-Diane Landberg, On the Threshold of Hope
I am currently going through the process of changing my distorted thoughts. Not only did I grow up in an abusive household in which I was taught that it was normal to be abused and neglected, but I also deal with having distorted thinking due to my schizoaffective disorder. I deal with daily thoughts that people are trying to hurt me or kill me. People are following me and everybody is against me. They're all after me, my thoughts say.
My doctor called yesterday afternoon and we are trying a new dose of one of my medications, an antipsychotic, to deal with the paranoid thinking.
My PTSD and schizoaffective disorder have mixed and I have flashbacks that sometimes lead to the psychotic thinking. Lately, I've been having many flashbacks of the abuse. When I was abused, I was told many times that if I told anybody about what happened, then I would be killed or nobody would believe me, which plays into my psychotic thinking.
It's not a good cycle, but it's what I have to live with. And my life could be a lot worse, so I choose to live a happy life, regardless of the negativity. It's just something I deal with. It's frustrating at times, but who doesn't live with some frustration? Every time I have a flashback or paranoia, I have a choice of whether I want to let it consume my life or if I want to move forward.
I choose to move forward.
I'm sorry but I'm going to talk briefly about some physics. Many people know what friction is. Friction occurs when there are two objects and the surface of one may impact how easily one moves over the other. Well, in a lot of ways, that's how my disorders work. I'm moving forward and I am moving through life but all of a sudden, it gets harder to move through life. But that doesn't mean I'm not moving forward. It may mean that things get rough or that I have to slow down. It may mean that more obstacles come my way. But no matter what, I keep moving forward.
At the same time that the meds are working to stop my distorted thinking, I am trying to figure out how to deal with my past and the flashbacks I have on a daily basis. For years, I thought that the abuse I grew up in was normal. I never knew anything differently. I still often struggle to trust that what I went through isn't normal. I still am suspicious that other people are abused.
After all that was my normal.
It took until I was 13 to realize that what I went through as a child was not normal. I had no idea that my childhood was not what everyone else experienced. I still remember my reverend telling me, "It's not normal to be home alone every single night when you're 13." I had no idea.
In many ways, I have to forgive myself because I feel like I let it happen since I didn't know it wasn't normal.
But that's part of recovery and figuring out the truth.
I have a lot of hope in my recovery from both the PTSD caused by years of abuse and the schizoaffective disorder.
Why do I have hope?
Because even though this life is hard, God never lets us go. He is there with us every step of the way. I feel Him even at my lowest points. I experience His grace and peace even in the darkest times. In my last psychotic episode, I recited the Lord's Prayer and felt at peace.
He is the reason I am still here fighting each day. I love God and I know He loves me. And He wants me to heal from everything I've been through. I don't know where God will bring me in the healing process, but I have a lot of hope.
Healing takes time.
It's not something we can rush. It's something we go through as a process and the harder things have gotten, the more healing needs to take place. But it makes the healing process all the more meaningful and beautiful.
I want to heal more than anything. More than anything I've ever wanted. Healing may not mean that my disorders go away but that over time, they aren't as bad. I don't know what God's plan is for me, but today, I am going to trust Him. Currently, my disorders are impacting my life tremendously, but I am clinging to a lot of hope that they won't always be so invasive in my life and that over time, I will gain my life back.
I have hope that I can claim my life back. I have hope that I can recover from all that has happened in my life.
The most important thing I know is that I can find hope in Christ because I have been redeemed through Him. This is what I cling to when the flashbacks become very bad. When the memories become too hard to deal with, I cling to this hope that I have been redeemed and there is nothing to be ashamed of.
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