Many of the highlights of last year have been, and were, easy to share. That's the best part of highlights is in the sharing. However, I also experienced some very low parts and times where I was forced to confront things, feelings, and ideas that I have tried very hard for many years to avoid.
The saying "I'm not where I once was, but I'm not where I want to be" holds very true for my life, especially right now. It is very, very seldom that I willing choose to open up and share, mostly because people tend to feel sorry for me, and pity is not something that I ever desire to receive. However, I am hopeful that opening up to share the gritty messy parts will encourage others to press forwards, even in bad times.
Last year it became necessary to confront and deal with many false ideas, problems, and unhealthy relationships that were in my life, many since childhood. I was forced to come to the painful realization that a certain family relationship in my life was extremely unhealthy and abusive; and that many of the relationships intertwined within it were also unhealthy as a by product. This realization broke my heart and forced me to come to the truth that said family relationship will likely never be what I hope and prayed that it would become. I have held on for 30+ years to the hope that change will happen, or that the relationship will improve.
Sadly, I was forced to confront the truth that the unhealthiness of it was only revealing the parameters in which that relationship would exist in. Parameters that I had no say in, control over, and that did not take my feelings, or personhood into account. In those unhealthy moments the other party was showing who they were in the relationship, exactly what value they placed on me and the relationship as a whole, as well as their goals and desire for what the relationship and those affected by it would be. While these instances were nothing out of the ordinary, nor were they anything worse than they always have been in the past; I was forced to realize the truth of how toxic and abusive it was.
I found myself in a place of mourning for what might have been, what I hoped for, and the potential that was lost in that. And mourn I did, a mourning that left me in depression, self-doubt, questioning, and loss. While there has been no loss of life, I mourn for the loss of possibility of what this could have been, my hope for the relationship and the affect this has had on my extended family, my daughters and husband. I found myself in a tailspin of emotions, questions, self-doubt, and depression.
The toxicity and abuses that I was faced with forced me to confront many things which I have long known to be true about the extent that this relationship and those intertwined with it are unhealthy. Problems, status quo, thoughts, and realizations that I have tried for many, many years to avoid or to change. I tried for so long to avoid admitting the truth of how toxic it was in the hope that it would change. I finally came to a place where I had no choice but to realize that I cannot make this relationship heal, change, or evolve into a healthy relationship. I was forced to realize that the only solution, for this time, is to draw boundaries to protect myself, my husband, and my daughters from the abuses and toxicity.
I have learned a lot in this time, both about myself, and about toxic relationships. In the admission of how unhealthy this family relationship is came the realization of the truth of it all. These realizations and the boundaries that have come with them have caused me to learn more about myself and who I am. The verbal and emotional abuse I have been faced with and subjected to in this relationship and the removal of that from my life have caused me to realize that the abuse has shaped how I see myself, in a detrimental way that should never have happened. I have come to take ownership, and continue to take ownership, of who I allow to speak into my life and how I allow them to do so because of this.
Once I began to remove the toxic poisons of the abuses and insults of this relationship, and others from my past, from my thoughts and my heart I began to grow. I am coming into the realization that in this moment and time I have the opportunity to get to know myself and grow into who I truly am. Free from the insults, belittling, blaming, abuses, and bullying I have this amazing fresh start to create in myself the person that I am, the person that in the past I have not been allowed to be or become.
I am still in the process of growing through this pain, and find myself slowly emerging from it all into something and someone new. I am learning who I am, who I have been all along, and finding new freedom to be me. This is still a process, some days the pain hits me again and I mourn, but each day is the first day of the rest of my life and I am choosing to be me.
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