I know this as I survived 2018. It was the year of my slippery slope. Life was getting out of control. I knew it was impacting my health. I started off the year fearful. By the end of February I had fallen three times on to my left hip. The inflammation in my joints was beyond painful. The tumor in my parotid gland was growing. It had gotten to the point that I couldn't turn my head to the right. When I left the office in Elroy I would arrive home in Mauston, exhausted. I fed the dogs and crawled in my bed. That was my routine. The paper had been gutted to the point that I was the only full-time employee and the only one, at that point, that could do every aspect of the paper; ads, graphic arts, articles, editing, pagination, social media/website and then be the face present at business functions. Oh, and then there were times I also delivered bundles to the newsstands.
Yes, I was exhausted and making far less than anyone would imagine, especially considering 12 plus years with a company. It was not enough to catch up after all those years of raising two boys on $20 an article and $5 a photo. The hole I was trying to dig myself out of only got larger the harder I tried.
Not having any health insurance drove the barrel over the edge. I was left with one option, I needed to resign. I need to be able to on insurance without going further into debt. Also, I felt there were things going on behind the scenes which would have taken the paper in a direction that Bill Smith- the founder, if he knew, would have rolled over in his grave. When Dianna had cancer and was forced out of her position, losing the remainder of her payments from the buyout, I promised her I would do my best to keep that paper going for the subscribers but when inevitably I would move, that I would go out with a bang. It took a little longer than I planned and all because I was stuck on a hamster wheel, unable to physically move. I crashed.
Feeling like I had failed, I started having arguments with myself. I was constantly belittling my own abilities, my skills, and my life. The security I fought tooth and nail to slowly build was being whittled away from me. I couldn't believe that after a life filled with being a survivor of many things, would end in the direction I was heading. I felt like a fraud. So many in my community viewed me as a strong confident presence, an influencer but little did they know life's hurdles were encompassing me and I was trapped.
When I was home, I sat in the house - alone - the walls screaming out at me the horrific memories, all those incidents of domestic violence clearing the path for my life, a life on my own. PTSD - I remembered the boys sitting under the kitchen table, clutching one another in terror as they shielded themselves from the domestic bombing of marital war. I'd sit in my bedroom and have flashbacks of the brutal emotional attack that happened right before their eyes. A crime that landed their father in prison for sexually, physically, and emotionally abusing me ...inches from the boys. The man, who at that time, I had been married to for over 16 years.
Who does the main advocate in a community reach out to? People, when they see you as a rock, don't always notice when your shield is being picked away.
I wanted my parents. I wanted to be able to call them, hear their voice, I just wanted to be a little girl again who was afraid of the dark and they would let me in their bed, protected. My parents died years ago.
I had friends all around me, and to no fault of their's, I felt completely alone. There were days I could remember being 14 years old and having that feeling of doom, life was not for me. Rather than giving into it all, somehow a glimmer of the fighter in me stayed alive. I can only give credit to God for that, he never stopped believing in the life he created.
So much happened in such a small time frame that it hurts to even remember it all. By the end of the year I had spent a few months living off my life and a dream, #WhenIBecameFree. That tumor of mine was removed during a five and a half hour surgery. Doctors had me on a lot of medication, especially the once suspected fibromyalgia became obvious. Gabapentin became my enemy. It ate away at my working memory. I walked life in a fog.
It was then I allowed something to happen that would have never of occurred in the past decade of helping the homeless and survivors. My boundaries came crashing down. I opened my home and life to one - providing them a safe place as they were in crisis -my safe place, my hone.
The exclamation to the end of the year was selling my fixer-upper at a price less than I needed and moving 10 hours away to be close to my sons...one month out from surgery. I arrived at my destination on December 23rd. I pulled in to town barely able to walk, in so much pain - feeling gutted. I resembled a battle-worn veteran limping home.
The new year started off with some twists, disappointments, and turns but they needed to happen as they were the slaps of reality I needed. I took myself off the mind numbing drugs and allowed clarity to settle back in the space fog had been taking up residence.
The main lesson for me in all of this is something I worked so hard and very long to learn even though for a while, forgot- if I am not at the top of my list for tender loving care, I will fall - that is not a maybe, it will happen. HOWEVER, falling does not damage the wings I have stitched together painstakingly slow - it just knocks the wind out of me. I need to recognize and honor all I have survived, grieve what stills needs to be grieved and as Scarlet O'Hara would say, always remember, "tomorrow is another day."
As survivors of child sexual assault, child abuse, and domestic violence, we owe it to the ones who unfortunately will come after us, a sign of hope. We have to tell our stories and give to them something many of us never had, a network of support. It is our job. We can't sugar coat it and pretend healing is easy because we are superwomen, we are human and as such, flawed. Mistakes will happen, bad decisions will be made but as long as we remember that healing is a life long experience, we will learn to be patient while holding on to glimmers of hope.
Brutal Honesty is healing. We protected our secrets far too long with avoidance and lies. No more.
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