Page 138 of Burned & Bound

At some point, I’ll transition to their outpatient program and learn how to live on my own like a functional adult, but I’m not there yet. Right now, I’m working with a psychiatrist and a therapist for help. I’ve learned that time doesn’t heal everything. Sometimes, time just makes everything worse.

I’ve spent my whole life burying everything I’ve ever felt and just hoping it’d go away. That’s not how shit works, even if I did have myself convinced I was just fine.

But you changed my life. You broke me, Jackson. And not in a bad way—don’t think that. You broke down all the walls I’d built for myself to keep those things out and to bury things I should’ve dealt with a long time ago.

I’m working my ass off to deal with those things. I’ve made progress—at least, most days I tell myself I’ve made progress. So far what I do know is this:

Harrison was a brutal parent. What he did shaped everything I know and think about myself.

My mother committed suicide in front of me. I never should’ve seen that, and it’s impacted me more than I can put into words right now.

When I was nineteen, I was raped by nine men in prison. I’m still struggling to work through this one, and I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to fully.

I was sexually assaulted by a doctor in the hospital during recovery and was told it was normal.

I don’t know who I am. I know what I became because I had to survive.

I don’t know how to relate to people or be in a relationship with anyone.

I don’t know how to cope with anything I’ve been through or how it’s affected me. Drinking was coping, but as soon as I tried to get sober… it just made everything worse because I didn’t know how to help myself.

It sounds simple on paper or maybe I’m diminishing it… I don’t know… but it’s fucking hard. Some days are more brutal than others, but I’m trying. I’m sober and doing my damnedest to stay that way.

I see the psychiatrist here every month. She’s diagnosed me with cPTSD—complex post-traumatic stress disorder. She says it’s more than just a single-incident PTSD kind of thing. That cPTSD alters the way the brain develops and functions. There’s a whole list of ways it changes the brain that I won’t bore you with, but apparently, when I say I’m fucked in the head, I wasn’t wrong.

I’m on medication to help my anxiety, my depression, and my insomnia. It sucked at first, but I like the way they help me now. I work with a therapist a few times a week to unravel all of this shit. I hate therapy if I’m being honest, but I know it’s good for me. I don’t know how to deal with anything right now without it. There’s a family not far from here—The Harveys—that let us come onto their farm to take care of the horses as a part of my therapy. Equine therapy. It helps. It makes the harder days easier to talk through. Not sure my therapist appreciated the day I helped a horse give birth though.

When you asked me to marry you… I didn’t say no because I didn’t want to. I said no because I didn’t want the life I was living. I didn’t want that for either of us. You deserve better, but so do I.

I’m not asking you to wait for me, Jackson, but I want you to know I’m trying. I’m trying to take back my life and trying to figure out who I am. I want to know who I am when I’m not stuck trying to survive.

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