healing gracie

Yes, I have another confession. It is weird how this one kind of hit me. I had met with my counselor last week...I didn't talk much. I was struggling and feeling pretty discouraged (I'm still feeling that way to be honest). There was something that my counselor said that really hit me...in fact in got me crying a bit. She had asked if I truly realized that the abuse was not my fault. If I believed I was not to blame for what happened...that the fault was with the perpetrators. That I was just there...that I did nothing to deserve what happened to me.

It really hit me then...I still feel like it was my fault. Notice I said "feel." In my head, it makes sense logically: the abuse was not my fault...I didn't deserve it. But I don't feel that way, I don't believe it outside my mind. For some reason it's "easier" to believe it was my fault. In some weird, twisted way it puts the control in my court. I did something wrong, that's why bad things happen. If I do something right, then bad things won't happen. Big thinking error, I know...but it's how my life has been led this whole time.

I had started crying a little because I was shocked that I still felt that way...I mean it's been three years for crying out loud. I shouldn't be feeling that way. I should know by now (and feel) that it wasn't my fault. I don't know, I guess there is comfort in believing it was my fault...it's what I am familiar with and used to. I need to change that...and that change is going to be uncomfortable. But I need to do it. I need to not only know, but feel that I didn't deserve what happened to me as a child.