Writing to Heal

"Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart." William Wordsworth.

Writing - journaling has been one of the best ways for me to deal with stuff. I couldn't tell anyone what happened, how I felt or how afraid I was or even what I wanted or needed - But I could write.

Writing helps free me. It takes me to that dark place deep inside myself that I've been too afraid to look at. The place that's held the fear, the shame, the pain, the memories.....The place I've spent years running from. Writing has helped pull from that place what I could never say.

To say meant owning it - Owning it meant it was real. I didn't want it to be real. But the shame kept me a prisoner....isolated and distant even from myself....

So I write.

In writing I own it. In writing it becomes real. In writing I look at the shame. I face the fear, the pain, the memories that have tormented me.

There are times I want to close my eyes and not wake up....the memories hurt- the shame too overwhelming....But God doesn't let me give up. He takes me to a place I've never been....a peaceful place. He sooths that part of me I try to hide, to push away, to pretend doesn't exist. He offers me His gentleness and whispers; it's ok now.

People in my life don't know where I've been. They see me as happy, fun, free. I don't know how I never told anyone about being held in that house for six months, desperate to get away. I don't know how I never told all those things I lived, the 14 year drug addiction, the years of battling an eating disorder and cutting myself, of being forced into situations that nearly broke me. It's like I've lived two lives. Side by side. Never free. Pretending. But I want to be free. I really want to be free.

My book is soon ready to be published. I'm afraid of people I work with, friends and neighbours knowing how awful things were and how much a fight it has been. Not telling though is being selfish. If God hadn't touched me the way He had - I wouldn't have lived. I owe Him.