Running

@ENKELI

Therapy yesterday... one of my coping strategies... my visualisation of Jesus (aka J) saved my life...

How I survived was that when I dissociated... my form of escape... I would go to my safe place... J and I would dance and smile and I was just a little girl standing on his shoes as we twirled around this white room... while monstrous things happened to me in reality... it was him and me... I felt happy and free with him...

after my baptism... as atrocious as it was... he became something more than my best friend and me dancing on his shoes... he became my beloved... he became the one I had a future with... I used to and still do draw these intricate floral patterns I saw on my wedding dress with him... because he was something so much more to me than anyone realised and the love I had for him was something nobody could take away... and the love he had for me that I came to realise in my first Bible...

it was when I was 15 though that he truly became my saviour... when my conviction met my reality... when I started being painted as the wayward daughter for having a faith that I actually lived... when my life became something out of a horror movie... the internal room where J and I would dance... where I fell in love with him... he became my reason to keep fighting... knowing that whatever happened to me in reality... I was safe and loved and cared for in his arms... that the little girl from years before had no idea how vital this place would become...

Even now this place has become so much more than a white room... it has become the place where I feel safe enough to explore my past... safe to grieve and to love and to be... safe enough that when I have flashbacks I need just whisper his name that he comes and saves me from the memory that has taken hold... dispelling all the evil that surrounds me in whatever memory I'm in... binding my wounds... carrying me out of scene that enveloped me... laying his hands on me... holding me in his arms as I drift off to sleep... then crying with me when I wake... my beloved... my saviour... my friend...

This "coping strategy" I needed to share it to it's full extent and the beauty of it... because He, our Lord and saviour is the one who saved me with this... by drawing me to himself in a way unique to me...

Hello @Jynx

Hey Hi Hello @avant-garde!

---

@avant-garde wrote:

...today was hard...

...we discussed family...

...we discussed mum...

...we discussed mum's alters...

...we discussed my coping strategies...

...we agreed that dissociating saved my life...

...we agreed that my visualisation of Jesus (aka J) saved my life...

...we discussed the early rituals...

...we discussed church...

...we discussed abortion...

...we discussed sacrifice...

...and I was honest.

---

@Jynx

Wow @avant-garde really intense... but good? Like the process, not the topic I mean.

How you feeling this arvo?

@Jynx

It wasn't EMDR but you could tell she didn't doubt simply by the understanding she had of my physiological responses

I feel like a rung out rag

That kind of understanding can go a really long way hey @avant-garde.

Oh I bet. Do you have anything you need to do this afternoon or are you able to just chill?

@Jynx

It's one of the rare days where I have had nothing on, no appointments, no schedule, just me and my bed and an audiobook

Oh we love to hear it @avant-garde. What audiobook you getting yourself nice and engrossed in?

@Jynx twin crowns series by Catherine Doyle and Katherine Webber

cultic flashback just now... typically happens when I'm exhausted