I feel hope again, for the first time in a long time. I feel that I am on the brink of a new path in my life, a path of being a stronger more confident woman. So long my view of myself has been that I am broken, crushed, damaged. I was not able to truly see myself moving into a healthy place in my life, a successful place, because broken crushed children aren't successful. I had this idea that I wanted to be calm and stable, yet the connection was never there. I felt like a farce, a fake . . . As if I was fooling every single person around me and eventually they (whomever they were?) would figure it out and come yank my stability from me.

Tracking back I can recognize this began very early and has built over my life. I was fearful of the loss of my children because they would figure out I was a bad mother, fearful of the loss of my home because I wasn't good enough as a wife, fearful of the loss of relationships because of my anger and frustration, and finally fearful of the loss of my degree if they figured out I wasn't smart enough for it. I have been projecting this fear into my future . . . thinking I am too broken, picturing that broken child as a successful therapist and believing that it was not possible. How could I possibly be successful when I am so broken inside.

Then I heard this . . . . "In my brokenness I find my wholeness" that hit hard. The conversation progressed to talking about how this work, this path I (we) have chosen is forcing us to emerge. Emerge. I can Emerge and become something more then just a broken child. What will I become? This is a thought that has never truly hit home until now. Who I am now is completely based upon who I was then. My brokenness then will create the whole woman in the future. That is powerful.

What does the future hold for me? I have always pictured myself away in a cabin, in the woods, surrounded by trees, completely self sufficient and having a need for nobody. I have planned ways that I could work for myself so that I would not have to interact with others. I never saw myself with a partner. I planned isolation for myself in an intense and deep rooted effort to protect myself from rejection of others. Any others. My need to control the surroundings in an effort to lesson the impact of others finding out I was broken and not worthy.

Now, I can see that. I don't exactly know what it all means but I do know I am aware of it. I know being aware means I can rewrite that story. I can build a new future. I can choose trust in my self and others instead of recoiling in fear and pain. I can be a woman of my choosing. I can emerge.

Waking up with fear an anxiety pulsing through my body. Today I have to drive up that long windy road, knowing that the awful cabin sits there. I want to confront my fear and say its no big deal, that it is just a house with no power but I don't feel that way. I feel panic just picturing the cabin. I try to visualize it being a safe place or even a nuetral place but the image is so frightening I can't even hold it in my mind without shaking and blocking it out. I realize more and more through the years that my defense mechanism is to shut it down. If it hurts, don't go there. Let it go. This is not helpful.

How am I supposed to work with clients and do therapy when I can't even follow the simple directions that i am giving? How can I lead them to a place of sitting in the raw pain and working through it when I am woefully unable to do it myself? I don't know what all my pain is, what all its from. I want to close it out and say it doesn't matter but it does matter . . . or else it would not be so terrifying.

Why the hell did I choose this internship? To prove something to myself? what the fuck was I thinking, I have nothing to prove. Why do I torture myself in these ways. I must have known on some level somewhere that this would trigger painful issues. Issues that would have been far better laid to rest and not touched. Why did I choose this therapist to work with? Why somebody who is so difficult and so pushy?

I wish I could get sick and not go. Just curl up under a blanket all day and forget that this area even exists. Not have to face her comments about me and my sexuality, about the work I do, or about the ways I should not be concerned about anything. This whole situation just is as messed up as it can be. I want out. Now.

This is ridiculous. Night after night sleep escapes me. I can feel the tension in my body, feel the anger and raw emotions that begin to rise when exhaustion is bordering. I know the depression and dark place I go to. I see it. I don't want it. I just want to lie down and sleep . . . long enough to replenish and refurbish my body.

Sleep comes so quickly. I'm exhausted and the second I stop I collapse into a deep e xhausted sleep . . . but within hours the dreams begin. Dark swirling dreams of choking, dreams of running with nowhere to go. I hear them coming after me but there is nowhere to run, no place to hide. I'm scared.

I want to have a place to run and hide, somewhere safe, some place that is soft to land. The nightmares have to stop.

Depression scares me, hurt and pain scares me. Why can't I just force my way through this?