Crayon, drawing.

The person I love most in the world.

Tiny sketch.

I did not get accepted into the craft fair.  I feel ok about it.  But I am a little sad today about other stuff.  I think I get extremely anxious before my art therapy sessions.  So much stuff is shifting and moving in my therapies and I know I am getting better but it is also scary and sometimes overwhelming.  

Poem for today at "The Writer's Almanac".

Fear of power.

Not long after I started my therapy (six and a half years ago) I got a Jenny Holzer t-shirt on eBay that read: ABUSE OF POWER COMES AS NO SURPRISE and I wore it for a several years.  Today I finished my pet sitting job and tomorrow I will pick up the money for that.  It will be the most money I have had in a while and I have really been struggling over having it.  I have been talking about this issue with both my therapist and my art therapist.  My fear of having power.  It is difficult for me to tolerate the feeling of having power (even over a rather small amount of money) and as I have been feeling more and more real and as the past becomes more clear and feels less 'not me'... it is more difficult for me to tolerate.  I know the reason this is happening and I try to remind myself of it and then I have to comfort myself and remind myself that I am safe now and that not all power is bad.
The reason I have this "fear of power" is because when I acknowledge now that I am a strong person who can take care of myself and make my own decisions and do what I want I am also acknowledging and knowing about all of the years that I was not able to take care of myself and not able to make my own decisions and do what I want.  Now when I know that I have power I know about when I did not have power- when I was being abused.  So in order to keep myself from fully knowing about being raped and abused I have been keeping myself from having money, power and success with my work.  But now I just hurt myself more and more by continuing to try to shut myself off from these things that were once used against me- like money.  So I am working hard now to separate the past from the present and the things my family did from the choices I make now.  It is painful.  But it is more painful to try to hold onto the lies that I hid behind in order to try to not know about all of the abuse.
This makes me think of this poem.
I had a friend that used to tell me that my greatest revenge would be my recovery and I used to nod my head when she said it and say, "Right.  I know.".  But I did not really believe it- I was still far away from healing- but now as I heal more and more- and it pains some ways of my thinking to acknowledge the truth in this- but I know she was right.

A photo of a drawing of a self-portrait.

Feeling better.

Today is my last full day of dog sitting.  I took this picture yesterday.
I also did this big organizing project while I was dog sitting this week so that has kept me kind of busy.
I have barely been writing on here for months and months now... but I really miss it and yesterday I actually cried and talked about it in therapy.  This blog has been a good place for me to write about things as I continue to heal and especially good when I feel overwhelmed.  I am going to try not to worry about who is reading this anymore and just go back to writing my truth as I know it.
The reason I looked for the dog sitting job is because a couple of weeks ago I applied to be in a big craft show.  It is juried and now I have been waiting to hear if I got in.  They are supposed to notify everyone by this coming Monday.  I was hoping I would hear earlier... but oh well.  Anyway- if I do get accepted there is a fee I need to pay for the booth- I took the dog sitting job so I would have the money if I get accepted.  If I am accepted I am going to sell my drawings on clothes there.  If I am not accepted I am going to start selling my work online.  Either way I am going to start selling my work online actually.  I recently (last week) sold my first pair of jeans with drawing on them.  It was my first commission and the woman was really happy with them.  So that was pretty exciting.  I will post an image of them here soon.
I just wanted to write something here because I have missed writing here and I wanted to say that I am going to be trying to write more.  I really am getting a lot better and I have documented so much of my struggle here... I feel like I want to keep going, say the rest of what I need to say and also start to document my life as I start to make it better.  Healing from child sexual abuse feels impossible a lot of days- but it is not really impossible.  I want to be sure I start to tell the other side of things- like the ways in which I am feeling better now and the ways that I am healing.

feeling like this

3 dog week.

I am pet sitting for the week.  One of these dogs is named Goofy.  Lol.  Can you guess which one?  I will try to write more here soon.  

Lion, tiger.

You will feel like a failure and it will be untrue.

From my art therapy yesterday.

ALL YOUR HARD WORK

Too hard to say.

More than one way of thinking.

Not cutting.

I have not been writing very much here- posting images and poems mostly.  I am going through something in my therapy work that is really difficult- more memories have come up and I am struggling a lot to tolerate them.  It is painful and it is also my 'natural' reaction to return to self injury in order to cope with the seemingly "unbearable" feelings and memories that I now have to sit with.  Instead of any kind of self injury though I am trying to write and talk about the feelings and memories I am having.  And the furry one in the photo is my focal point that I come running back to hug... over and over and over again.

About healing.

You will think it is impossible and you will be wrong.

Sitting with complicated thoughts.

"You Are There" by Erica Jong (from "The Writer's Almanac" for today.)

You Are There

by Erica Jong

You are there.
You have always been
there.
Even when you thought
you were climbing
you had already arrived.
Even when you were
breathing hard,
you were at rest.
Even then it was clear
you were there.

Not in our nature
to know what
is journey and what
arrival.
Even if we knew
we would not admit.
Even if we lived
we would think
we were just
germinating.

To live is to be
uncertain.
Certainty comes
at the end.

In the under(ground, belly).

Curling paws.

"In the middle of the night I call your name."

Collaborative drawing (in progress).

Starfish. by Eleanor Lerman

Starfish

by Eleanor Lerman

This is what life does. It lets you walk up to
the store to buy breakfast and the paper, on a
stiff knee. It lets you choose the way you have
your eggs, your coffee. Then it sits a fisherman
down beside you at the counter who says, Last night
the channel was full of starfish. And you wonder,
is this a message, finally, or just another day?

Life lets you take the dog for a walk down to the
pond, where whole generations of biological
processes are boiling beneath the mud. Reeds
speak to you of the natural world: they whisper,
they sing. And herons pass by. Are you old
enough to appreciate the moment? Too old?
There is movement beneath the water, but it
may be nothing. There may be nothing going on.

And then life suggests that you remember the
years you ran around, the years you developed
a shocking lifestyle, advocated careless abandon,
owned a chilly heart. Upon reflection, you are
genuinely surprised to find how quiet you have
become. And then life lets you go home to think
about all this. Which you do, for quite a long time.

Later, you wake up beside your old love, the one
who never had any conditions, the one who waited
you out. This is life's way of letting you know that
you are lucky. (It won't give you smart or brave,
so you'll have to settle for lucky.) Because you
stopped when you should have started again.

So life lets you have a sandwich, and pie for your
late night dessert. (Pie for the dog, as well.) And
then life sends you back to bed, to dreamland,
while outside, the starfish drift through the channel,
with smiles on their starry faces as they head
out to deep water, to the far and boundless sea.

Llllloyd

Sketcher book pages.

I have been working on a series of small drawings. As soon as I get some finished I will post them here. My therapy has been difficult recently but I am finding that in saying the most painful things that feel stuck in my mind... there comes a lot of freedom after truth.