Real Places
I'm still on vacation with my family.I just got off the phone with my husband. It was so nice to hear my husband's voice.
There are a lot of memories here still haunting me.
Last night I slept in my old room.
There are still a lot of ghosts in there.
They kept me up for a while.
When I go up in that room, especially at night, I don't just see a room. I see and hear myself as a teenager and a young college student trying to deal with an eating disorder all by myself. I see another me trying to cope with a friend that just died and having no one to talk to. I see another me trying to figure out what to do now that my little sister just left for college. I see another my screaming into a pillow in the middle of the night because I'm having flashbacks and no one in the world knows. I see myself staring into the mirror by the window and seeing another person's eyes look back at me and saying over and over again, "Who ARE you?" I see another me shaking off the voice I hear in my head of a little girl crying "Mommy?" over and over again.
Its like all these old memories still crammed together stuck inside a 12x12 bedroom. And they wander around still trying to get out. Sometime in the middle of the night in a stupor I even said aloud something about "I want you guys to get free" (yah, medication overload last night talking outloud in my sleep).
The thing is, I escaped. I got out. That's the important part.
Today I went to my old school. I went inside. It still smells the same, looks the same. I went into my old classrooms. The places I talk about in therapy, the places that Tuck and Carolineine and Mae tell my therapist about: they are REALLY there. The classroom where the health teacher told me "You look like someone who really enjoys dessert". The bathroom where I would brush my teeth obsessively because I was worried about being clean. The halls I was so careful to walk up and down in a good row and be a good line leader. I LOVED that school. I felt so safe there. From the hours of 8-2:30, I KNEW I was safe in that place. I depended on it. Today I got to be back inside for a little bit, and it felt so good. The inside kids loved it. We had proof that those places are real, that the things we talk about really happened. I took pictures to show my therapist.
Posted by pilgrim | Filed under:
I remember school as my safe place, too. I loved the routine and knowing what to expect from predictable people who were, for the most part, kind. Safe. I'm sorry it's hard elsewhere right now. Stay safe. I hope you and your sister and her kids are having a good visit.
The Real Me