healing from personal tragedy together

this is not the end of your story he/him

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Hi everybody! I wanted to make a pinned post for this blog, as it discusses some triggering content.

Trigger warnings for this post: mentions of sexual assault

So: I was sexually assaulted by my partner for over a year. It was a very traumatic experience for me, and I felt very alone. I created this blog because I didn't want anybody else to feel like that. This blog was created to serve two purposes: to provide support, and to provide education. This blog is a live documentation of the ways in which healing is not linear. This means there will be positive posts from a place of joy, and very painful and emotional posts. I want to help people like me, and that means being very transparent about the ways this could hurt you. Please be thoughtful about going through this blog.

And to those of you who are here because you too feel alone, or scared, or ashamed: you are not alone. This was not your fault. I love you, and I promise, we will be okay.

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Life is going to be different now. But you’re going to be okay.

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I got to meet with a psychiatrist and, among other things, I’m getting treated for PTSD. It’s fucking hard to have that officially confirmed, but I’m so grateful that I’m able to access treatment.

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I talked with the counselor I’ve been seeing for 2 years now about reporting, and they were super kind about it, but they said that it wasn’t a good idea. And I know they’re right, that the process would be terrible, and I know that it wouldn’t go anywhere, it still feels awful that he just gets to live his life now. He just gets to go on and I’m stuck back there for the rest of my life. This is it, and I’m never going to get that part of myself back, and nobody will believe me. And that really sucks.

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he took something from me. he got something from my body that I didn’t want to give him. i feel so disgusted and robbed. i can’t breathe about it.

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the absolutely gut wrenching experience of having your partner watch you get sicker and become disabled, having them watch you go through the excruciating pain of having your bodily autonomy taken away from you, for over a year, only to have them turn around, pin you down, and strip it away from you all over again while you can do nothing to make it stop? it's fucking terrible. i have never in my life felt so powerless and so betrayed.

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healing. is. not. linear.

remember when i said i was doing a lot better and i was really happy? im having three panic attacks a day, awful flashbacks, nightmares, i can't focus on anything, i'm constantly on edge, i can't stop crying. i am not having a good time, im not feeling good, and i know i will, but today my therapist started teaching me coping mechanisms for ptsd, and its kind of starting to hit me for the first time that this is permanent. im never going to get rid of what he did to me.

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I say I’m fine and then I start having nightmares about it

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One of my favorite (being very genuine here) things about running this blog is the way it’s so clearly showing that healing isn’t linear, and that’s very comforting to me.

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For the very first time since ending my deeply unhealthy 14 month long relationship in October, tonight, I was able to get excited enough about something to fully and enthusiastically stim. I was able to engage with my interests without being afraid of looking away from my messages for too long, and I was able to heal enough from all the shit that went down to be happy enough about it to stim.

We are healing. It’s getting better. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m so, so happy.

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i was praying to anubis/anpu. sometimes it's devotional, sometimes it's just me thinking through life.

i was talking about how my past relationship checked off a concerning number of boxes for psychological and sexual abuse. i thought i was over it, but maybe i needed to reach out for help, because i still felt nauseous and terrified every time i thought about it. but there was no way it was abuse, because he would never do that to me. when i confronted him about the assault after i broke up with him, he promised it was an accident and offered to let me hit him with my cane. i didn't want to, and i told him that. he said i could always do that if i wanted to. i told my family, they said it was manipulation. but he was a good person, i know he was a good person- i knew him better than anybody! he wouldn't tell his family anything about him, he would get so mad at me if i told anybody anything about him. he told me he didn't like being perceived, and any time anybody learned something he didn't want them to know (which was almost anything) about him, he would cry for hours and refuse to leave because he didn't want to see anybody anymore. i fucked up, i knew i fucked up. it was my fault. he didn't do anything wrong, he promised he was good, and i was the only person who knew him.

but isn't that bad? i realized that i should never have been in that position. and i still can't bring myself to believe that he ever did anything wrong, but i can conceptually recognize that none of that should have happened. i can recognize that i would call that manipulation if i saw it happen to any of my friends. the fact that i can't see him as anything but good even after everything he did tells me a lot.

i thought i was over it. i don't think i am. i think i'm going to reach out to some resources. and i'm okay with that. it's hard, and it's difficult, but i love this life. i love the gentle kindness i've learned to give to myself, i love the peace and softness i've created. i won't give that up, and if i need more help than i'm getting to keep that, i will absolutely get more help.

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I’ve been a bit mia! Which might seem bad on a blog dedicated to healing, but I disappeared off the face of the earth for really positive reasons! I’ve been building my craft, exploring my spirituality, and connecting with deities. I’ve been working really hard to cultivate a sense of peace and gentleness and love in my life. It’s still hard, but I feel like I’m living my life again. What he did is still there sometimes, but I’m living in a space so much bigger than what he did. I’m really grateful that I was able to grow like this.

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As a chronically ill person, “feel better” usually makes me feel worse, because I know I won’t. “It’s going to be okay” makes me feel worse, because I know I’m not going to be okay.

And it’s not that I don’t appreciate the sentiment- I do, it just hurts.

And I know a lot of mentally ill people (myself included) feel the same way when they’re not doing well.

So I’ve taken to saying two things:

Instead of “I hope you feel better soon”, I say “I hope this becomes easier to feel.”

Instead of “it’s going to be okay”, I say “This will feel okay one day.”

This won’t work for everyone, but it works for me. I hope it can help some of you too🧡

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Reconnecting with family and friends after ending bad relationships is so healing and beautiful

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Getting sexually assaulted by your partner is weird.

There’s so much anger at them for betraying your trust, and even more at yourself for trusting them in the first place.

There’s this constant unshakeable fear, always beneath everything you fear. Even when you break up and cut them out and go no contact, you’re still so fucking scared, all the time.

You never want anybody to touch you in any capacity ever again, you never want to date ever again, but you still long for emotional connection and you still feel attraction.

There’s constant doubt- they loved me, they told me they loved me, did it really count?

There’s this giant gaping hole in the life you built around them, and you have no idea who you are anymore.

It’s really fucking weird.

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you were everything to me

my whole world, for two years

everything revolved around you

keeping you safe, keeping you happy, keeping you okay

my entire existence became you

and it's gone

it’s over

i destroyed it all, ripped it apart with my bare hands

i tried to push you off my body and you pressed down harder

i tried to tell you to stop and you just kept going

i tried to fix it

all of it

everything broken about you

that i dedicated everything i had to making better

for my own good

and it never stopped

you never stopped

and now i’m alone

i feel so lost

the only thing that feels real is the pain

of your hands in my hair and your teeth on my lips

praying for it to end

gods i barely believed in abandoning me

and everything i am is proving that i didn't deserve it

proving to myself that it will be okay

that it will end

it never ends