Update

Hey everyone. It’s obvious that I’ve stepped away from the blog for a while, and I probably will again after this post, too. I just wanted to let you know a little bit about what’s been going on. I’m going to warn you before you begin to read though that this is going to be a pretty heavy post.

I feel like it’s important to let you know that I am open to sharing my life with you, I just have to process through some things before I do that. The small things that I have shared, I have come to terms with and have processed and that’s why it’s so easy for me to talk about them. In my current state of mind, that is not the case. My life situation at the moment will be the hardest thing I have ever had to process. And it’s going to take time.

I debated even blogging about this, because I hate that I am giving you such vague information, but I have little choice at the moment. The court case is still awaiting trial. And I need to deal with what happened to me privately before I can share much more about it publicly. But I promise you, I will tell you everything. Just give me some time.

I’ve tried starting other blog posts, but ended up walking away, because I’m not going to try and force something that isn’t there. I am not going to try and talk about something that isn’t at the forefront of my brain. I am not going to pretend. This isn’t a situation in which I am just going to “change the subject.”

I’ve realized a few things about myself recently. It’s so obvious, but for some reason I just recently came to terms with the fact that I am terrible at dealing with grief in any aspect. I have a coping skill for everything, but when it comes to feeling feelings, I just stuff that shit down… SO far down that sometimes it’s hard for me to even feel good emotions. I get so far removed and detached from people because of this. Looking back, it started to get worse a couple of years ago and has kinda snowballed into what it is now. And I need to address it.

I knew I had to go through a box of my dad’s things a couple of months ago. I put it off for quite some time because I was dreading it. But I did it. And it was in that moment that I realized I am terrible at handling grief. I had been avoiding that box for years. As I was reading letters he wrote me, I got angry because I started to cry…. No, that wasn’t a typo. I got angry because I started to cry. I got frustrated with myself for being sad. I literally said outloud, “What the fuck, Rachael,” because I was so upset with myself for being sad. Like, why can’t I allow myself to feel these emotions? Why do I get so uncomfortable that I have turned them off for so many years?

I’ve been avoiding things in my life recently. Little things, like taking the trash out. I went to my therapist because I knew I needed to see her. When I was telling her about this she stopped and asked, “Is there anything else in your life that you are avoiding?” Basically me avoiding all of my household chores was symbolic to me avoiding dealing with grief in so many aspects of my life. I’m talking years of grief. (I know I’m not alone in this, either. If this is something that hits home to you, I encourage you to start dealing with your grief, too.) That’s why I struggled so badly in treatment… I just couldn’t open up and talk about the wounds. For someone that has so many coping skills that I have learned over the years, and is so open about mental health and the importance of taking care of yourself, I don’t allow myself to feel basic human emotions. I haven’t dealt with a lot of stuff. I need to start with my dad’s death, because that’s when things started to unravel.

My ex-boyfriend almost killing me 4 months ago….I need to deal with that. I can’t keep trying to look at things objectively as if they happened to someone else. I need to stop preventing myself from feeling the inevitable sadness that stems from that night. People thought at the time that I was moving too fast. “Are you sure you’re ready to go back to work?” “Are you sure you are ready to go stay at your house?” “Make sure you are taking time to take care of yourself.” I immediately started redecorating my main floor. I’m talking every room. I started my blog. Anything to keep me busy. I was so busy picking up the pieces of my life that I didn’t have time to feel the emotions correlating to what happened. And now that things are at a lull and the trial keeps getting pushed back, I have no choice. And a friend made a good point to me the other day that if I don’t start to deal with what happened now, when those court dates do come, I will be more traumatized than I could even fathom. Those days won’t be as healing as they are meant to be if I don’t start coming to terms with what happened to me. I can’t keep looking at it objectively and removing myself from the situation. That happened to me. That. Happened. To. Me. And it is so fucking hard to come to terms with. I can’t begin to tell you about the pain and trauma…mostly because I haven’t allowed myself to feel much of that yet. I know those court dates will be hard regardless and I will have to relive the Hell he put me through, but I can either go to court with the healing process started and deal with the emotions privately now, or I can go in and have no control over those emotions and have them present themselves in a courtroom full of strangers.

If I’m being honest, I’m getting nauseous even typing these words. I have no energy to include funny little snippets into this post. I have no energy to edit this post. This is not the kind of post I want to welcome you back to my blog with, but it’s my reality. And as I keep telling you, I’m going to be okay. It won’t always be like this. But figuring out life in our 20s is weird. It’s hard. But we all eventually find our way.

Thanks for being a part of my journey and sticking by my side through this. It means the world to me.

I’ll see you soon.