Take your life in your own hands and what happens? A terrible thing; no one to blame.
It is so easy to point the finger at someone else if our plans don't work out. For example:
" I would have been more successful, but the economy was slow this year."
"Well that sounds nice, but my therapist says that I should avoid too much stress."
"I wanted to do that, but my husband didn't like the idea."
What a frightening prospect it is to take your life into your own hands, to decide whether or not you will accept full responsibility for all of your actions and choices. What an amazing - and sometimes terrifying - freedom complete responsibility for your actions brings!! We all make mistakes. Sometimes we stumble and fall. But OH - the feeling when you finally get it right! When you decide to take that step and it works. Them your doubts cause you to ask the universe for signs that you're on the right path - and the universe provides. Ask and you shall receive! But when you receive it, you need to acknowledge it, accept it and apply the knowledge. Use the tools given to you. After all, you asked for them. You bring about what you think about. That's when you discover that those fragile butterfly wings on your back are not just there for ornamentation. You can fly!
Own your power! Take charge of your life! With so many tragic things that are out of our control...control what you can. Take responsibility for your actions. This will heal your toxic shame.
Ultimately, no one chooses what you will do - but YOU. Enjoy the freedom - you've had it all along,!
"Spirit, help me take complete responsibility for my own actions. Give me the guidance, and power, to steer my own course according to the dictates of my heart and my conscience."
I'd like to share a piece of my book. It's called, "Letter to Panda. " Then i'l share how my story changed when I took accountability for my misguided survivor mode behaviors of FIGHT OR FLIGHT and FREEZE OR FAWN. A common symptom of CPTSD.
This was a letter I wrote to my cousin in jail, who got out this week. However, i discovered he never got the letter because he was transferred to another prison. He's out now. Panda, if you're reading this...My last letter was:
Letter to Panda
Hey Panda!
I’m sorry communication has been lacking! Life has been pretty intense. My stalker found me. I reported him to the Vermont court and District Attorney. He had an arraignment and he was released on conditions no different than the ones placed in the original restraining order!!!
So I booked it to a friend's place in New Baltimore, Michigan. 23 Mile. Near 8 mile. Detroit. Man was that a traumatic four weeks! Friend failed to tell me he lives with his Oma. And also neglected to tell Oma I was coming!! DOUCHE. So, scared as fuck, I went on craigslist and found a room for rent 8 miles away in Macomb County, Michigan. It was an old man, Brooklyn Bob. He was 60 or 70. His wife had died and he had prostate cancer. He had a room for rent in exchange for housekeeping and meal preparations. It was in a nice, ritzy area and it seemed to be the perfect opportunity considering I was homeless in a strange, dangerous city and knew no one. Dude smoked 2 packs of Marlboro Light 100’s a day, He drank bud light until 2am every damn night. He constantly spoke political nonsense that meant nothing to me and made my ears bleed in disgust. He was tall and had slicked back white hair and always wore black button up long sleeved, collared shirts and jeans. He had a new york accent and spent the entire day in his office where he smoked, watched the news regarding the election, drank and looked at tits on his computer.
He started with the nasty comments about my mesmerizing eyes , my toned legs for days, golden tits and hot bod. Then he began touching my tits and ass when I walked by. He asked to see my nipples and told me there was a no bra rule in the house. The way he spoke to me was disgusting. I began to be triggered by a memory from my childhood. I was ten or eleven. I’m honestly not really sure. I could have been younger. Mom and Danny had just split up. Danny had discovered my mother had been lying to us all about having cancer. She was really just anorexic and hooked on pills. She was also an alcoholic and the reason the island of maui was hooked on opiates. We were homeless. Danny kicked her out. Which meant I was kicked out too. Danny was a drunk and a wreck. Jaime had run off to stay with friends of hers. She was popular. She had people. I did not. I had mom. I imagine i wanted to stay with Danny, however at that time i didn’t know what was going on. I loved my mom. Maybe she didn’t want me to stay with Danny. Maybe Danny didn’t want me. I don’t know.
Danny was my best friend. And I was his Boogie. I was mom's Happily Natalie. Mom did bring me to see him once. She told me to take the school bus to Pohailani, have dinner with Danny and she would pick me up at the bus stop tomorrow after school. Well, I sat there with Danny eating chef boyardee ravioli and watched a Celtics game. Danny loved the Celtics. He was from Watertown, Massachusetts. He was so sad. He tried so hard to hold back his tears. He then began to have an alcoholic seizure. We were alone. I didn’t hesitate. I laid him on his side and bolted through the neighborhood screaming for any neighbor to hear me. I believe I reached Paul Anka. My childhood best friend, Justen’s dad. My memory of the rest of that night is black. I remember being at school the next day. Side note - Paul used to tell my mother, “Natalie does not simply walk. She positively frolics!” I wasn’t frolicking that night. I was running.
When school got out, I took the school bus to Pohailani to wait for mom. I did this for days. I have no idea how many. I have no idea where I stayed. I just remember her showing up one day at the beach across the street from Pohailani. You’d think she'd have known about Danny. You’d think she’d have come with food. No. She said , “Hey honey, we have a home, let's go!”
We went north. To a little hawaiian valley named Kahakalkoa. It rained there daily. The nights were cold and there were thunder and lightning storms every night I can remember. It was dark and eerie. This was not like my little neighborhood in Kahana. We pulled off the wet, rocky, dirt road onto a piece of land that was near the cliffs to the ocean. There was a tiny little shack. Old man Sonny also had about 200 stray cats. Oh, and an old beaten up abandoned school bus - aka - mom’s new apartment. In her book, she describes this bus. “Rustic didn’t come close to describing this place. It had no running water, no bathroom, no electricity, dirty mildewed futons to sleep on and holes in the floors everywhere.” Hey, it was $50 a month. Mom says, “ It was so faded from the sun you couldn't tell it used to be yellow. It had busted windows, no door, filthy grimey windows and smelled terrible.” Need I say more?
Mom tucked me into bed. I remember her telling me she was going somewhere. “But it’s okay.” Old man Sonny would watch over me. Oh he sure did. I remember his short, old, phillipino silhouette in the darkness of the night. His right cheek bone stuck out wicked, it was broken or something. I remember him hovering over me whispering, “it’s okay,” as he slowly pulled my blankets off of me. I felt them uncover my chest, then my belly, then my legs, and my feet. I remember him breathing on me and pulling my shorts down. I remember him touching me. Then, blackout. Neither did I. Until Michigan.
Brooklyn Bob . He climbed into my bed when I was sleeping. I woke to his fingers inside me. Two of them. In two inappropriate places. His beer smelled slobber licking my neck and whispering in my ear. “You gotta give it to me sometime.” I threw him off of me and said, “No, I don’t want to. Stop.” He slurred, “Fuck you.” and left the room. I slept in fear for two more nights. I bought a one way ticket to Portland, Maine and said goodbye to Michigan. I will NEVER go back there.
So here I sit in Freedom, New Hampshire. It’s the last town in New Hampshire on the border of Maine. I’m about two hours from my kids. I’m living with my friend Zachariah and his 17 year old daughter Abbie. She’s a little dark and twisty but she’s a sweetheart and we’re bonding. So here I sit, building my art webpage, being creative, sketching, painting, blogging, book writing and working on a journey to self discovery and healing. I am mostly happy. I am working hard on acceptance, knowing my worth, owning my power and letting go of Keith Falman. I yearn for love and passion. I yearn for happiness. I have faith I will have all of these things.
“I wish I could wake up with amnesia so i could forget about the stupid little things.”
“What matters most is how well you walk through the fire.”
“We cannot become what we want by remaining what they are.”
“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. Do the thing you think you can not do.”
In this letter, I placed blame. I was in a dark place - in survivor mode, in flight response - RUNNING. In this letter you read about some traumatic shit. I learned the appreciation of home. New England. My friends I missed dearly. What was I thinking? I thought i'd take a job for the winter to rebuild my life and come back to fight for my kids. I was not stabalized with my medication, I had stopped therapy that I had been doing weekly for months I surpressed my emotions. I told myself and everyone around me that it was HIS fault. My stalker. I feared for my life, I didn't feel safe. Thing is, i belived the stories I created in my head. I didn't know this at the time. I was a mess. I had just been abandoned by what I called my "BIG LOVE." I destroyed my relationship with my best friend(stalker) - who had my back no matter what. I was in the process of coming off of Welbutrin and Paxil. If you look up the process of coming off these meds, you will see that the side effects cause severe mental instability. All the while, I was starting a new medication - Venlafaxine. Mind you, I was terrified of this medication. My ex took this. When not taken in a consistent, routine manner - along with alcohol abuse - this man beat me. Shit.
As I've gone through therapy and started my healing process - i realized the blame, those flame throwers, that i had placed in an unhealthy, irrational manner. I told myself I was leaving for my safety; that i couldn't heal here anymore and I needed to leave for a while. You reap what you sow. Michigan SUCKED. But brought me friendship, clarity and gratitude. I am home. I didn't leave because of my stalker. He wasn't completely innocent in the matters, but I was a mental mind fuck, not in the right state of mind and acted out of anger, impulse and brattiness. I am stubborn. Very. Then when I make those decisions - bad ones - I find a way to justify it in my head - literally manipulating myself - so that I feel OK with the choices I made. Truth is, I was struggling from addiction and a broke heart. I saw pain everywhere I went. So i blamed Justin. This caused issues getting my parenting time as well. So since I've been home, i have spent literally every day working on healing. I see a therapist weekly, I see a spiritual healer, and I self teach. I refuse to be anything less than the very best version of myself. For my babies. For me. I had to literally want to change who i was. It's not an easy process. It's like this - you're hitting yourself on the head with a hammer over and over and over - literally living the definition of insanity. You can make the choice to take the hammer away - but the wound is still there. Medication is not an end all be all or permanent magic fix it pill. It helps, but is just a band aid. There's so much more work you can do on yourself to enhance the quality of your healing. And it's so worth it. I'm coming for you my babies - because mommy finally has nothing to lose, no obstacles. No toxicity. Just a heart full of love and an eagerness to share it.
Mahalo :)
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