The rollercoaster of emotions suddenly, unexpectedly hitting you smack dab in the heart. It leaves you feeling exhausted and downright confused—that reminder of the cruel words of the past. Just when you think you are pretty stable, all it takes is a message to slam you back into the wall frozen with fear. 

What if that pain I have come to know that familiar gut-wrenching pain I have come to know so well over the last 36 months. It started with a social media message.  I received one the other day that rush of pain the words from the past hurt. I was in an okay space, and now... I don’t want to get up. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I don’t want to move. My eating habits crap! Last night my pillowcase soaked with tears. My head hurts from thinking and overthinking. That familiar panicked feeling I have learned to control, threatening to take control. Yep, it still hurts; the wound isn’t healed, and it didn’t take much to rip the scab off and have it bleed again. The trigger of an Instagram message!  How stupid, right? The deception of other actions and the timing all slamming me back into that heartbreak.

These are the questions my mind will ask, and my heart will feel more often than I want, more often than I can control, I do the work, I fight the fight, but on the days I lose, I lose big! 

Why was this an option?How could he?I don’t understand?Why wasn’t I ENOUGH?I can’t do this anymore...It’s never going to feel okay...I don’t want to do this work anymore... This is now my life...I hate it...
There it is, the truth after 36 months, betrayal is painful, no matter the details of it. The words and thoughts ripping through like a razor blade cutting you from the inside. You wake to wish you could go back and freeze a moment in time, wishing this damage had never been done, the damage you are now left with and responsible for healing. The pain and sadness make you want to run, but I have been told the pain will follow me; the only choice is to heal it. 
I think to myself, it official the day you have all been watching and waiting for the day I lose it... I keep repeating breath, just breath, but it seems too torturous to even do that. 

I mean, how attractive is grief? One step forward, 10 steps back... (sigh) am I going to fall back into that darkness and be lost forever? Will I step into the light and finally leave it all behind me? When the devil knocks... yep, I listen, I listen to the words it’s too hard I am done, I listen to the words it exhausting just give up. I listen to you wasn’t enough. You will never be enough. What the heck is happening? Why are these feelings I have felt with the darkest days surfacing again? What you are not prepared for is how utterly exhausting it is. I have so many tools I have been given in therapy, bug moments where I am taken back to a place where I forget it all, I forget all the work I have done and all the steps forward I have made. This is where I am a ball bouncing back and forth from dark to light. It sucks, and it’s work, and it’s exhausting. Trauma, post infidelity trauma. The work to getting unstuck, no point in wishing it didn’t happen because the reality it did, wishing only brings the pain, and then I prefer to run from that pain, I don’t want to sit in it, I am not ready to at the moment. Because I can’t do one darn thing about that wound that I have learned will stay with me, the one that won’t heal. That’s what it is an inner wound nobody can see, but it’s there, and that’s what it is; nothing can be done about it. This is my reality! 

Say it out loud, yep, therapy tool. The joys of therapy! 

He cheatedHe did it You can’t wish it away.There is nothing you can do to change it.It hurts

Every toxic bit of it was real.The fall out of the trauma is this, every day is a battle nobody sees, nobody feels it, and dang sure nobody but you can fix it. Truth statements, it was abuse.  I remember that moment I had to repeat these words; I couldn’t say them because no was I someone who would ever stand for abuse, but what happened to me was abuse. Pain from that abuse has caused trauma that knows no age; it’s like it was yesterday in your brain like it's happening now. Pain and its superpower Here I stand or rather lay in my bed trying to find a positive ending for this post, and guess what happened? It was sent to me by a friend, the perfect ending to a messed up life.Yesterday, my inner child spoke to me because all I wanted to do was pack a bag and take off, you know like you did as a kid when you threatened to run away. I said to a friend, you think anyone will notice if I pack a bag, and I start walking down the road dragging a bag and a blanket. Will anyone come after me? So I guess I crawl... and keep moving forward!

Thank you, you know who you are.