Touch.
The simplest, most basic form of conveying emotion.
We don't notice it unless it is unwelcome or until it is missing.
Touch is something I do often, I touch people I love constantly. To not touch someone in my life seems impossible to me.
Hugs, running fingers through their hair, holding hands, cheek kisses, linking arms. These are all common forms of touch in my life.
Sometimes unwelcome touch becomes so normal that we begin to not notice that either, until it is also missing and eventually forgotten
I sat down a couple weeks ago to watch the pilot of a show called Boardwalk Empire. In it was a scene of domestic violence so intense, it reminded me of what was now missing in my life. I watched in tears, not wanting to look but not able to stop. I could feel myself shaking with fearful recollection. As I watched the scene unfold on the television, I realized a number of things that had not occurred to me before:
1. I was never okay with how I was treated in my first marriage.
2. I was not okay with how I lost 2 of my pregnancies.
3. I'm still not okay with either of those.
4. I have never truly forgiven HB for his actions even after it stopped.
5. This is what ruined our marriage. THIS, which sadly began before we were married.
What was astonishing to me was that I had forgotten the details until I was watching it. Once, in 2005, I admitted to my father that I was a victim. That once was so humiliating that I dismissed all past and future occurrences from that point on. Dismissing is not the same as forgiving. I hadn't even realized this is what I did with it. And the details, the details I wish I could forget all over again.
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My first summer home from the islands, I was going through some of my things and found an old, old, old diary. With hearts on it and a lock and my entries said, "Dear Diary.." I must have been about 7 or 8. And I outlined the day my dad knocked my tooth out of my head. And then I talked about one of the holes that he put into my bedroom door with his fist. It went on from there; sort of a Pandora's Box of things I didn't even know I had put somewhere else.
I sat there, like you probably did, with a lump in my throat. Wondering how I could possibly have forgotten. Understanding my own previously confusing reactions to certain things. It felt like someone had punched me in the gut; I could barely breathe.
The thing is, you got out. Once you understand that, the forgiveness kicks in. "Ok, you did this to me. It will never be ok. But I am stronger than Goddamn steel and I wouldn't have even known that without you."
You don't have to forgive anybody. He hardly deserves that. But it will help you to understand where it has gotten you to have been strong enough to live through it. You have three amazing girls. You have a wonderful, gentle man who loves you to the moon. You picked yourself up and YOU are why your life is not in pieces. I like to think of these things as potholes in the road that I tripped on, but managed not to fall completely into. One of the past lives.
I love you. Lots.
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