There's a song from the 90s sung by Paula Cole...
I don't know if she wrote it.
I don't think that matters, but some folks think there's no integrity in singing a song they didn't write,
even if it is sung really well. Beautifully, even.
Title: I Don't Want To Wait.
She won a Grammy for that album, and this song was later used as the theme song for Dawson's Creek.
There's a line that I have no copyright permission to share, but the gist is,
what's it going to be? As in, what do you choose?
As I have so often done, I replaced it and will swear that the lyric is actually:
will you choose me?
I don't care what you choose, as long as you choose me.
I just learned about 34 minutes ago that I was singing it wrong this entire time.
The song doesn't come up very often--I searched my phone for it because it came to me in the shower.
Point is: I think this is a pattern. It's happened many times,
singing along in the car, off-key of course,
saying the wrong words--
and everyone looks at me like I'm daft.
Interesting reaction, theirs.
There's a thought choice for them in that moment.
Number one: "She's daft. Who would think that those were the lyrics?
It's obvious to me that's not what they're saying. What an idiot."
We think this very often about others--it's so easy, the ego.
Number two: Interesting that she thinks that's the line... Well, at least she's cute.
Either way, I'm getting it wrong. I'm imperfect.
Y'all can have any number of reactions.
My reaction this morning, as I looked up the lyrics and saw that it was not what I had MEMORIZED thirty years ago, was curious.
I was curious about the words I had imagined.
Will he pick me?
Of all the girls in the room, in the building, in the church, on the bus, at the bar, in the school...
There's such a pleading there.
Please, please, pick me.
Desperate to be chosen.
Honestly, it wasn't about being picked OVER someone else,
not about being better than others.
It was: make me worthy.
Because if you pick me,
if you love me,
that means something about me.
I am not that neglected child of a married affair, in a shut room in the back of the house.
I am not the molested four year-old girl.
I am not fatherless.
I am not hungry.
I am chosen.
Will you pick me? Such an old recording in my head. And when it comes up,
often,
I feel to cry. Because I made the circumstances mean something about me.
I have decided to focus on and try to heal my child sexual abuse.
I don't know if it can be healed, but I have the tools to try.
I am opening the closet door.
Why not now, right?
I've already white-knuckled through a life, which helped cause it to break.
One of the top ten factors, maybe.
I think, if I'm going to make a great 3rd Act plan, I'm going to try.
Imagine thirty years of potential healing.
Even that word, I'm resistant to.
Letting something heal. Who am I if I'm not wounded?
Most of the women in this camp have subtle signs but perform functioning, adequate lives.
Married. Mothers. Grandmothers.
Young girls.
Trauma is easier to see in others if you have some of it yourself.
I wonder what it looks like to the untouched? For those three looking at the one.
I can only guess.
She's edgy.
She doesn't fit.
Loser.
Uneducated.
Recluse.
"She's so real."
"I wish she'd stop talking about it."
We want safe places. Which depends on your perception of the world, right?
The world is safe, or it's not, depending on your beliefs.
Limbic Girl is afraid, even when the door is locked,
even when there's a counter between the man and me.
Men.
Women, the three of the four that are untouched--
if that stat is even real. Maybe it's 1/4 who actually report it?
Any-hoo, I can forgive the other half for not being traumatized,
for their trauma ignorance. For things they say that are not trauma-informed.
But men, they are dominant. They created all of this mess.
Kept us low, made us think we were less.
It's been their society.
Forgive me.
I just have a chip on my shoulder.
But it's not a chip. It's a wound, that I ignore, so I can play all of my parts.
Today's Deep Breath: a practical juju nugget, a collective Next Best Decision.
I played them SO well.
But now my roles are over, and it's 100% me all of the time.
So let's do this.
What's in my toolbox that I can share?
#1 Journaling. Occasionally, I start with the facts of the day,
if there's no drama to splash on the page.
Sometimes the tiny little thoughts are the ones that have been holding me back.
Here's some from recent pages:
I can't.
It's too much.
This is A LOT.
I wasn't perfect.
They should...
Something will go wrong.
Someone will hurt me.
I won't survive.
All of those thoughts have their own evidence. Tons of evidence.
Limbic girl brings it ALL up: "See?
See?
It's true."
I've loved living as Limbic Girl. She is fun, and spontaneous.
She loves driving with loud music.
She dances in the kitchen.
She's a great kisser.
She can paint and draw and create.
But she is also a bruised, bitter teenager,
afraid and worried and limiting.
But she'll never not be there.
So, I must love her to heal her.
And there is our challenge.
LOVE THYSELF.
It comes first.
For the three, or the other half, the untouched,
they might subconsciously already do this, so they may say:
Love God.
Love your husband.
Love your children.
Because they already love themselves. It was mirrored to them as children.
They were loved, therefore they believe they were loveable.
They don't have this first step.
As much. Maybe they do. Maybe I can't know what they think or feel.
I assume.
All I know, is; there is a deep, dark cavernous hole in me.
I walked around it when I was younger. You could see it in everything I did.
I saw it in everything that I did.
Then, in order to build a family, I covered it with just enough flooring to walk over it and function.
It became my kitchen. The heart of my home.
It was always there.
Every breakfast. Every movie night with popcorn.
Every time I tucked in my babies.
All of it rested on this hole.
Time to open the door.