For a long time I was told that I was depressed. They tried to treat me for depression. They attempted to isolate and at one point institutionalize me because of what they say my depression was doing to me.
Part 30.
“Now I get to…”
I didn’t listen to them. I did what I could to explore and express my feelings. It took years to figure out that I was not depressed. I was sad. I was sad because very bad and traumatic things had transpired in my life. Things that aren’t normal and were going to affect anyone that experienced them, adversely.
It was okay to be sad. It was healthy to be sad.
But they made me feel guilty and ashamed for feeling the way I did about the things that went on. I ran away because I was embarrassed to not have a better grip on life. I felt stupid for having the severe trust issues and reservations I had about humans. I dealt with anxiety and stress and anger issues because I was unable to release my hurt and frustration in a way more productive than bottling it all up and internalizing, to the detriment of my health.
They put labels and titles on me that became barriers and roadblocks. They put ideas in my head and some of the words in my mouth. My attitude and energy became a reflection of what I received from those people and the places they came from.
I never went to therapy because I had heard stories about individuals being admitted and committed to institutions and facilities due to their clinical diagnosis. So I never sought that type of help. I just dealt with what I had to deal with. I am not prescribing the methods that I used to anyone that is suffering or struggling with “life”, I am being honest about my own path and journey towards healing.
The truth is that I wanted that type of “help”. I wanted the doctors and the pastors and the medicines to heal me. To help me. I fought so hard for that type of help. I was turned away, denied, rejected, and much worse. That added to my stress. That I could not seem to find those means to fix me. So I must have been really broken. Unrepairable.
I was listening to a poem I wrote, a few minutes ago. I closed my eyes and listened to the words I was saying. As I listened, I thought about everything I’ve gone through to get to the here that I am at now. I thought about the undeniable miracles and moments that God has orchestrated so much of this journey. The things that I can only say are God. No person did it. Not even me. I know what God has done in my life. I know the only reason that I have the patience and perspective that I have is due to the evidence that God has shown me.
I started the poem over a couple times. I’m starting to realize just who I’m listening to…
I’m listening to an expert. An expert on the Power of God! An expert on the Protection of God. An expert on the Peace of God. An expert on the Path that God has for ME!
I’ve joined so many churches over the years. I paid for, attended, and dropped out of multiple colleges. I’ve tried jobs and careers and lifestyles that I thought would bring me the something more that I felt I needed, deserved, wanted.
But God…
God had a plan. And if nothing else I’ve listened to God’s voice and went with that plan. Against advice. Against odds. Against any and everything that opposed what that plan has been.
And that plan didn’t make one bit of sense to me along the way!
All the while, for 30 years, I had to also deal with the person that murdered my Mother walking the same earth as me. And not just the same earth, but being in the same environment, and even in the same room sometimes. The person that shot my Mother in her head and left her body in the house to be discovered by her children. My Mother’s body lie in her bed for almost 2 days before I discovered her on Monday, March 28, 1994. We slept in that house not knowing that she was dead. With that smell. Children, unknowing and ignorant to what was to change when I opened that door.
I listened to the poem that I wrote a few days ago about walking into a new door. For 30 years I was afraid to open doors. Fearful and anxious about the tragedy that could be on the other side of them. Trauma and PTSD is so real. So freaking real!
The person that murdered my Mother died earlier this year. That person was my bogeyman. They controlled my entire life. Puppet-mastered so much of my movement and presentation. Without knowing. But with extreme success.
Because I’d gotten no justice. And instead I plotted, procrastinated, prepared, paused, pondered… I planned.
First, it was my siblings that I considered and were what kept me from killing that person. Then it was my son. Then it was that persons children. Because I never wanted any child to experience what I had over the time that I had. And so I was paralyzed in between wanting to destroy my bogeyman and having to do what my soul kept saying was right, to move on, to let go, to heal, to help myself then others through my experience.
Breathe.
Writing is what saved my life. These words you are reading, and hearing, are life lessons that I have learned and LIVED. These poems are what have been my process.
Breathe.
When the bogeyman died, there was relief. I ain’t gone lie. It felt extremely good. Instantly. I know that grace and forgiveness and compassion and understanding and mercy and unconditional love and peace and consideration and all of that is what is supposed to be the “Godly” way to talk, but listen, that monster tortured me and my family for 30 years. I suffered and struggled for 30 years. I avoided living for 30 years, in fear that muthafvcka was going to be around the next corner I turned, or behind the next door I opened.
Breathe.
“Now I get to…”
The last 8+ months have been me adjusting to life without the anxiety or angst of having to walk the same earth with that person. It has taken some time to process being free of that. Healing is not instant. Although I felt a great sense of relief and peace when that person transitioned, I still had to adjust my mental, spiritual, emotional self to this new reality.
That’s when I started sitting in the car and recording these poems. I’ve always written, I’ve had success and progress along the way, I just never had the ability to maintain consistency for the fact that the triggers and trauma of what the bogeyman had done, and that the bogeyman was alive and well, and that the bogeyman was connected to me in so many ways… all of that was the reason I’d “abandon ship” as I did.
Thank God for my journey.
Thank God for my journey.
If I do nothing else from these days forth, know that I will continue to speak life. I will continue to create art and messages that inspire/motivate/encourage with the intention to help and heal. I will continue to be transparent and vulnerable with my path, in order to give hope and optimism and expectation of growth!
God created me to be ME! My journey, my story, my life… is for ME to live and experience FULLY. I do not believe that God has me here to be worried about “God”. I am here to work with ME! God has shown me that I had to do this. So many things I expected others to do, say, think, feel… was MY responsibility. That’s where the whole “YOU NEED YOU.” concept comes from. Because my life really started to work when I started to work it.
Back to the bogeyman. Which was actually a woman. A couple years before the bogeyman actually died, God created some circumstances and situations that forced me to began the final stages of healing from that trauma. Before the bogeyman checked out of here I was able to gave conversations and closure with a whole lot of people. Those conversations and closure had to happen before the bogeyman died. Had the bogeyman died before I had those conversations and achieved the clarity that I did, those people and that stuff would have been able to come in after the bogeyman was gone and act like everything was okay, and my grief, or my being gullible to the desire of wanting to know “why” so much of what I wanted to know would have allowed me to accept mediocrity as a means of explanation. I’m sure of it. But God orchestrated some events and instances that forced that part to be done when it was. When it had to be done. In God’s timing. Totally not mine. Because if we were on my time, I would have been killed the bogeyman and I’d probably have been out of jail by now, and on with my life. Dead-ass.
But God had another plan. Smile.
Breathe.
Now I get to… LIVE.
-see
©️2024 Cornelious “See” Flowers
