The Abyss of the Soul

“The dark night of the soul can be devastating, but it is a temporary condition” (1)

(1)(Bruce, Robert, ENERGY WORK The Secret of Healing and Spiritual Development, Hampton Roads Publishing Company, Inc, VA 2007.)

I share this here for it has been my journey. There was little comfort in my darkest hours and I was desperate for understanding. I am motivated to share my journey so that it may help others who are desperately seeking...something, anything that might lift them out of the abyss.

It is lengthy, it is a mini book. There is an end to the dark night of the soul... I hope you find an end to your own dark night of the soul...as I have done.












[edit on 2-1-2009 by Thurisaz]

Dark place

I am in a dark place. I am just standing alone in a dark place. It is so dark I cannot see my own arm. I am scared. I don’t know where I am. I don’t know why I am in this dark place. I cannot hear anything either. There is no sound and nothing to see. I cannot leave the dark place because I do not know how to get out of it. I don’t even know how I came to be in a dark place.

I decide to just stand and wait until I can see or hear my way out of the dark place. I wait a long time and being to cry. I don’t like being in this dark place. I hear the sound of footsteps. I am scared because the sound of the footsteps, sound as if they are getting closer to me. The sound of the footsteps stops but I know that someone is standing close to me in this dark place. I am too terrified to move.

I want to scream and run but I cannot see, so cannot run. I want to scream but if I scream perhaps the person who is standing close by will hear my scream and know that I am in this dark place. My breathing is loud and I am trying to hold my breath so not to make a sound. It is hopeless. The person who is in this dark place will have heard me breathing.

I begin to see light filtering into the dark place. I wait for my eyes to adjust and slowly I see that I am in a room. It is a dark room and there is light filtering in from underneath a door. As I try to focus on my surroundings, I see that there is a man standing directly in front of me. He is staring at me. I realise that he could not only hear my breath, but as he was standing so close to me, he would have felt it.

Startled, I stepped backwards and looked at the man’s face. I ran out of the dark room. I ran into another room that had more light in it and decided to hide. But I could see the door of the dark room was left open and as I hid I could see the man standing, waiting. I cannot sit and watch the man waiting in the dark room, so I decide to run.
I run, but while I am running I soon realise there is no safe place to run to, no safe place to hide in. I cannot run away from the man standing in the dark room. There is no escape.

Dark room

I hate this dark room. I wish it would go away. I am sitting in the middle of the dark room. I hold my knees in my arms. There is enough light so see the shape of the room. The man isn’t standing here this time. I can see a bed. It is my bed when I was little. Now that I see it, I run over to hide underneath it. I am safe there hiding. I wonder why in this dark room my bed is here? This dark room is exactly like my bedroom when I was a little girl. I see from underneath my bed my Sister’s bed against the far wall. I can see she is in her bed asleep.

If the bedroom door opens, my bed is the first thing that can be seen. From under my bed, I can see if the door is opened. I can see that the door is slightly ajar and the hallway light is filtering into the room. I don’t know why I am hiding under my bed and I don’t know why I am scared.
I can hear the sound of someone walking up the hallway. I can see the shadow of the person as they walk past the door. I hold my breath. I don’t want the door to open.

Standing Room Only

I am in the dark place. The dark place is my bedroom when I was a child. It is dark because it is at night. I hate the nighttime. I am under my bed again but that isn’t a safe place to hide anymore. I hide there whilst I think of another place to hide. My Sister and I have a small cupboard for our clothes. One side of it is a wardrobe; the other side has a little mirror and three or four drawers. I decide to hide in the wardrobe. I quietly sneak over to the wardrobe and stand in there. I hold the brass clasp to close the wardrobe door. I can’t manage to close it completely so I hold it to keep it in position. There isn’t much room so I can only stand. I am tired and want to sleep but I won’t go to sleep because it is not safe to go to sleep in this room. My Sister is asleep in her bed again. I wonder why she doesn’t hide like I do?

I stand in the wardrobe a long time. Even though I am tired and want to go to sleep I stay awake and listen for the sound of any movement. The wardrobe is dark but if the bedroom door opens I will be able to see the hallway light coming into the room. From the wardrobe I can hear the television in the lounge room.

My arms ache because I have been holding the clasp to keep the door closed for a long time. I rest my head against the wardrobe and want to cry. I won’t cry; I have to be very quiet. I hear the sound of my Mother coming home. Our bedroom is the closest to the front verandah. I can hear her keys with her at the front door. It is safe now so I quickly jump into my bed to go to sleep.

No Places Left To Hide

The wardrobe isn’t a safe place to hide anymore so I try to think of other places I can hide until my Mother gets home. I can’t hide under my Brother’s bed because his bed has draws underneath it. I need to go to the toilet but I am too frightened to leave my bedroom. I don’t want to walk past the person who is sitting in the lounge room watching television.

I can’t think of anywhere left to hide. I get into bed with my Sister. She tells me to get out and go to my own bed. We will get in trouble if we are not in our beds. I get in my bed and hold onto my dolly. I don’t like this bedroom. I want to run away.

I can hear the footsteps in the hallway. I lay very still. The bedroom door opens and I hear him waking my Sister up. She gets up out of her bed and leaves our bedroom. I hear her walk into my Mother’s bedroom. I go to sleep.

Little Dolly

I was in the sports stadium playing basketball with my friends, when I saw a little man whistling as he walked along the white line marking out the basketball court. I stopped playing basketball and couldn’t believe my eyes: there was a little man walking along the white line! I picked him up in my hand and just observed him.

I stood there thinking about what to do about him. I walked over to the desk where there was a little garden box and decided to place him there as it would be safe. I then ran out of the stadium and went straight to my Teacher to talk to him.

“I saw a little man while I was playing basketball”
“What was the little man doing?” He asked.
“He was walking and whistling”
“Where is the little man now?”
“I put him in the garden box on the desk” I replied.
My Teacher told me to go back to the stadium and play basketball.

I ran back to the stadium and as I closed the door behind me, I found myself immediately in a garden. I was confused and thought I had gone out the wrong door. I immediately turned around to go back the way I had come, but as I turned around, the door had gone; there were only trees. I began to panic and feel for the door that was there before. It was no longer there. I sat confused for a moment and then I decided to walk around to see if I could find another door so I could get back to the stadium.

As I walked, I saw the man in the little hat and tiny little jacket that I had found walking whistling in the sports stadium talking to people in the garden, but he was no longer tiny, he was same size as me. I ran up to him and shouted: “Hey! Do you remember me? I put you in the garden box?”
He looked worried.
“You were walking along the white line of the basketball court. I nearly stepped on you!”

He knew I had put him in the garden box but pretended not to know what I was talking about. He just stared at me as I spoke.
“We are obviously trapped in the garden box that sits on the desk!”
“I am in a garden box that sits on a desk, a desk?” he asked.
“Yes!”

I was determined to get the little man and myself out of the garden box.
“We are in a garden box, if we go to the edge of the box then we can get out of it”…
There were other people in the garden and we all began running to find the edge of the boundary.

I realised that the people didn’t know they were in a garden box. At the same time, I wasn’t sure myself but as I had put the little man in the garden box and there he was, that is where I must be. I had to get back to the stadium where I was playing basketball.

We reached the edge of the boundary and all began pushing on the retaining wall. We all pushed together and after some time, the wall began to buckle. As soon as we saw the wall moving we began to push with more fervor. With one great push we fell with the wall onto the desk in the stadium. We got up off our knees and looked around. I could see my friends I play basketball with. They were standing on the basketball court. I began to yell and wave my arms around. “Hey! Hey! Here I am. I am here!”

Nobody could hear me so I kept yelling and waving my arms about to try and get their attention. I saw a big me sitting down on the basketball court. I could not believe my eyes. How can I be here and be sitting down on the basketball court? I slid down one of legs of the desk and ran over to where I saw myself sitting. People were standing around me. I could see my Teacher talking to the big me sitting in the middle of the court. The big me had her head between her knees. (2)

I ran up to myself and yelled at the big me. “Hey! Here I am!”
The big me just stared at the little me. The big me then picked the little me up, got up and ran off the basketball court and sat in the corner of the sports stadium. I could see my friends resume playing basketball, one of my friends were angry with me because I had interrupted the game. My Teacher walked over and sat with me. “I didn’t know I had a small me, I am going to look after and protect her”. My Teacher told me to go the sick room and rest.

continued

When I got home, I decided to call the little me, Little Dolly (3). Little Dolly was only five years old. I put Little Dolly in the dollhouse that was in my bedroom. I sat down on my bed and watched Little Dolly. Little Dolly was crying. I didn’t know why Little Dolly was crying. Little Dolly did not want to be in the dollhouse. All I knew was that I had to protect Little Dolly and keep her safe.

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(2) Bass and Davis (1988, 78) explain that ‘memories can be triggered’ by a variety of ways. I don’t know what happened to trigger my episode, however it is clear that I did see a little man and then I found Little Dolly.
Bass and Davis (1988, 75) state that ‘memories come up under many different circumstances’ and I felt reassured to read further down the track, that memories ‘don’t always surface in such dramatic ways’.

(3) Carter (2008, 95) explains that ‘young children are natural multiples’. Carter (2008, 95) helped me to understand why I was dealing with a Little Dolly:

“Children get better at weaving together their ‘I’s as they get older, but the juvenile network of self is generally much patchier than that of adults. Most of the little ‘I’s that children generate just fade away, like wispy clouds in a summer sky. But some are too intensely experienced to disappear. If the experiences in which they are incorporated are also very different from anything the child has previously experienced these small characters may not merge with others and will remain isolated from the rest of the previous and future ‘I’s and frozen in time”

(Carter R, 2008, Multiplicity: The New Science of Personality, Little Brown, London EC4Y 0DY.)
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Why Is Everyone Killing Me?

I am walking down a path. It is quite bright. There are other paths that lead off from it. I continue to walk forward. I walk past someone. I continue along my path when I see that the person has turned around and followed me. The person has pulled out a sword and has stabbed me in the back. I watch myself die. I watch myself come out of my body and I observe the dead body that was once alive. I then look at the person who has killed me. I am confused. I ask, “Why did you just do that?”
The person doesn’t answer. The person just smiles and walks off.
I stay with my body trying to understand what just happened.

I go to a place where there are many people seated around a stage. I take my seat. It is my seat to take. It has always been my seat. Everyone has his or her own seat. As I sit quietly, I hear my name called and I am called to walk up onto the stage. I walk up onto the stage and when I get there, a man greets me with a smile and then takes out a sword and kills me in front of everyone. I again, watch myself come out of my body and I observe the dead body that was once alive. I look at the person who has just killed me and I am confused. I ask, “Why did you just kill me in front of everyone?” “What did I do to be killed in this manner?” The person doesn’t answer. The person just summons someone to remove my dead body off the stage. I follow my dead body and have no idea what has just happened.

I am in the dark room again and I see that as I stand in the centre of my room, a man repeatedly kills me with his sword. Over and over again, the sword pierces my little body. I see that there are many of me. Every time I am killed, I leave my dead body. I get up and stand looking at this man when the sword kills me again. This goes on for a long time. This is a killing session. I now know what is going to happen so when the sword pierces my body, I die and do not leave my body. I stay in my dead body. The man who is killing me with the sword only leaves the room when he knows I am finally dead and it is only when I know he has left the room, do I get up and look at my dead body.

I am in a café. I am with some people when I see the man that killed me when I was walking along the path. I see him and continue talking to the people I am sitting with. This man walks over to my table and takes out his sword and kills me in front of everyone. I leave my dead body where it has fallen and ask the man, “Why are you killing me?” He doesn’t answer, he just grabs my coffee and walks off. I don’t know who this man is. I don’t know why this man is killing me.

I am to meet up with some people in the same café. I walk in and look around for them. I see them in the corner of the café. As I walk over I see them sitting and talking with the man that kills me. I don’t even get a chance to sit down when the man pulls out his sword and kills me. I do not speak to him, I do not even bother trying to understand it. I pick up my dead body and walk out of the café.

I see I am in the dark room but this time the Sun is shining through the window. My Sister and I are eating tomato soup at our little red table. We are laughing and giggling. My Mother comes in and kills both of us with her sword. She kills my Sister first and then me. We leave our dead bodies and go and lay down on our beds. We do not understand why we have just been killed. My Sister after she has finished crying asks me, “What did we do wrong?”
I don’t answer because I am still crying.

The Man Calls Me A Whore

I run away from a man who frightens me. I have been running from him for a long time. I know he is killing me but I don’t know why. I decide to stop running, turn around and run towards him. I ask, “Why are you following me?” He puts handcuffs on me and takes me to a jail cell. He puts me in prison.

The man, who I am in jail with, scares and confuses me. I am handcuffed to the prison bars whilst he walks around looking at me. He is intimidating and has all the power here. I ask, “Why am I am in jail?”

He replies, “You are in jail because you are a whore.”
“But I am only five years old! What is a whore?”

I don’t understand why I am being punished for being a whore and remain silent. I don’t even understand why I am being called a whore. I don’t even know what a whore is. The man says he will keep me in jail to make sure I behave myself. The man says if I do as he says everything will be all right, so I sit in jail under the supervision of a man who is punishing me because he says I am a whore .

The man bothers Big Dolly and she decided to cut off her breasts and cut off her long hair. Another woman comes into the jail to see me and asks, “What is happening to you?”
She looks like a woman. I tell her to go away! She is not my friend at all. She pretends to be my friend so I can be punished for being a whore and she won’t. She is free to walk around. She is not in jail.

The man says that while I look the way I do, he would not chase me to try to kill me. He says he wouldn’t even enjoy raping me. I continue to sit in the jail cell. The man says I am hurting myself to deny him. He tells me to take off my jail clothes and walk around naked. He says now, there isn’t anyone who would want me or want to have sex with me. I am so thin. I have no muscle tone. My ribs are visible. I am ugly. My head is shaved and there are two scars where my breasts used to be. The man says I no longer look like a woman, I don’t even feel like a woman.

I think to myself, I have some power here, not much, but I have some. I have enough power to prevent being raped and killed. The man says he no longer wants me to be in the jail, in fact he no longer wants to even look at me. He tells me to pick out clothes to wear for when I leave. I chose to wear a black tight fitting tee shirt and black pants so I look even thinner and everyone can see I do not have breasts.

The man says he wants to take me to a hospital because I am sick. I am so confused. The man calls me a whore, punishes me and then wants to take me to a hospital so I can get well? I say I am not going to a hospital so I can get well. Once I am well, he will only put me back in jail and punish me for being a whore.

As I walk from the jail cell and out of the prison I see there are other woman walking around freely. They look like women. I ask the man, “Why aren’t they in jail?” He says, “These women are not whores, but you are”. I don’t understand this.

I leave the jail and move into a house. I decide to live alone. I am a recluse. I feel safe living this way. After some time my hair has grown back and I have put a little bit of weight on. But the man’s face haunts me…I worry that if he sees me, he might decide to chase after me again to rape and kill me and then punish me for being a whore.

Inside the Bubble

I am in the dark place again but it is not my bedroom. All I see is a bubble of light. I have to look at this. I don’t know what it is so I walk over and look at it. I see that this bubble of light has two layers. Something is happening in the bubble of light. I try to see what is happening. I am standing up watching something that is happening in the bubble of light.

In the centre of this bubble, I can see someone is hurting a little girl. I don’t know why I am watching this. I don’t understand why I am seeing this. I look into the bubble again and I wonder if what I see is what I see. There is a man and he is raping a little girl. I am confused.

I see in the outer layer the little girl is trying to get away. She is kicking and screaming. I then look around the dark place and see that just outside the bubble of light, the little girl has fallen into the dark place, she looks dead.

continued

Bravo so far! Keep it up!!!

I just stand there in the dark place and observe what is happening. I don’t know why I am seeing this and who is this little girl? I look again at the little girl. I look at the same little girl being held down and raped, then I look at the little girl in the dark place dead on the floor.

As I am standing observing the bubble I see that a Ghost has walked over to me and has stood directly in front of me. I look at him and then look at the bubble. I don’t understand what is going on. I don’t like to see this and I want to leave the dark place but the Ghost won’t allow me to leave. I find a corner and sit down. I just stare at the bubble.

Take a Peek

I am sitting in the dark place with my back up against the wall. I don’t know what else to do. There is nothing I can do. I am trapped in a dark place watching what is happening in the bubble of light. I don’t want to see this. I sit with my back up against the wall and cover my eyes. I begin to cry.

I don’t uncover my eyes but I peek through my fingers. The bubble is still there. I can’t look at this bubble anymore. The confusion and despair rises up through my body and the emotions burst out. I begin to run around in circles in the darkness, yelling
“Get me out of this place!”
I run up to the Ghost and begin to yell at him. I hit him. He doesn’t move. The Ghost justs stands there while I hit him. I grab his shirt and clasp it in my hands. I hold the front of his shirt and I yell in his face,
“Get me out of here!”

The Ghost doesn’t move, doesn’t answer. I let go of his shirt and stand looking at him. I walk over to the bubble and see the same thing I have seen before. It is replaying over and over again. I feel frustrated at what I see and don’t understand why I have to keep watching this. I stand helpless and all I can do is stare and breath.

I can see the little girl on the floor that looks dead. She is outside of the bubble. She has not moved, she does not move. I walk over to look at her. This little girl has no clothes on. I kneel down to look closely at her.

I stand up and shake my head. I turn and run to the Ghost. I start to hit him. My arms swing just to hit out at him. I then grab onto his shirt once more and scream into his face,
“Get me out of this place!”
“Just get me out of this place!”
The Ghost doesn’t speak or move.

I run back to the little girl that is dead on the floor. I pick her up and hold her. I sit and hold her in my arms and cry. “Why does this little girl look like me?”

As I hold her, I start to scream out to the Ghost… “Why?”
“Why does?” sobbing
“This little girl…”

There I remain, a woman holding onto a little girl who doesn’t move, doesn’t talk.
I sit in the darkness underneath the bubble of light and hold onto a little girl who looks like me when I was five. I see a dressing gown nearby. I had a dressing gown exactly the same when I was little. I hold the little girl and I stare at the dressing gown. I then look at the little girl. Tears stream down my face.

The Ghost walks up to me and sits down beside me. I don’t look at him. I am holding the little girl and stroking her face. He gently touches my head and asks, “How brave are you?”

I don’t answer.

Ready for Battle

I am walking along a path. This time I have my own sword. I walk along being mindful that I have been killed in the past so I look in all directions keeping watch for anyone who tries to kill me. Sure enough the man that has killed me on many occasions walks past me. Instead of walking forward, I stop and turn around. I draw my sword ready to defend myself. I watch him turn around and walk back towards me. He is surprised to see that I have turned to face him. This does not stop him from reaching for his sword. Before he can kill me, I plunge my sword into him. He drops to the ground and I look at him. As he dies he looks at me. He, after death just stares at me with such anger. He doesn’t ask why I have killed him; he knows why and he knows now that I am ready for battle.

My Mother and I are in a kitchen. I am washing the dishes. My Mother is walking around the kitchen. As she walks she is holding her sword. She doesn’t know that I have a sword. I have kept it hidden from her. I stop washing the dishes and turn to face her. I draw out my sword and she stops and stares at me. She shows me her teeth and that brow frown. She raises her sword ready to strike. I raise my sword to enter into the battle. She knocks the sword out of my hand and kills me.

I am sitting in a room with my Sister and my Mother. My Mother is walking around the room waving her sword about. My Sister and I just sit quietly while she waves her sword. We fear we could be killed at any moment. I cannot find my sword, I need it right now, but I can’t find it. My Mother’s sword comes dangerously close and I move from where I am sitting to avoid being killed. My Mother kills my Sister with her sword but the sword remains stuck in my Sister’s body. My Mother can not pull the sword out of my Sister. She has let go of her sword. I pick up my Mother’s sword and move in for the kill. My Mother backs away and falls to the ground. I could kill her with her own sword but while she is on the ground, I simply lay her sword in front of her. She knows I could have killed her. I know I could have killed her but I don’t want to kill her in front of my Sister. I help my Sister pick up her dead body and place her back in her seat. I walk past my Mother still slumped on the ground, she looks up at me and I look down at her. I walk out of the room.

On My Island

I am on my lovely Island. I have a home on my Island. I made myself a home on my Island. I spend all my time making pottery and painting. The Island is how I want it to be and this is my home now. It is very peaceful. I can hear the sounds of the ocean. The Sun is high in the sky and there is not a cloud in sight. I feel wonderful. I feel happy.

The man who killed me in the cafe comes to visit me on my Island. I am not sure why he has come to see me. I don’t trust him at all but I welcome him to my Island and invite him to have lunch with me.

We are sitting on the beautiful patio eating lunch. I tell him what I have been doing. After lunch I show him my pottery wheel and my paintings. He doesn’t seem impressed. He is starting to annoy me and I want him to go away. I avoid eye contact with him and know he is up to something.

“Why have you come to see me today?”
“I come and see you everyday”
“I didn’t see you yesterday!”
“Yes you did. Don’t you remember?”
“I would remember if you came to see me yesterday. You are lying!”
“No, I am not lying. I want you to look at me.”
“Why do you want me to look at you?”
“I want you to look at me and tell me what I am wearing”
“You are wearing a blue shirt”
“Yes, that is right. Can you see anything besides the blue shirt?”
“No”

The man says he has something for me. I am sitting opposite him and he is holding out something for me to take. I see that he has my dolly.
“Why do you have my dolly? I hid my dolly in a box under my bed!” I snatched my dolly out of his hands…
“No one is allowed to touch my dolly!”

The man snatched my dolly back and pulled out a tiny little brush and began to brush my dolly’s hair. I started to feel agitated and wanted him to leave my dolly alone. He is upsetting me and I don’t want him to be touching my dolly.

Angrily, I yelled, “Get away from me!”
“You’re a bad man…stop touching my dolly” He finished brushing dolly’s hair and handed dolly back to me. I grabbed hold of dolly and ran off into the Island (4) to hide from him. I was angry with him.

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(4) Carter (2008, 14) suggests that ‘children who are repeatedly abused learn to ‘go away’ in their heads when the situation becomes intolerable.’ Carter (2008, 65) writes that this is a way of ‘defending the self’. It is ‘daydreaming but, technically, it is a form of dissociation’:

“the fearful Lucy in her bedroom was temporarily put to sleep while another Lucy – a little girl in a garden – was created in her stead”

Carter (2008, 65) explains that the subject ‘was separating the sound of her parents’ voices, and her other current sensations, thoughts and emotions from the picture of the children in the garden’.

(Carter R, 2008, Multiplicity: The New Science of Personality, Little Brown, London EC4Y 0DY.)
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Time to move

I was running through white columns. I could see a mist surrounded the bases of the columns. The mist started to rise and it had soon become so thick that I could no longer see the columns. I could no longer run because I could not see. I placed my hands out in front of me and felt my way as I walked. I felt the columns and went from column to column, hoping that I was walking forward. I started to feel cold. I began to feel so cold and started to shiver. The shivering subsided and I felt a peace come over me.

I stopped walking, placed my arms beside me and succumbed to the mist. I tried to walk but my legs were stiff and felt so heavy. I could not move.

I heard a gentle voice “You have to move”
I then saw the girl that was dead on the floor.
“She is dead”
“No, the little girl is paralysed”
The child had been paralysed for a long time, unable to move; all I could see was a single tear falling down her cheek. I began to cry at the sight of the trapped child’s single tear.
“I can’t move”
“Will yourself to move”

“My body won’t move”
“Will your body to move”

continued

“It is time for you to move”
I look at the child and simultaneously as the tears fell down my cheeks, the tears fell down hers.

Desperately and helplessly, I begged, “Please help me, I can’t get my body to move”
“It is safe now, it is time to move your body”

I start with my toes, while my eyes look for signs of danger. I then move my fingers very slowly. I am frightened that if I move too soon, I will separate from myself and when I sit up, I will look at my body still lying there. I have to move all of me and all of me has to get up.

I slowly move and my body and I become one again. I then see the Ghost. He wraps me in my dressing gown and picks me up from the bed.

Giving Up

I am in a dark place again. I am standing on a narrow ledge. The ledge is so narrow the tips of my toes hang over the edge. I stand upright and try to maintain my balance. I look around but I cannot see what is below, what is in front or what is above me; all I can see is me and the ledge so I stand on the ledge because that is all I can do.

I stay like this for a long time and consider my options. I then realise that I don’t have any options. I can’t continue to stand like this. My legs are shaking and it has become too hard to keep standing. I feel like I am fighting a losing battle. I consider that falling might actually be better than trying to stand on this narrow ledge. I succumb to my weakness and collapse into the darkness. I am conscious that I am falling and wonder if there is an end to the journey of the fall. I don’t know where or what it is I am falling into. I am too tired to care.

I do not know when I stopped falling. All I know is that I did. I did not feel the pain at the time of the fall. Where am I? Is it the bottom of the glass? Is this dark place my psyche? I am left to sit down somewhere and feel my way around. I cannot see or hear anything. All I know now is that there is a narrow ledge above me. I don’t know how far above it is. I just know it is above me and I am below it.

All I can do now is sit and think. I reach out to feel for something, anything that might be with me in this dark place. I feel something next to me. I pick it up. I can’t see what it is, so I begin to feel it. It is long and narrow. It is lightweight and feels hollow.
I reach out to find if there is anything else around me I can feel. I find another object. It is very similar to the first one but it is thicker and longer. It also feels lightweight and hollow. I put it beside the other object and on my hands and knees crawl around trying to find anything else.

As I crawl I feel something brush up against my leg. I stop crawling and touch with my hands what is touching my leg. I reach back to pick it up. It is oval shaped. I turn it around and then feel it has two holes that sit side by side. Beneath the two holes there is another small hole and beneath that is a bigger hole. As I feel this, I begin to realise what it is.

Desperately and clumsily I retreat back in the direction I crawled from. My desperation turns into panic as I realise that I have lost all sense of direction. I scream in terror. My terror is incensed when I hear the echo of my own screams. I get lost in the screaming. I am on my knees and all I can do is scream. Every breath brings with it another echo.

As I scream, I look around. It is completely black so I close my eyes. I huddle myself up into a ball on the floor and continue to scream. I continue to scream until exhaustion takes away my strength to.

I don’t know how long I remain huddled on the floor. I am in the fetal position and as I lay there I want to go back to the womb. I want my Mother. I need my Mother. My Mother is not here to comfort me. No one is here to comfort me. I am alone and there is no one to comfort me in this dark place.

I see a dim light filter in. I cannot see very well because my eyes have not adjusted to the light. I remain unfocused for sometime. I am beyond fear now. I feel nothing. I am numb and gaze out with no desire for comprehension.

I sit up and look around the dark place. There is just enough light to see what I don’t really want to see. I want to see but I don’t want to see; I already know what it is I don’t want to see because the things that I felt in the dark place told me what I needed to know.

As I look around, I begin to realise that the things I felt in this dark place could never prepare me for the reality of what was before me. This dark place is a graveyard; nothing lives here, skeletons are piled up upon each other. I begin to cry, this time though the tears fall out of my eyes without sound. My eyes are crying. My eyes feel what I won’t allow my body to embrace. I don’t want to feel what my eyes feel.

I am sitting in a dark place with skeletons. Is this my closet? I look at my body and can see my flesh. I am flesh…I am not a skeleton so why am I here? Maybe I have just died and my flesh is yet to decompose?
I look at my body and look for signs of decomposure. I check my pulse to see if I am alive. I can’t feel the pulse in my wrist, anxiously, I hold my fingers to my throat and hold my breath to still my body so if there is a pulse, I will feel it. I feel the pulse in my throat and I exhale, I smile feeling relieved that I am alive. I thought I was dead but I am alive. I have a pulse. I pause and it is in that long pause that I find rest.

Raise Up The One You Want

My Mother kills me. She kills me with her sword. Every time she kills me, my body falls to the floor, I die but I come out of my body and stand back up. I refuse to die but after so many killing sessions I realise standing up is hopeless. I allow her to kill me and I decide to stay with my dead body. I see her then reviving me. For her to have a relationship with me and for keeping up appearances, she resurrects one that she has killed. It is not that she doesn’t love me because she does. My Mother needs to customize me in order for her life to be how she wants it.

The resurrected one allows her to live in denial. The resurrected one take all the responsibility for being raped and sexually abused. The resurrected one does not talk about the rape and sexual abuse. It is too painful for her to discuss so for her well being the past stays in the past and it is never spoken about.

Even though she has resurrected the one she can live with, unconsciously, she does not want to look at my face. When she is with me, she sees the sexual abuse and would rather that truth just go away. She would rather I didn’t exist in her life.

I do not lose sleep over this anymore. I understand my Mother protects herself. I am the threat because my face, my dysfunction and reclusive life remind her of things she does not want to face. My Mother does not want to take responsibility for the past. It would kill her if she had to deal with the past. She is not entirely responsible but she bears some responsibility.

Feeling Angry

I feel angry. I feel so angry. The other night I dreamt I exploded into this huge fireball. The fireball was so big, it took the Earth with it. Funny thing is, the night I dreamt of this, I went to bed feeling quite peaceful. Today, I am on fire. There is something within me burning out of control. I have to let it burn freely, if I try to repress this, I will spontaneously combust.

The fire has to be contained. I don’t know how to contain it. I feel angry that I have lost my life in an abyss that holds many dark places. The abyss is a maze you don’t even know you are in. Once you are in it, there is no way out. One dark place after the other, there is no end.

My sword isn’t enough. I need and desperately want to pick up my sword and kill a man. No words can explain how angry I feel. I hate everyone right now. I know hating everyone is not correct as I do not know everyone. I know it is misdirected anger. Can I direct it at the person responsible? No, I can’t. Why? Because he would be dead and buried and it would be over for him. Let him live I say. I want him to live and suffer. I want him to live in my nightmares and have no escape. I don’t have an escape so why should he?

Tomorrow, I will feel different. I will try to look at his actions and be subjective. Then I feel angry once more because to be subjective you have to put yourself in that person’s shoes. Well, the biggest problem I have got is that I can put on his shoes but the shoes don’t fit. I am nothing like him and I can’t even comprehend being him for one minute to be subjective.

Little Dolly Meets Big Dolly

I am in the hallway of that house. I am walking into the bathroom. I see that there is a grown up woman that lives inside my little body, she has just come out to let me know she is with me. I don’t like her. I tell her, “Get away from me”… There is something very wrong. “How can a woman come out of my little body?” And, “Why does this woman live with me?”

She should go away and get her own body to live in. I don’t know who this woman is but I don’t like her. She has sex. She doesn’t fight at all. She does what she is told. I don’t want her anywhere near me. I tell her to go away. She is sleeping in my body and she says that I can wake her up if I need her. But I hate her. I want to kill her.

She looks different to me. She has dark hair. I have light blonde hair, so I wonder why she lives inside of my body? I am a little girl. I am only five years old. This woman should not be in my body!
I get so angry with her.
“Who are you and want do you want?”
She tells me that she is me and that I am in her body…

continued

“I am not grown up! Get out of my body”

She starts to cry and is confused too. She doesn’t know why I am in her body. She says she has done nothing wrong. I feel sorry for her and tell her she can stay, but she has to sleep and she is not allowed to have sex. She is not allowed to bother Little Dolly at all.

Who Is The Ghost?

I have always run away, it is an unconscious and conscious thing. I didn’t know why I run. I didn’t know what I was running from until I saw the Ghost. The Ghost scared me and so I ran away. I ran to a house and I hid there. I felt safe but could see a Ghost was with me. I tried to ignore the Ghost but it began to bother me. Why is there a Ghost with me? I decided to move. I decided to run. I ran to another house to hide. I looked around the house to see if the Ghost was with me. I had left the Ghost behind when I ran away. I felt safe for the moment.

I was in the mirror in the bathroom when I saw the Ghost. I was startled to see the Ghost and froze in fear. I just stared at the Ghost hoping the Ghost would vanish. I thought I had left the Ghost behind. I looked at the Ghost. The Ghost was a man and he knew I could see him. I tried to ignore the Ghost again. I tried to deny that I had seen the Ghost again. I walked out of the bathroom into my bedroom. The Ghost followed me and stood by my bedroom door.

Why is there a Ghost following me around? Everywhere I go the Ghost goes. I want the Ghost to go away and leave me alone. I decide to keep busy. I fill my life and house with many distractions. I am determined to forget about the Ghost.

But the Ghost will not allow me to rest.

I cannot sleep because the Ghost is upon me. I stay awake for the rest of the night, I just sit and stare into nothing. Did that really happen? NO! This is not happening. I am not brave and this is not happening to me.
I stay that way until morning. I shower. I dry myself off and the Ghost is haunting me. I don’t want to look into the mirror…I don’t understand what is happening. Whatever this is, it is not happening. I go, wrapped in my towel back into my bed and pull the quilt up over my head. I stay like that for a month.

Big Dolly Has Big Problems

Big Dolly has too many people in her body that confuses her.

Little Dolly draws a picture of a man, inside the man is two women. One has light hair and the other has dark hair. They are both the same size, the same age and were born when the man killed Little Dolly when she was five. They are twins but they have very different personalities.

Little Dolly draws another picture of a woman and inside the woman is a little girl. The little girl’s head sits underneath the woman’s belly button. The woman is Big Dolly. The girl is Little Dolly.

Little Dolly needs the twins to live with her. Little Dolly doesn’t know how to look after herself. Little Dolly only thinks about eating, going to school and doing what she is told. Little Dolly lets the twins take over.

Little Dolly wants the twins to go away now so she can grow up. The dark headed one is very good at being a woman. She can have sex, get married and do what grown up women do. The light headed one runs away and hides in her house. She doesn’t like anyone touching her. She is always scared. Little Dolly would like to be Little Dolly again now she is no longer paralysed.

Big Dolly didn’t know about the twins so Big Dolly had big problems when they left. Big Dolly did not know how to be Big Dolly. Big Dolly started to fight with Little Dolly all the time. When Little Dolly started to move again, Little Dolly came back to life.

Little Dolly draws another picture of the same woman and the same little girl. This time Little Dolly has coloured the space around Little Dolly with black crayon. Little Dolly is surrounded by darkness. Big Dolly thinks it would be better is she were dead so that there will only be Little Dolly and Little Dolly can grow up. Big Dolly cries because she is stuck with Little Dolly and thinks Little Dolly is broken and can never be fixed.

Big Dolly doesn’t know what will happen to her now Little Dolly is moving. Big Dolly feels the pain. There is a great pain in Big Dolly because Little Dolly is inside her. It unsettles Big Dolly to know Little Dolly is now moving around in a dark place. Little Dolly wants to come out of the dark place but is frightened. All she is doing in the dark place is moving her toes and fingers. Little Dolly feels it is safe so has started moving around a lot now. Little Dolly is moving so much it is interfering with Big Dolly’s life.

Big Dolly’s life is very empty. When the twins left, Big Dolly just stayed at home and didn’t know what to do. Big Dolly doesn’t sleep very well. She doesn’t eat very well either. Big Dolly doesn’t cook anymore. Little Dolly doesn’t know how to cook and when Little Dolly moved she took over Big Dolly and now just eats breakfast cereal. Little Dolly knows how to get her breakfast, oh and ice cream!

Big Dolly wants to have a boyfriend but knows Little Dolly is inside her. Little Dolly is very hard to live with. Big Dolly has trouble living with her so Big Dolly will not have a boyfriend. Big Dolly doesn’t want Little Dolly to be raped so Big Dolly has to stay on her own. Now that Little Dolly is moving around in a dark place, Big Dolly can’t get away from her.

I Have A Secret

I have a lot of secrets but this one is top secret. I don’t ever tell it. I am afraid to tell this secret so I lock it away in a box. The box has a key. I forget about my secret that is top secret until I see the key. It is a little tiny gold key. It is like the key I got as a present when I turned 21. But that key is a big key and that key, they say is the key to the door of life. This little key opens a little box that I hid, out of sight and out of mind.

I stare at the little gold key for a long time. I am not sure I want to find that box and unlock it. I thought I had hid it away to stay away forever, but now I have found the key. I feel upset but wonder if other people have what I have stored in my little box. I know what is in the box but wasn’t sure if I could live with it. Maybe it would be all right for me to open it and try to live with it?

I pick up the little gold key. It is hard to pick up now because my fingers are bigger. I had little fingers when I locked this secret away. I unlock the little box. Inside the box is a little piece of paper that is folded up into a square. I delicately unfold the piece of paper and I can see the picture that has been drawn on it with a red crayon. I see it is a picture of me.

I have drawn a picture of me. I have a little head, a little body, two arms, two legs and a vagina. The vagina is a little circle and the circle is coloured in red. Little Dolly has drawn a cross over it. Little Dolly is confused and upset.

Big Dolly has a crisis now. Big Dolly has to live with two vaginas.

Now, I can’t make the other vagina go away. It is there all the time. It is bothering me. Does anyone else have two vaginas? How can I live with two vaginas?

Amazing

Little Dolly has drawn a picture. It is a picture of Big Dolly and inside Big Dolly is Little Dolly. One half of Little Dolly is a boy and the other half a girl. Little Dolly loves the little boy. Little Dolly called him Amazing. He is amazing. He makes Little Dolly laugh.

He can make and do the most wonderful things. Amazing can throw up in the air a handful of dust and the dust changes into butterflies. Amazing knows how much Little Dolly loves butterflies. Amazing can be the raindrops and taught Little Dolly to do what he could do. Little Dolly thought she was a cloud and became the cloud. When Little Dolly didn’t want to be the cloud anymore she turned into rain and fell to the ground and then sprang up to become the grass. Amazing could always find Little Dolly. Little Dolly and Amazing play together all the time.

One day, Little Dolly disappeared and Amazing had to find her. Little Dolly decided to be his tear drops and Little Dolly came out when he cried and he found her. When Little Dolly disappeared again, Little Dolly saw Amazing collecting all his teardrops in a cup and looking inside the cup just in case Little Dolly was there.

Little Dolly decided to be Amazing’s pen. Amazing didn’t know where Little Dolly was but this way Little Dolly was always close by. Amazing was sitting in his special place at his desk. Every time he picked up his pen, he was holding Little Dolly. Amazing was worried because he hadn’t found Little Dolly and when Little Dolly saw that Amazing was upset, she decided to change back into herself and stood on his desk and smiled. If Little Dolly hides, Amazing will always find her.

Little Dolly loves Amazing. Amazing separated from Little Dolly. Little Dolly was heart broken. Little Dolly cried so much because Amazing threw Little Dolly in the dark place. Little Dolly thought Amazing didn’t love her anymore but Amazing put her in the dark place for a reason.

Amazing loves his Little Dolly and always looks after her. Amazing found Little Dolly when she was sitting outside of her body. Little Dolly did not have a body so Amazing put Little Dolly into his body so Little Dolly could live again.

continued

Amazing went away so Little Dolly could grow up into Big Dolly. When Big Dolly finally met Amazing, she loved him too. Big Dolly loves him more than anything or anyone. Amazing plays mind games. He sent out a thousand daggers towards Big Dolly to see what Big Dolly would do. Big Dolly turned the daggers into feathers in a split second. Amazing sent out a thousand rats towards Big Dolly. But Big Dolly turned them into moths. The moths then flew upward seeking the light and left Big Dolly alone. Amazing was standing opposite looking at what Big Dolly had done. Big Dolly just smiled and sent him a million love hearts to swirl all around him.

Amazing is still upset about what happened and has multiple personalities. Amazing separated from Big Dolly because he had multiple personalities. Big Dolly doesn’t care and loves Amazing regardless. Amazing is so special that Big Dolly is happy just to be with one of his personalities because Big Dolly knows whoever is with her, it is always Amazing in disguise. Big Dolly would like Amazing to just be himself but that is a lot to ask. Amazing is so very special that he could never be just one personality. He is a creative genius and Big Dolly loves him, all of him, whomever he wants or needs to be.

Nothing

“When I grow up I am going to be a somebody! I am not going to be nothing!” Yelled Little Dolly.

Big Dolly always remembered what Little Dolly had said. It was always in the back of Big Dolly’s mind troubling her. Little Dolly felt as though she was nothing. Little Dolly wanted to be special, wanted to be loved and if she was ‘a somebody’ then she would be loved and she would be happy.

Big Dolly tried many things to be ‘a somebody’ and each somebody she was, it wasn’t good enough. After a while Big Dolly accepted that she could never be ‘a somebody’ that was special and loved. Big Dolly accepted she was nothing and told Little Dolly she was nothing and she just had to accept that.

Big Dolly gave up on everything she once aspired to be. Even though Big Dolly feared being nothing, after a while, Big Dolly liked being nothing to anyone, anything:

I am in a dark place again. I have been in so many dark places I no longer fear them.

This dark place is different. I realise that I cannot feel that I am lying down, but I am lying down. I cannot feel anything against my body. I can not see my body and try to feel if I have one. I don’t have a body. I sit in this dark place and I have no body. I then consider that perhaps all I am in this dark place is my consciousness? This dark place has no start, no finish and no boundaries. It is an endless expanse.

This is the nothing place. Nothing exists here except me because I am nothing. Although I once feared being nothing, I feel very happy that I exist as nothing. How very clever of me! No one will find me here. No one can hurt or reject me here. No one can rape or abuse me here. I feel happy because I know that nothing is the basis of everything so that means if I am nothing, I am the basis of everything. And who looks for nothing? I laugh and consider that I am so very clever.

I hear a man’s voice. He asks me if I like being nothing and existing as nothing? I feel angry that someone has come into my nothing place.
“I am nothing… I like being nothing. Nothing is my name…just go away!”

This man brings illusions with him and he creates one for me. He wraps the illusion up in a bubble and places me inside of it. I burst the bubble; I smash the illusion he has created for me.
“You can create your illusions! But I know it is only an illusion. When your illusion is gone, know that nothing will still exist and if I am nothing then I will exist. It is from nothing that you create all illusions. Everything comes from and returns to nothing”.

“Why do you want to exist as nothing? The man asked.
“Because being nothing is special. Being nothing is important. Without nothing you can’t have something…being nothing is safe. Who can comprehend nothing? Who would consider that my consciousness exists in and as nothing? No one can comprehend nothing!”
I then heard the man laugh…
“Well then, allow me to introduce myself. I am No one”
I paused and considered No one’s words.
I felt angry and yelled, “No one is allowed here, this is my safe place!”
The man laughed again…
“And that is why I am here”.
“No one can comprehend Nothing!”… I yelled.
The man laughed again…
“I am No one and I comprehend Nothing”
“Why are you No one?” I asked.
“Why are you Nothing?” He asked.
“Because I chose to be Nothing!” I argued.
The man laughed again
“As you decided to be Nothing. I needed to be No one in order to comprehend Nothing. The only way I could find Nothing was to be No one”.

I felt delighted, that someone decided to be No one in order to comprehend me, Nothing.
My delight was short lived when No one began to yell in the most frightening voice.
“If No one can rape Nothing, No one can abuse Nothing and No one can hurt Nothing... and I am No one and you are Nothing… What do you think that means? Hmm?”
In the smallest voice, I answered, “It means, you can rape me, you can abuse me and you can hurt me”

I decided to run from No one and from Nothing. I know understood why Little Dolly so desperately didn’t want to be nothing. Nothing is a place where something happened and No one was there. Nothing is a place Little Dolly goes to, to run away from No one.

As I ran from No one and from being Nothing, I saw Amazing’s face. I stopped running and we looked into one another.
“You were No one just then!” I yelled.
He nodded his head.

Going Back To My Body

I am in the dark place. I see that I am still holding the little girl who I found paralysed on the floor. I am no longer crying; I just comfort the little girl.

The Ghost is sitting beside me and does not move, nor does he speak. He just sits with me as if to let me know he is there. I want to smash his face in for chasing me and bringing me to this place. But I hold back because I don’t understand what is unfolding. I do want to smash his face in. I tell him.
He doesn’t say anything.

While I sit and hold the little dead girl, I look at where she has fallen. She must have fallen out of the bubble and onto this floor. This girl must have been raped. I can see the same girl in the bubble struggling to get away from a man. I wonder why I will not do anything to help her. I don’t know why I just sit here and hold her. I could go into the bubble and pull the man off of her. I just can’t move. I am too shocked at what I am seeing, from what is happening.

The Ghost speaks and tells me it is time I went back to my body.
“What?”
“I am in my body”
“No, you refuse to go back to your body”
“I am in my body”
“No, you are not, you ran away from this…”
“This child is not me!”
“This child is you.”
“No, no, no…this is not me…” starting to cry,
“The child that you are comforting is you”

The Ghost stands up and walks away, leaving me to cry. I want to smash his face in. I want to smash someone’s face in. I just have to smash something, someone. I look at the bubble and I see the man raping the child and then I decide it is his face I am going to smash in as soon as I sort out the child that can't move.

I am crying again and I clench my teeth. I start to feel angry. I throw the child down and run up to the Ghost. I grab his shirt and clench it within my hands.
“I am not going back in there!”
I push my fists that are clenching his shirt into his chest; “I am not going back into her body!”
“I am a grown woman! How can I go into her body, now I am no longer the same age? I will be paralysed again. I am not going back to feel this!”

The Ghost just stands there again and does not answer. I shove him with whatever strength I have and run back to where I have left the child. I can’t do it. I just can’t do this. I stand and look at her on the floor unable to move. Fear overcomes me and there is just no way I am going to do this. It is hopeless. I am hopeless.

I decide to sit down and just look at her. It must be awful to be paralysed for so long. I can’t leave her there paralysed. I can’t help myself but I can help her. What am I saying? I can’t help myself? This is me and I am the only one who can help me. I walk up closer to her and lay down next to her. The Ghost walks over and tells me it is safe to return to my body.

Safe? So what! It might be safe but I still have to go in and feel this. I don’t want to feel this. What if I can’t move once I am in there? I don’t want to experience this. What am I saying? Am I really accepting this is me?

To hell with this, this child is not me. It is another child that looks like me and has the same dressing gown. I don’t need this #. I want my life back. "I don’t have to do this!” I scream.

Relive It Until You Accept It

My body will not allow me to forget. Big Dolly will remember and relive this whether she likes it or not! Big Dolly will relive it until she deals with it.

Night Sweats

I woke up to a night sweat. When they happen, I can only move my arms. I don’t understand why it is happening as I do nothing except feel the heat of my body and perspiration on my chest. I am aware of my breathing…I am distressed and in a state of panic. Night sweats are haunting me. All I know for the few seconds I experience this, I am in acute distress.

The morning brings with it a terrible rigid feeling. My body feels rigid. It is difficult to move. The entire day I have aches and pains in my body. My jaw feels stiff and aches. It feels as though I am walking knee deep in sand. I can’t lift my legs up out of the sand so I push each leg forward as best I can.

continued

If I Leave The Dark Place I Will Be Raped!

This one sentence replays over and over again in my mind. I have never understood it.

I am sitting in the dark place again. I am alone. I am huddled sitting on a floor. I hold my knees. I cry and don’t know what to do. I don’t like to be alone. I feel very frightened stuck in the dark place all by myself. I am very small and the dark place is huge. Everyone left the dark place and I am left here. I call out for the Ghost. I wait in the dark place for the Ghost to come and comfort me.

The Ghost walks over to me and I stand up, tears strolling down my face.
“Please, don’t leave me in this dark place all by myself!” I jump onto the Ghost and hold onto him. I have my arms around his neck holding on for dear life.
“Please…”
“This dark place is your body”
“The dark place is my body?”
“Yes”
“Why am I so small in my body?”
“You hid in your body when you were raped”

I start to feel a panic setting in.
“Is it still happening? Am I being raped right now? What is happening to me on the outside?

Anger

I am in a boxing ring. In the other corner is a blonde boy about seven years old. He is staring at me with such anger. I call him Anger. I don’t feel angry. I feel awkward and confused. I don’t understand why I am in the boxing ring with Anger to begin with. I will just have to defend myself as best I can while I am in the boxing ring.

“If you had done as you were told, we would not have been raped!”
I lifted up my gloves to shield my face…“It was your fault because you said NO! …Why did you stand up to him?”
Anger yelled as he threw out another right hook, “I didn’t stand up to him… you did!”
“NO! I didn’t! As if a little girl can say no and fight a grown up man? You were the one saying no…I was the one crying”
Anger dropped his arms to his side, stared at me and ran back to his corner. He climbed up over the ropes of the ring and then ran out of the hall.

I climbed out of the boxing ring and as I began to take off my gloves, I knew it was his fault…he didn’t want to admit it but he was the one that fought and struggled. He was the one who said no and now he tries to blame it all on me. He is trying to blame it all on me.

I have got a problem with Anger. I am always fighting with him. He blames me for being raped. He blames me for everything that has happened. He hates me and will never like me. That upsets me a lot. Anger calls me many names that hurt me. Anger and I will never be friends. I love Anger and feel sorry for him. I try to pacify him. I tell him I love him even though it is his entire fault.


Water Body

I see that I am swimming in dark water. The water is murky, it is quite hard to see where I am going but I continue to swim through it. I reach an embankment and come out of the water to rest on the bank. It is then that I realise my body is clear and made entirely out of water . I have a water body. The water in my body is still. It is crystal clear. I wonder where my physical body is? Is this my body?

While I sit and marvel at my water body, I see a man walk up to me and touch my water body. I watch the effect it has on my water body. The water begins to ripple outward similar to when a stone is thrown into a pond. The ripple expands outward until the water settles once again. My water body is still once more, so very calm.

I then watch the same man come back and touch my water body. He is rough and I just sit and watch him touching me. I don’t want him to touch me. I try to get back into the dark water but this man is now holding my water body down and placing his body onto my body, squashing my water body. There is so much pressure that the water wants to burst out. The water in my body is swishing about in all directions.

The man gets up off of my water body and walks away. I remain lying on the bank and cannot get up because my water body is convulsing. I have to wait a long time for my water body to settle down. I cannot do anything except wait until the current begins to flow again in one direction. I watch the water current flowing around in my body until all the water is still once more. I do not get up. I simply roll down the embankment back into the dark water. I swim off and decide to stay submerged in the dark water. It is safe in the dark water. I do not want this man to hurt my water body again.

The Box

I am in a steel box
I am the box
I have locked the box
It is steel
No one can get in the box
I want my privacy
I am thinking about sex
I need my thoughts to be private
I don’t want others to interfere with my box
I don’t want to have sex with anyone
I don’t want to hurt or kill anyone
I don’t want anyone getting too close
I am Angry

I try to masturbate in the steel box but I can’t because there are faces in the box flashing in front of my face. I recognise the faces and I start to feel angry. Then I see Anger’s face is in the box too. I wish they would all go away so I can masturbate.

Anger wants to hurt me because he is in the box and doesn’t want to be with me when I try to masturbate. He doesn’t like sex at all and calls me a whore for touching myself.

Anger remembers saying No! and then gets very big in my body. Anger begins to shake so much it hurts. Anger’s body is rigid, all of his muscles are tense and then he makes my body do that. Anger says he is going to hurt me if I masturbate.

I am upset that the faces are bothering me in the box. I am upset by the things they say too. No one and Sex have the same face. Anyone is a male friend of mine.
I want No one’s face to go away. I am sick of seeing his face. It is that man’s face. He The Box

I am in a steel box
I am the box
I have locked the box
It is steel
No one can get in the box
I want my privacy
I am thinking about sex
I need my thoughts to be private
I don’t want others to interfere with my box
I don’t want to have sex with anyone
I don’t want to hurt or kill anyone
I don’t want anyone getting too close
I am Angry

I try to masturbate in the steel box but I can’t because there are faces in the box flashing in front of my face. I recognise the faces and I start to feel angry. Then I see Anger’s face is in the box too. I wish they would all go away so I can masturbate.

Anger wants to hurt me because he is in the box and doesn’t want to be with me when I try to masturbate. He doesn’t like sex at all and calls me a whore for touching myself.

Anger remembers saying No! and then gets very big in my body. Anger begins to shake so much it hurts. Anger’s body is rigid, all of his muscles are tense and then he makes my body do that. Anger says he is going to hurt me if I masturbate.

I am upset that the faces are bothering me in the box. I am upset by the things they say too. No one and Sex have the same face. Anyone is a male friend of mine.
I want No one’s face to go away. I am sick of seeing his face. It is that man’s face. He is interfering with me and I feel so desperate, I desperately need to be left alone.

I am confused about Anyone’s face. Why is my friend’s face in the box?
I then consider what I thought about Anyone: I don’t want to have sex with Anyone; I don’t want to hurt or kill Anyone; I don’t want Anyone getting too close… he has been my friend for a long time. Perhaps I am feeling threatened by Anyone? Perhaps he is getting too close? Anyone did ask me for sex one day. I felt Angry then. I said NO! He seemed to be all right about it, but I worry that he might still want to have sex with me. Then I feel angry and scared. I said NO! before and bad things happened when I said NO!

I wish they would all just get lost so I can masturbate. As I try again to masturbate all their faces seem to blend together. I am confused and then I see Little Dolly’s face. Anyone becomes No one, No one becomes Anger, Sex becomes No one. I am so wretched. An emotion is welling up inside of me and I don’t know what it is. I start to cut myself in the box and the feeling goes away. All the faces once I cut myself fade a little, but they are still there.

Big Dolly is cutting herself. It is Big Dolly that I see in the box cutting her legs.

Shifting Consciousness

I am in the dark place and I feel too distressed. I feel so overwhelmed. I begin to kick and scream. I simply lay down on the floor and thrash my body about. I am in my dressing gown and as I kick and scream, the dressing gown opens up to expose my naked body. I have nothing on except my dressing gown. I am distraught. I want my pajamas on. I want my little pants but I cannot find them. I want the man to go away.

The man walks over to me and stands over me. He is standing over me yelling. I can see his mouth moving and the expression on his face. This man is so angry with me but I cannot hear what he is saying. I don’t want to hear his voice. I don’t want to be in this dark place with him. He has picked me up and is shaking my little body. He is yelling at me to stop screaming. I have to be quiet. I have to stop screaming. I have to stop crying. I can’t stop screaming. I can’t stop crying.

He has stood me on my two feet and is holding both of my arms. He is bending down to look me in face. He is shaking me and yelling into my face.
He is shaking me so hard that my body is moving every which way he shakes it but I see my mouth is open and tears are streaming down my face.

He is hitting me. Shaking and hitting me. With every strike of the back of his hand I separate myself from the reality. The shock and intensity of his anger and actions has caused the memory to fracture into segments.

continued

[edit on 2-1-2009 by Thurisaz]

Some segments have paused and others continue to play. The event has become staggered, as if it is in slow motion. I now see that I am in the dark place but now there is more than one of me. There are multiples of me in the dark place.

I am lying on the floor kicking and screaming; I am being shaken and hit; I am huddled up on the floor in a ball; I am holding my knees scrunched up in the corner of the room; I am frantically running around the dark place; I am standing with my head looking down at the floor saying no, no, no repetitively and I am standing at the entrance of the door crying.

Then I see that I am also standing in the room observing what is happening in the dark place, but I am not a child. I have grown up and I am now able to watch all the segments. I don’t know what segment goes where so I view many of me, all at once.

I feel detached from the segments and I am now able to view the segments without feeling the trauma. If a segment becomes too traumatic, I can shift my consciousness to a segment that is not as intense. I am angry at what I am observing. I watch the man and I am calmly seething.

I walk over to the man and stand next to him. He does not see that I am watching his actions. He stands over me, yells at me, hits me, rapes me and as he does this, I stand next to him watching all he does. I follow him wherever he goes and watch whatever he does. I am calmly walking around the dark place observing this man who is intimidating and abusing me as a child.

I now understand what this dark place is.

I now understand why I am experiencing this dark place. I also know that I am no longer trapped in the dark place and when things become too traumatic, I can leave the dark place and go back to it when I chose to. I finally have the power over the dark place. The dark place no longer has the power over me. I am not frightened of the dark place, nor am I frightened of the man who is in the dark place anymore.

The man in the dark place is now frightened of me, the adult, who is calmly walking around observing him and his actions.

I stood near him and watched him. He was completely unaware of where I was until he caught a glimpse of his shadow. He looked at his shadow and saw my face staring at him. He was shocked to see my shadow and he looked at me; when our eyes met, he lowered his eyes in fear. I continued to stare at him even though he would not look me in the eyes and he knew I knew. It was my turn to intimidate him. I didn’t have to say or do anything. Just my presence was enough.

Grey Place

I am in a grey place. It is the dark place but there is light here and it looks grey now. I am very small. I am walking around in the grey place. It is very quiet now. As I walk I wonder if this dark place really is my body. I don’t understand how my body can be a dark place or a grey place. How can I be so small walking around in my body? And why would I do that, if that were at all possible? I walk and I think.

If I am small walking around in my body, it means I have shrunk down into my body? I have shrunk inside my own body. That is just absurd. I walk and I continue to think.

A lot of bad things were happening in this dark place. I never liked being in this dark place. If the dark place is my body, then a lot of bad things were happening in this body and I never liked being in this body.

I rationally thought this dark place were memories. A journey into darkness to discover the truths I did not want to deal with, that I preferred not to remember. They were dark because I had blocked them out. I rationally thought that my brain had turned the light off on these bad memories so I could cope and that was why they were dark. For some reason, I became trapped in the memories and could not get out. During this dark time, in my mind, I was either in a jail cell or trapped in a dark room confused and distressed.

It seems my freedom and sanity relied upon ‘remembering’. I was trapped in a dark place and could never get out of it. I had to stay in the dark place until I remembered. Until the light was turned back on. I had to deal with the dark place, the dark memories. That doesn’t sound absurd.

I had minimised memories that I did remember. I learnt, thanks to Ellen Bass and Laura Davis (5) , that that can be a typical thing to do. I now consider if I minimised events, perhaps I minimised myself and I became this very small person inside my body? Perhaps this was also another mechanism to survive?

I had discovered that my mind could shift in or out of being conscious of trauma. My mind created comforters and personalities to cope. I could escape and be the curtains or leave the room entirely by being a butterfly and flying around in the garden whilst I remained in the room being abused. My mind created whatever it had to for me to survive.

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(5) (Ellen Bass and Laura Davis, The Courage To Heal: A Guide For Survivors Of Child Sexual Abuse, 1988, Harper & Row Publishers, New York.)
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Acute Anxiety

I had in an acute state of anxiety driven around to my friend’s home to see her. She opened the door to a woman who was hyperactive. My anxiety was compounded by the fact I tried not to show that I was anxious. My anxiety that day felt like I was a tightly sprung coil. I can tolerate and function in that state. I am used to it but the acute stage is when the coil is trying to find another spring to tighten even more. The coil does not have another spring and it feels as though, the coil will snap or break. I am desperately trying to prevent the coil from snapping. It is in this state of acute anxiety I desperately need help…

Urgently, I ask my friend, “How will I know if I am in my body?”
“Like this…”
She pinched my arm very hard. It hurt and continued to sting afterwards.
“Did you have to pinch me that hard? That really hurt!”
My friend smiled, “Sorry, but that is how you know if you are in your body. Did you feel that?”
“Yes… I did”
“Good! If you can feel pain, you are in your body…that is how you can tell.”

The stinging sensation in my arm was painful but I felt relieved and I began to settle down. My anxiety had lowered. The coil had loosened a little and I could breathe again. I did not snap.

All I have to do now whenever I am feeling acute anxiety is inflict pain, hurt myself. Easy!

Killing myself

I am in the grey place again. I look around and there are all these bubbles. I am in every bubble. I watch what I am doing and if I am doing something I don’t like. I run into the bubble and kill myself. I have killed so many of me. I don’t want to see me having sex. I don’t want to see me being raped. I don’t want to see me ‘being someone to fit in either’ so I kill myself.

Each bubble I look slightly different. Different ages, different personalities, and different activities. I have killed so many of me that now only one of me remains.

Now when I look into the bubbles, past events are playing but without me in them because I have killed myself. I didn’t like me at all. Well, the me that had many personalities. Now there is only me left. I am alone in the grey place. I feel quite bored and wonder what I can do to take away the boredom.

The one that is left is Big Dolly. Big Dolly is surrounded by her Ghosts; there are many Ghosts in the grey place. Big Dolly wonders if it is a bad thing to kill off so many of herself. The Ghosts that remain seem to follow Big Dolly around. The Ghosts make up one huge Ghost. There must have been many of me. Perhaps I should feel sad for killing myself? Is it the wrong thing to do?

Surely, it maybe nothing more than clearing out the closet so to speak? All the Ghosts I have are me. I have only ever killed myself so I shouldn’t feel too bad.

The only issue now is people who I had previously been in the bubble with are wondering where I am. They are wondering, ‘What happened to Natalie?’ ‘She just vanished…where did she go?’

It is very hard for Big Dolly to tell the people that they never knew Big Dolly. Natalie is Big Dolly but no one knows that Natalie is Big Dolly. No one knows that Natalie has been sexually abused. No one knows that Natalie thinks about killing herself everyday and every night. How terrible of Big Dolly to be so selfish! There are many people who love Natalie so that will mean they would love Big Dolly too.

Natalie does not want people to know that she is living a nightmare. If people make a fuss then Natalie won’t know how to deal with it. Nobody really bothers with Natalie as it is, Big Dolly doesn’t want that to change. If everyone who knows Natalie or who they think Natalie is, suddenly makes a fuss to show they care. Big Dolly will be upset. Big Dolly doesn’t want to be special in that way.

And why would anyone want to be special because of what happened to Little Dolly? That is an awful thing. No one cared about Little Dolly, so why should they care now about Big Dolly? Big Dolly does not want people to know.

Natalie will live as two people; it is best that way. It is a lot easier if Big Dolly is a private thing. When Natalie was successful, lots of people thought Natalie was special but they don’t know about Big Dolly and Natalie is Big Dolly so everyone who knows Natalie doesn’t really know Natalie at all.

Live And Let Live

Big Dolly decided to let the Ghosts live because one of the Ghosts kept trying to kill Big Dolly. If I don’t try to kill my multiple personalities, they won’t try to kill me so we are all living together and trying to get along.

continued







[edit on 2-1-2009 by Thurisaz]

I have told them I will allow them to live but they are not allowed to bother Big Dolly.

They all went away and lived somewhere else but they are alive and Big Dolly has some peace and quiet.

It is so awful to argue with yourself. The twins were the worst. They were completely opposite. One could have sex and be what she thought she was supposed to be; the other would run and hide away from everyone because she was frightened. She does not like to be touched at all. She doesn’t even like being looked at.

The twins created a lot of problems for Big Dolly. The dark one would be having sex and then the blonde one would wake up and start screaming. She would kick and scream. Big Dolly at the time did not understand what was happening and just decided not to have sex. Big Dolly stopped having sex because the blonde twin would wake up.

Then Big Dolly started to hurt herself. Big Dolly didn’t know why but she would cut and hit herself. Big Dolly discovered that when the blonde one didn’t wake up, she would have to hurt herself to bring the blonde one back. If Big Dolly did not listen to the blonde one, she would then have to hurt herself.

The Ghosts want Big Dolly to know they are still alive. The Ghosts want Big Dolly to make friends but Big Dolly is in control and won’t listen to them.

Whoredom And Being a Good Girl

I am in the dark place. I see that I am doing what a man is telling me to do. He tells me to ‘do it like this’… ‘do it like that’…if I don’t do what he wants or how he likes it, he will hit me and get very upset. I watch him hit me and get angry with me.

I don’t want him to be angry with me and hurt me so I try very hard to keep him happy. I try very hard to do what he wants so he won’t be angry with me. I don’t want to upset him because if I don’t please him, he will hurt me.

That man says, “This is what good girls do” so I will be a good girl from now on.

I am a good girl now. I do what I am told. He is happy with me but I am still a whore. The man says I was a whore before I was born and this is the way whores are treated. This is what whores do.

So, I will be a good girl now, now that I am a whore and whores do it like this and they do it like that.

How old is Little Dolly?

Little Dolly is counting her fingers.
“I can write my name!”
“N…a…T…l…e” she spells out so proudly…
Little Dolly is pleased she can write her name. Little Dolly can sing the alphabet but misses out many letters but sings along anyway. Little Dolly sings with such zest the end part of the alphabet song.

Little Dolly is still counting her fingers and thinking very hard…her face shows how hard it is to think about this. Little Dolly shrugs after thinking so hard and long and giggles… “I don’t know” whispers and giggles Little Dolly.
Little Dolly doesn’t know how old she is.
She is having trouble with that. Little Dolly doesn’t know when her birthday is.
“My Mum tells me when it is my day”
Little Dolly is excited, “It is Mum’s day and I have made a card for Mum’s day. I can write M U M…”

Mother’s Day is in May. Big Dolly knows that her birthday is in April but Little Dolly doesn’t know that…

“My Mum tells me when it is my day … ‘it is my day today’. That is when it is my day” clapping her hands in excitement.

“I go to school. I have a Teacher. She has a big book and she can read.
Bing bang clang and they ALL ran…
Away from the clang bang

Little Dolly is doing the sounds of the bing bang clang with her mouth, eyes and hands. Little Dolly loves story time.


The End

reply to post by Jkd Up


Thank you for your encouragement...

Thank you too for those who u2u'd me.

I received this link via u2u and considered the words to be beautiful and yet bitter sweet:

1. The soul at the beginning of this song has grown aware of her obligations and observed that life is short [Jb. 14:5], the path leading to eternal life constricted [Mt. 7:14], the just one scarcely saved [1 Pt. 4:18], the things of the world vain and deceitful [Eccl. 1:2], that all comes to an end and fails like falling water [2 Sam. 14:14], and that the time is uncertain, the accounting strict, perdition very easy, and salvation very difficult. She knows on the other hand of her immense indebtedness to God for having created her solely for himself, and that for this she owes him the service of her whole life; and because he redeemed her solely for himself she owes him every response of love. She knows, too, of the thousand other benefits by which she has been obligated to God from before the time of her birth, and that a good part of her life has vanished, that she must render an account of everything - of the beginning of her life as well as the later part - unto the last penny [Mt. 5:26], when God will search Jerusalem with lighted candles [Zeph. 1:12], and that it is already late - and the day far spent [Lk. 24:29] - to remedy so much evil and harm. She feels on the other hand that God is angry and hidden because she desired to forget him so in the midst of creatures. Touched with dread and interior sorrow of heart over so much loss and danger, renouncing all things, leaving aside all business, and not delaying a day or an hour, with desires and sighs pouring from her heart, wounded now with love for God, she begins to call her Beloved and say: St John: Dark Night of the Soul: more here

Thank you 'TheRealDonPedros' sending the link







[edit on 2-1-2009 by Thurisaz]