Vulnerability/Dirty laundry pt. 2
I was recently looking at my blog stats, and to this day Dirty Laundry remains my most popular blog post. I was wondering what about it made it so interesting to readers. I finally decided it must be that I was willing to put it out there-the gritty, ugly truth. Like most people, I like to keep those kind of unspeakable things to myself, but I don't know what purpose it serves except for upholding an image-who or what people think I am. People should care about me, flaws, catastrophic mistakes, and all. The struggles I've faced and the errors I've made only make me human, no more or no less than who I really am. More often than not, I think that we don't like admitting our own misguided choices because we still don't forgive ourselves for them. We say we've moved on, but I think many of us carry those things around with us. Perhaps by airing our dirty laundry, we can move on.
All of these mistakes are years and years and years past, but I still have trouble letting go and forgiving myself, even though some of the people closest to me already have.
In my life, I have been involved with people who were not available. Some were emotionally unavailable, while others were making their own misguided choices. Although I have never cheated on someone I was in a relationship with, I've been on the other side. There is no excuse for such a choice, but it is one I made more than once. I made it out of wanting to be loved, out of wanting to be validated, and it caused me a lot of turmoil and grief. I've many times had the feeling that my payback will come. It has caused me to struggle with trusting others to be faithful, which perhaps is my payback for my poor decisions. I wish that I could've written a letter to myself in the past from my own future. Maybe I would have made the same mistakes anyway and missed some valuable lessons, after all do we take the advice of those around us who have made mistakes they want us to avoid?
Another mistake I have made that haunts me is the anger and bitterness and hatefulness I dished out to the people I love the most. From age 12-19, I struggled the most with my RSD. It completely transformed me. I suffered so greatly, and I felt like no one really understood me. One Christmas, I could not move. I couldn't open presents, hell, I couldn't even open my eyes. I actually remember crying out, begging God to take me home. I didn't think I could survive the pain of that day to see the dawn of another. Many times, I lashed out at my family: my mom, my sister-10 years my junior, my brother, and my dad. Mostly, my mom and my sister. The worst part of that is that they were the ones that were by my side the most. My mom spent sleepless nights telling me stories of my childhood to distract my mind from the pain. And I'll never forget that my (then) 3 year old sister held my hand as I prepared for an onslaught of painful nerve blocks (injections in the spine/back muscles), she looked at me and said, "You can squeeze as hard as you want." The amazing thing is that I got my life back, and even though I still have my bitchy moments, I have an awesome and close relationship with both my mom and my brilliant little 16-year-old sister.
There are a few people in my life who know everything about me, good and bad. They still love me. I am glad they've given me such forgiveness and grace. So I guess I put these things out there for the world to see because I know that everyone has those mistakes, big and small. I know that the people who matter will still love me, and the ones that don't really matter will weed themselves out by disowning me or writing me off because they are perfect and equipped to judge me and look down on me, even though I am not the sum of my mistakes. I'm a new woman today, and I strive to be better each day of my life. Perhaps perfection isn't the point. Maybe it is the striving to be the best and kindest version of ourselves.
All of these mistakes are years and years and years past, but I still have trouble letting go and forgiving myself, even though some of the people closest to me already have.
In my life, I have been involved with people who were not available. Some were emotionally unavailable, while others were making their own misguided choices. Although I have never cheated on someone I was in a relationship with, I've been on the other side. There is no excuse for such a choice, but it is one I made more than once. I made it out of wanting to be loved, out of wanting to be validated, and it caused me a lot of turmoil and grief. I've many times had the feeling that my payback will come. It has caused me to struggle with trusting others to be faithful, which perhaps is my payback for my poor decisions. I wish that I could've written a letter to myself in the past from my own future. Maybe I would have made the same mistakes anyway and missed some valuable lessons, after all do we take the advice of those around us who have made mistakes they want us to avoid?
Another mistake I have made that haunts me is the anger and bitterness and hatefulness I dished out to the people I love the most. From age 12-19, I struggled the most with my RSD. It completely transformed me. I suffered so greatly, and I felt like no one really understood me. One Christmas, I could not move. I couldn't open presents, hell, I couldn't even open my eyes. I actually remember crying out, begging God to take me home. I didn't think I could survive the pain of that day to see the dawn of another. Many times, I lashed out at my family: my mom, my sister-10 years my junior, my brother, and my dad. Mostly, my mom and my sister. The worst part of that is that they were the ones that were by my side the most. My mom spent sleepless nights telling me stories of my childhood to distract my mind from the pain. And I'll never forget that my (then) 3 year old sister held my hand as I prepared for an onslaught of painful nerve blocks (injections in the spine/back muscles), she looked at me and said, "You can squeeze as hard as you want." The amazing thing is that I got my life back, and even though I still have my bitchy moments, I have an awesome and close relationship with both my mom and my brilliant little 16-year-old sister.
There are a few people in my life who know everything about me, good and bad. They still love me. I am glad they've given me such forgiveness and grace. So I guess I put these things out there for the world to see because I know that everyone has those mistakes, big and small. I know that the people who matter will still love me, and the ones that don't really matter will weed themselves out by disowning me or writing me off because they are perfect and equipped to judge me and look down on me, even though I am not the sum of my mistakes. I'm a new woman today, and I strive to be better each day of my life. Perhaps perfection isn't the point. Maybe it is the striving to be the best and kindest version of ourselves.
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