What A Surprise

Yesterday at the show I was using the loo and it had a full length mirror to the left of where I was peeing. I turned and looked at did a double take. I saw a slim handsome man looking back at me, dressed nicely and looking good. It was me!

I have not seen myself full length in a mirror for years. I just have the one for shaving and the one in the hall that shoes the top half. I have avoided mirrors for most of my adult years. All I saw was an ugly enormous deformed person looking back. Even when I was underweight, I saw a huge person.

Now at almost 50 years old, I am pleased with myself. Finally. I can look at myself and not cringe and feel shame. The road that led to here was excruciating but I followed it and here I am. Some have said I was brave. I know different. I had a choice, change or become insane and /or die. I changed.

I think many victims don't get this. It is we who have to change. Those who victimesd us cannot change us. We do need them to change for us to change. we dont' need them to be different in order to change. We need nothing at all from them to live well and be happy and above all to love and accept ourselves.

I used to think I needed the recognition of the abuse by those who abused me, an apology even. I believed I would never be free of of my family until that happened. I thought I needed them to love and accept me and approve of me.

None of that was true I needed to love, approve of and accept myself.

The day I realised, truly realised, that I had been abused because of who THEY were and not because of who I was, was the day I became free. It didn't feel like it at the time. Of course not. It felt like death. It was the most painful grief I have ever felt. It was appallingly painful. I cannot find words adequate enough to describe the wrenching agony I experienced.

Yet it was all to the good. It freed me. It allowed me to see I was loveable. That I was not loved by them because they were unable and not because I was defective.

Today I want nothing from them. I don't hate. I never did hate them, only myself. I don't regret. That is the most wonderful feeling. Liberation. To yearn for a thing so badly that you will never get is soul destroying.

In the end I did get what I wanted, Love, approval and acceptance. I gave it to myself. This is the only way that has true meaning. Yes, I was loved by fiends and by John. I was taught there was different way to view myself and the world I lived in. I learned the truth that we each create our own world and meanings.

I may have been taught to think the way that I thought. I most definitely was. However, only I could teach myself another way. Only I could undo the damage. It was simple. I had to learn other views, other ways to think. I had to KNOW myself. I had to realise that there was only one person I could change and that was me.

I didn't do this on my own. I was guided and loved along the way. By spiritual means and by people.

Have I arrived? NO! Growth and learning do not end. Now though I ma free to enjoy the journey. I am no longer hanging on with white knuckles to what little spark was left of me. That spark has become a light and I can see more clearly.