small cruelties, the slights, the digs, the relentless chores and work mirrored my childhood.

I looked in the mirror and was not the same woman. It was still unnerving, like being in a coma a long time and just waking up, but I was finally Ok! I was slowly moving forward and just like those 2yrs I had been sorting, organizing and letting go, I was again doing the same only this time with the truth and not all of the sinister secrets swirling around me all the time. The constant confusion that had become a normal part of my life like the lack of sleep.

I wasn’t now in a house full of old second-hand furniture; thrifted, mended and broken things I was trying to update, but another apartment. For years, I had tried to update and was often reprimanded for buying anything because we were paying off two mortgages and had vacation property and there were always windows we needed to buy or repairs to update and remodel. In the end, everything updated and remodeled on our properties, but I had nothing and no place to live I was told.

I was finally letting go of the old trauma and abuse that has taken the last 5 years to process. I could finally grieve and create the life I so desperately needed and wanted. The control releasing its ugly hold. A vice-grip I had come to liken it to that like a snake was slowly squeezing me to death. A life not centered around taking all the abuse from someone and in my case, a group of people. I could finally, slowly grieve it all because I finally had some idea of its tentacles in my life. The web of sinister lies and deceit that kept it all in place.

I had been carrying around so much baggage my entire life. My weight now reflected this. I hadn’t been able to get out of bed the past 2yrs and without being able to go to the gym, garden or do my Art, all the things I used to manage my life over the years, my Eating Disorder had found its way back into my life, but like then I knew it had protected me and had clues and protection about my trauma now.

I had agreed with the diagnosis of “anxiety” PTSD because the Panic attacks I had were pretty frightening, but I knew I was not “Schizophrenic.” I knew that I was also not crazy! The taunts that had become regular from everyone I thought I had known once the Divorce started, I realized to my horror, had been there since I was a child.

I had never been so heavy even my freshman year of High school when the mean-girls, some still involved, had bullied me and called me “Thunder Thighs!” I had put on about 15lbs when we moved and the abuse had escalated after I expressed interest in going to college, being in the Honor Society, theatre and becoming a majorette, but I was rejected in everything. I had often been in plays in grade school, told I was a good dancer, loved to dance and had the grades, but was not involved in enough “social committees,” they had told me.

A heaviness I could not name at the end of my marriage was now visible in my body and was so painful I would often wake up feeling like I was being burned alive! I was rarely sleeping and the constant moves and unending harassment was taking a toll on my once good health.

The harassment was contributing to my constant anxiety. My poor body ached with pain and I could barely move most days. The weight falling in ugly folds around my arms, legs and thighs. The old taunts from my classmates coming back along with my cousins that would often compare our body parts. I was always on the losing side and in the end was told there was really no comparison anyway because ultimately my best-friend at the time, my cousin, was “Blond,” and would always win. Boys always liked Blonds better anyway, she often said.

I was learning for the first time I had to be gentle with myself, something I often would push through to deal with all the abuse, bullying and deprivation. I could go slow, it was Ok to take my time, to not be rushed by the incessant demands of others; first my Mother and family and then my Ex-husband and in-laws. It was now my Story.

Namaste Dear Readers!

Thank you for reading me and following along on this journey.