Homily today was something I never expected to hear today.
Gospel talks about loving your neighbor the way you love
yourself. But that’s the thing, I don’t even know if I love myself enough.
I have been blaming myself for all the bad things that have
happened to me, and feeling that I deserved all of it. I thought, after all
these years of protecting myself, of walking away from a lot of things, from
not getting myself get hurt, I thought I was loving myself more. I realized
today that it was how I loved myself, but it wasn’t enough. I have lived all
these years in fear. Fear that all those bad things happening again. Getting hurt
by the one you love, feeling my heart breaking every time, feeling the pain by
every hit someone I care about says to me, or getting shattered by every blow a
threat or a punch or anything physical was shown to me by the people I love and
care for. I play the victim, because by definition, I am. But I also realized
that going to therapy, I am trying not to be one.
I remember, once, this guy told me that I should stop
feeling bad and sorry, that I should not live in fear, and I should face everything
head on. That same day he told me that was the same day he told me he wanted to
be in my life. That day, was also the day I chose to walk away, because I wasn’t
ready, I was scared, and I knew him well enough that I know at some point along
the way he is going to hurt me. And he actually did. He just never knew that he
did because I never told him how I felt.
In the Homily earlier, the priest also mentioned that when
you get hurt about something by someone, it means you actually love that
someone. Love means getting hurt and loving means feeling pain. Now I think
about all the things I have gone through... me letting my mom do everything she
did to me and feel very guilty about fighting back because I thought that I owe
her everything I am right now, having an absentee dad, him being asked by my
mom to leave the house at the age of 5, me meeting a little brother from
another woman at the age of 9, me seeing my dad 7 years ago and seeing how my
mom was so affected about it, me being mocked by people from the church
organization calling me a flirt, a slut, me being bullied in high school at
some point, me being a bitch in high school at some point, me trying to gain my
mom’s attention, even if it meant acting out, flunking, stealing, and whatever
it is you can actually think of.. me having a boyfriend at 13 and thinking it
was forever, but people ruined that chance for me, me having a boyfriend before
high school graduation and thought it was forever again, him meeting everyone
in my life, only to end up getting hurt physically, emotionally and mentally,
and me doing exactly the same to him, me dating a guy whom I thought was
perfect for me, but ended up short lived because he was too weak enough to
fight everything and everyone who underestimated him, me dating a guy because one
ex-boyfriend told me to, which ended up me getting sexually abused by him, me
stopping to date guys and dated girls for years because of the trauma of
getting raped in my own home, running away one Christmas because I couldn’t
stand him living in my home and doesn’t get sick to his stomach because of what
he did to me, me telling my mom one day in April the year after it happened of
what he exactly did to me which made me that way… me sinking into depression
after mom found out everything that happened, me having a heart time trust and
believe in myself and in other people already, me getting my heart broken by
some girl who lived 7,000 miles away, me meeting a guy and slept with him on
the first date, and ended up sleeping around, even to the point of it being at
the expense of a very good friend and losing our friendship, me deciding to see
a counselor, and eventually see a shrink and validate all these years’ theory
of me being bipolar, and apparently having post-traumatic stress disorder, me
being in manic for years already, me trying to go to therapy when I can, me
ended up stopping therapy and did all the vices I could do, smoking, drugs,
drinking, smoke, me getting my shit again together and started therapy again,
me trying to meet new people, me trying to gain new friends, me trying to meet
people and thinking of dating, me getting scared all the time about
commitments, relationships, trust… here I am. The list goes on, of the things
that have happened, but I’m sure there are some I could have forgotten, or
choose not to write here. I am somewhere I could not remember so many things
about my life, somewhere far past or near past or even just yesterday. I am
somewhere I could not recall the last time I felt love, because my heart was
filled with so much pain, anger, guilt… but mostly anger, anger about
everything that happened to me, and how I just let things as it is because I
chose to stay quiet and keep everything to myself, because I thought things
would be better that way. But I realized I ended up hurting myself the most.
Maybe I love myself, because I feel pain just thinking about
myself. But I now know I don’t love myself enough. I love others more than I
love myself, which to be honest, right now, it sounds so wrong on so many
levels. I wish I can love myself more, I wish I can give myself the freedom to
be loved by everyone. I just know that I am so scared at the moment to let
anyone in, to risk, to have faith in people. But I also know that because I am
so scared, I lost people that could have actually been good for me. As a
friend, as family, as someone special. I wish I can be free from just going out
there and making it. I know I have been trying to live my life on my own, and
somehow I feel I am successful, but I know somewhere along the way, I need to
have people whom I can count on, people whom I can trust my life with. People
whom I can trust.
So what’s the point of all of this blabbing? To be honest, I
don’t know. All I know is that, right now, I really wish to feel love. To feel
the pain of loving someone. I wish to be loved. Because I think I have
forgotten how it felt, to love and to be loved. I feel so numb about everything
at the moment. There are days I feel pain, but not because I was loving, but
because of the pain of everything I have gone through and chose to let go
because I felt I wasn’t ready, or because I was scared.
Do not get me wrong, I know that I have a lot of people who
love me and care for me, but because they knew me before where I am right now,
that’s why they stick. But right now, I feel that very few people know me
because I am scared to trust, to go out there, to love and be loved. Because it
means feeling pain, and pain is something I have been avoiding for the longest
time because for the longest time, it was the only feeling I had. Pain and
sadness have been my friends for the longest time, add up emptiness too. And
right now, I do hope, one day, my life will be filled with hope, love and a
something better.
Homily today taught me that there’s a silver lining out
there, that to feel love is to feel pain, to get hurt. That we should choose to
love even though we are in pain, that we should choose to forgive even we are
in pain. And there, we can find freedom.
Session with the shrink this week… I wish I don’t flake. And
I wish she tells me there’s progress.
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