Confessions of an Absentee Blogger: Taking the time to heal myself

The last time that I posted here on MBEV 2.0 was in November of last year. I started a series on ending violence against women which was supposed to last for sixteen days. I believe that I stopped on day three. Even though I had prepared material to cover the entire time period of the action, I found that I hit a mental snag when the topic of sexual abuse was on tap.

That particular topic is personal to my experiences as a woman. I found myself unable to compose a post that excluded my feelings about sexual violence. 

I could have easily excluded that particular topic and continue to post but my sense of awareness about how I felt would not allow me to ignore untouched feelings.

My abuser is now dead. I say this not with any form of glee because no true justice for his acts was ever extracted for my benefit.  I bring this up because it is a fact of life.

I have had to navigate the murky waters of being a survivor in a climate that often demanded silence as the response. It has taken decades of personal probing and often painful overt admissions that I went through such an experience. But those moments did not provide me with the needed self-healing that is required. 

I thought that I had managed to effectively heal over the mental wounding. Instead I discovered that I had only managed to structure a sturdy scab to cover over the feelings of shame and injustice that I have felt over the years.  

It was time for me to receive a true laying on of hands. Even though I am now sixty years old, I still had a portion of myself that felt like that young teenage girl who was being sexually abused with no escape from the individual.

I reached the point where walking wounded or in illusion was no longer acceptable. I decided that it was time for me to become the physician that I actually needed.  

What I did not realize was how much time this process would actually require of me. I did not feel like writing or sharing any other important social justice issue until I felt that I was mentally whole and well.

I am happy to report that my work is completed. It was painful and often forced me to step into mental spaces in which revisiting the past reduced me to tears and moments of sheer terror. But without making those steps and honest recognitions about what occurred, I knew that I would not be able to move forward for other women and girls. 

Now it is time for me to get back to the buisness of advocating on line for the causes that I honestly believe are worth my time and energy. I can do so with a clearer perspective and also with a cleaner bill of health than I have had in a long time.