The Big R – for rape…and resilience

A while ago, as I watched one of the shows I like to follow- the Big C- I start thinking about definitions. The things that people know or don’t about us that shape who we are, who we become. The things that we have no control over, that just get attached to us and shape parts of us.

Like cancer. Traumatic incidents. Loosing a person you are really close to. Becoming an addict. Being homeless. Diseases. Heartbreaks.

Rape.

When I first started telling some of my friends about what happened to me, I feel like I have peeled off all my skin and then went out- exposed, sensitive. As if I had what happen written on my forehead. For the most part, I was wrong. My friends didn’t see me differently- they just saw that I was going through hard time and needed them.

End of the Semester: About Concentration and the Fragmented Life

I’ve blogged about most of that first year after my SA and what it was for me, in a way.

But before I move on to the second year, there are few more things to mention.

Oh, and for those of you new here who are new to the story, if you scroll over “Story and Background” you can choose time period, and then go backwards in it to see what I’ve written. I’ll soon add few pages with chronologically linked posts for easier access. I’m also possibly writing a memoir book/guideline for those going through rape recovery. I’ve learned some things on the way of getting here, and although I am not an expert, there are things I learned in the past year that I wish someone had told me when I was first struggling with this. Anyway, that book is in the process of making, and meanwhile, there are few more things I would like to share.

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1. Counseling

I’ve mentioned in a previous post, that counseling somehow helped me, even though I told the counselor very little. One thing that struck me though- and that I tried to conceal from her, because I thought it made me a freak or crazy- was my inability to separate how I feel.

She started asking me things about how I feel.

I remember I mastered some answer, even though I knew that at best I’m twisting the truth.

But she kept asking me how I feel, and what was I supposed to say?

I was spending most of my time at my favorite university, with my friends, completely miserable? And despite that most of the time I am not sure how I feel? I can’t make difference between good, bad, sad, angry? Everything had somehow blended together and it wasn’t that I was running from how I felt. I had no clue how I felt. None. I ran her question through my head many times after that, for myself, and found it disturbing that I still didn’t feel in way. There was no separation of feelings within me anymore. I was an emotional time-bomb waiting to explode.

2. Fragments and concentration

Now, that is the other thing about my first year that I’d like to share. Mostly because while going through it I constantly wondered if I’m going crazy or have somehow broken my brain beyond repair. Only now, getting out of it, I can see how it was, and that it wasn’t forever. I wish I’d known that what I was going through was perfectly fine considering.

Why trauma cheats you out of your own recovery?

So as I have been getting better, I’ve finally, mostly regained my ability to work 8 hours and even enjoy it (okay, that one depends on the day). So I have been leaving very little time for blogging, which wasn’t such a good idea. Suddenly, I feel overwhelmed and sad. I feel again constantly tired and busy, I get irritable. I often break and eat chips or sweet things- way too much of them. ..and then recently, I suddenly find out why. Or one of the reasons anyway.