Dear Anita,

I have tears in my eyes from reading your response.  Thank you for thinking I am amazing.  You, too, are absolutely incredible and amazing.

This registers very well: “Our mental health is in our ability to think in according to what is true to reality. Any and every convenient, wishful thinking, any rationalizing away of reality carries a price, more sickness, more dysfunction.”

Look at reality in the face, and observe what you feel.  Yes, not doing such carries more and more dysfunction over time, that accumulate.  Just as poor health and diet accumulate to disease years later (at current the individual feels “fine”).

I wrote below prior to reading your reply, and it continues in the unraveling of the deep rooted dysfunction over a lifetime:

I find that I am in a place that is in between.  Sometimes I feel a sense of relief that I can finally begin to live.  Sometimes I feel a sense of doom that I am so harmed, and abused and battered down from it all.  It does make sense given that this is the reality, in one way, an achievement, in another just the beginning of the dark abyss that has not yet been entered.

This dark abyss is full of many things. It is full of:

-The feeling that the past 30 years were like a war zone, now I am out, hardly knowing I was immersed in the war the whole time.

-the wonder I have for myself, the fact that I was immersed in this above war but managed to keep an exuberant attitude (for the most part) and had many achievements

-The sadness of despite keeping a great attitude for the most part, I had many lows.  I see now where they stemmed from. They were not merely moods or phases, they were all apart of this grand picture of abuse.

-The wonder of finally realizing this, and seeing it as true.  Not seeing it as a “maybe” as I did when I first posted to you.  Not seeing it as something “people just deal with.”

-The strange feeling I get when I think about my wedding.  In some ways, forgetting that it even happened. In other ways, feeling proud we managed to pull off such an incredible event.  In many ways feeling a sense of sadness that we were robbed of the simple joy that a young couple feels.

-The frustration I feel when I think about: The simple joy. What is that? Everything and anything has become complicated and tainted by them.  From obtaining car insurance becoming a huge ordeal, to tax season, to our WEDDING. Everything and anything.

-The sinking feeling I have in my heart when I recall my husband over two years ago talking about one of the most important things for a man is to be able to propose to a girl he loves and feel happy and proud of it.  And how in reality, he was robbed of this joy. Instead he was beaten down, tortured, and abused. How silly and crazy this sounds!

-The frustration I have when I realize I have been having headaches and neck pains for over 10 years, the culprit: stress related muscular tension.   I know why I get them, just have never been able to be in a place in life to ever decrease my stressors. Can you imagine! Something people deal with as a phase, not chronically over years upon years.  My poor body!

-The magnitude of uphill strength it takes to on a daily basis, make the right decisions. To breathe well, to not tense up.  To say do yoga instead of lay on the couch. To eat healthy instead of take the easy way. To think before acting or speaking.  How much deliberate effort. Yes, this is all good effort, and with practice makes perfect —but sure that is tiring.