What I Know About Me

Hi everyone. New to this whole idea but I would like to try to explain myself to you. I am a 53 year old female. I have a wonderful life, now, that is. I am married to the most amazing man - he is more than I could have dreamt for. We are lucky to have come together at our ages and are enjoying every moment together. My husband tells me all the time how amazed he is with me. He has a hard time understanding how I made it to this place I am at now, with him, considering all I have been through in my life. I don't have the answer. He is talking about all the pain I endured my entire life. The beatings from my ex-husband, being shot at, thrown down stairs, locked in closets, tied up, you know, the stories could go on and on. But I survived. Not with a chip on my shoulder but with a total appreciation of everything good. I don't dwell on those bad times, but unfortunately triggers pop up now and then. Thanks to my husband we deal with them as they happen and move on.

Now that I have said all that let's rewind this story back to when I was growing up. I would love to tell you about my childhood. I can't. I have no memory of it. Was it good? No clue. I can't remember anything about my life growing up until I was 16 years old!!!!!! Not a christmas, or a birthday, Thankgiving, school, friends, anything. How does that happen? I have physical scars on my body that I don't know where they came from. For years I tried to talk to my mom or my sister about this. Nobody wanted to talk. Even when I became an adult no one wanted me around. Never invited to dinners, or Christmases, etc. What happened when I was younger to make them all hate me? It seems to bother me a lot lately. My husband stated that it is probably a good thing that I can't remember anything because he believes something bad happened to me. I would have to agree. I experience bad feelings about places or situations for no known reason. Certain spoken words can bring a chill to my bones. There are more examples than I care to admit. Lately little glimpses of my past have poked through. Like today, I remembered playing the piano when I was quite young. I can see the metronome moving back and forth - I see my hands on the keys, and I can hear music being played. There is no doubt that it is me. Now how is that possible? I can't even read music let alone play an instrument. What the hell?

A few weeks ago I saw a jump rope laying in a parking lot. I noticed it had yellow plastic handles. In my head I remembered see those handles before and could hear them click - clacking and I was terrified. I remember that sound. I also remember how I hated that sound. Even now when I think about it I become frightened. Pretty strange, huh?

All these memories are mine. For some reason in the past 6 months some of them are seeping back into to my head. When they do - I remember them like they were yesterday.

I thought that not knowing my past and then having little memories poking into my head was bad enough, but no...it's not the worst. Lately something has been gnawing at me. I have no idea where it came from but it won't let me be. I am actually scared that I may have done something bad when I was young. Something so bad that I have blocked it out. I am truly hoping that I didn't hurt anyone. I mean it makes sense.

Like I said I have the best husband, but even then it is hard to explain to him how screwed up I really am. He believes I am doing alright. It is too hard to explain to him how I try to hold everything together and appear normal. Damn I don't even know what normal is. I feel like everything is going to fall down around me and then everyone will know the real me. DAMN I don't even know who I am.

Well anyway, that was a long story, (sorry about that), and it probably doesn't even make much sense. Well, don't worry about, I don't understand it either, HaHa. Thank-you for listening, or reading I mean.

Patty