Sometimes starting a new life can bring up grief and regret for the old life. While I am happy to have new experiences without the pain and anxiety of the past, it makes me wish there had been more of it.
Time is such a tricky aspect of the human experience. We can’t control it. We can’t make more of it. We can’t get back what we think we have wasted. As the song says, it is like an hourglass glued to the table. And while we can figure out how to control so many aspects of our lives (which is not always a good thing), we can’t control time. It will keep on going, with or without us.
And 42 years is a long time. It is more than 22 million minutes. It is more than half the lifespan for Americans. And for me, it is the longest amount of time I have ever known.
In my 42 years, I have received 3 different degrees from two colleges. I have lived in 10 houses and 3 countries. I have visited most European countries. I have been married twice and earned income ranging from nothing to 6 figures. I have managed teams of forty people and accomplished some massive projects that may have seemed impossible to some. I have owned enough rental property to call myself a millionaire (on paper) and I have been bankrupt (not my proudest moment). And most importantly, I have managed to raise two small hearts to the ripe old age of 7.
Most would say I have filled my days well. I have succeeded. I have failed even more. And recently, I have even loved. Children will do that to the most cynical adults.
But there’s a problem. I have not really lived these 42 years. They seemed to belong to someone else. I seemed to belong to someone else. My life has never been my life. I was never free. I always seemed to be looking over my shoulder. I was not able to fully let go of the enmeshment with the useless adults who were a part of my childhood.
While I am proud of my recovery work, I do regret that my first meeting with my current therapist happened at age 34. I regret that my first recovered memory did not become clear to my conscious brain until I was 37. I regret the forgetting. I regret the waiting. I regret the years of running from my past.
Don’t get me wrong, I know that forgetting saved my life. But forgetting also consumed a large portion of my early adult years. So while I do my best to stay positive about all I have accomplished, I sometimes have to face the fact that I didn’t do it sooner. I tried the “easy way” first. I tried to run from it. I tried to live with the past filling my unconscious with irrational belief systems, somehow expecting it to leave me alone. I would love to have that time back. I would have loved to live those early years with freedom, but I know that wishing for that is almost as futile as wishing for an apology from my abusers.
I know I can start over. I know that there is no better time than the present to do that. Of course, my memory recovery has a schedule of its own, which makes my inner controller very unhappy. And while my inner freedom does not entirely rely on memory recovery, it does rely on it. All my parts have to be free for me to be free. This I have learned.
And so I work to be free, truly free. And I try not to regret the life I have not known because nothing can come of that. But there is time lost. And there is grief about that time.
And yet I know I can be free for the next 42 years.
I can start now.
And this time can be mine.
I really relate to grieving time lost, Elisabeth. We know it’s a waste of our time and energy, it only wastes MORE of our precious time/years, yet grief is like that–hard to let go of. On a positive note for you, be glad you didn’t wait 60 years like me before moving forward! But it’s exciting to know that if we have a week left to live, we’ll know that we spoke our truth, people heard and it made a difference in at least one person’s life. Thanks friend, for a great post.
You are so right. One week left to live would make it worth it.
Oh wow! Can I ever relate to this!!!! I’m 40 and feel the same way about wishing I had met my current therapist sooner than 3 years ago and about having my first recovered memory about 1 1/2 years ago. The healing process is slow but I have decided that must be the pace we need to move at in order to still function.
I had one glimpse of a memory that confirmed i’m not crazy nor did i imagine it and I’ve witnessed a few ‘parts’ take over briefly so obviously something horrific occurred for me to split. I so wish I could have faced this sooner so i could be living my life more fully but I also believe I really wasn’t ready and it’s very likely would not be here today if I had started sooner as I may have tried to take my life. And i do believe that I needed to know God first in order to begin processing this abuse to have that comfort and safety to help me through. So I know it all happened the way it was supposed to but i do still sometimes wonder. In any case I am so glad to have found your blog today!
I am so glad you found my blog too. It does sound like we have similar paths. I agree that there is definitely a higher form ensuring the timing is right for us and that the pace is right for us. I am looking forward to talking with you more.
Oh I so can relate to all of this…glad i’m not alone!
Hi Elizabeth, thanks for your brave post. I agree I would have done something drastic had I remembered sooner, just now in a deep process shifting hard stuff and realizing my memories so far are the tip of the iceberg. Unlike me you succeeded in achieving remarkable things… I understand though how you feel like you haven’t really lived. Whatever has been going on in our lives, that feeling is there. I have to say, your strength is awe-inspiring.
We all I guess, have our own way and time of healing…yes many wasted years and that is hard.
I’m thankful you tell it like it is. I can’t afford a therapist but I have connected to a spirit guide who has started appearing recently when I do relaxation exercises (and is free!). I am able to communicate with him and find guidance and support and also get this from your forum and from blogs. I think it’s so healthy to grieve for our pasts, and it can only come at a certain stage…I hope to be able to write about it when I get there too. It helps, thanks.
The hard thing about memory repression is that we don’t know what we don’t know yet. I hate that. My inner control freak struggles so much with that (as I mentioned in the post). Sometimes I wonder how much I don’t know yet. And sometimes I try not to. I too get some guidance from spirit. It can be so helpful.
I can sympathize with you on this. I have said the same of my recovery work. My therapist told me that I sought help when I was ready to do the work and not before. I’m still more than a little pissed off that I spent my first 33 years in the fog, like you, not really living. Onward, now, and hopefully upward as well. Love your blog!
Yes! Thank you.
I met with a new therapist today. One that is trained in treating trauma. An individual who, for the first time in my life, is teaching me the art of feeling safe. After I told her the short version of my story, she called me a miracle for having enough a fire burning bright enough to come as far as I have and accomplish all I’ve done. I cried. She has begun teaching me how to ground myself and help me go to a place mentally that is safe and only mine. I cried. She helped me understand that these tears are grief. I don’t think it’s a coinsedence that as I sat down this evening with a glass of wine, in the stillness that is bedtime, and read this. It truly spoke to me, Elisabeth. Thank you for sharing so much of yourself and your wise insight with us. You are such a beacon of hope.
Dawn, I am so grateful that you and your new therapist were brought together. She sounds like exactly what you need, what we all need. A therapist like that can make all the difference in the world. And I am glad that my article helped you. That means so much coming from someone as talented as you.
I totally get this. I still question these newly surfaced memories. Part of me would like to go back to the “before” life. Before things hurt so much, before things felt complicated, before I felt like I didn’t know what was going to come next.
And yet I know that there’s no going back now, no ignoring. As lost as those old days are in the light of all this, I do somewhat treasure the ignorance. And now I try to treasure the opposite–the awareness of all emotions–in these new days.
Xo
Yes. Do your best to keep track of how much you have improved in your awareness. That can help get you through.
And you are right. You can’t go back now. I like to say that “the train has left the station”.
I think grief is such an important part of healing. I’ve grieved the loss of my childhood, the loss of my young adulthood,and the loss of feeling worthy enough to be protected & adored. So many years living in darkness and just distracting myself from my pain. My grief an an ongoing process of acknowledging my losses, allowing myself to grieve, and remembering all I have to be grateful now. Thank you Elisabeth, for reminding me to honor this leg of my journey – grief.
Thank you Donna. I think it is extremely honorable because so few do it. It takes courage.
You make an important point. Trauma takes time from us. It is in recovering we take it back. The focus can then be on the present and future. We deserve joy, those that have survived childhood trauma.
We do deserve it. Thank you Patricia.
Hello Elisabeth, reading your grief article brings tears to my eyes as I too feel the same. I am 51 and I am still in the early stages of recovery. I feel we are sisters because when I read all your blogs it is as if I have wrote then myself. I have walked in your shoes. I am only starting to have memory return – most are ‘body memories’ with no visual. I do know I have a long road ahead which is why this particular article touches my heart. I am grieving my lost physical life as most of it was spent dissociated. I am not at the point yet where I can say I have allowed joy or happiness in my life – it wasn’t safe. I long for that moment – even if it is brief moment in time to fully feel it 100% and be present for it. So I grieve – I grieve for what could have been. But thank you for sharing and letting others know they are not alone, it helps a great deal.
Hi Wendy, I am sorry you relate so well to my blog. But I understand your grief as I am sure you know. I am very familiar with memory recovery and work with many clients who are having those experiences. If you ever want to connect with me, send me an email. I would love to have a free call with you to discuss my program. Sending love and light to you.
I know this is a late reply, but I felt I should comment. I started to remember last December a couple weeks after my 29th birthday and right around my absolute favorite holiday- Christmas. It started with dreams and body memories. I’d wake up in the middle of the night very afraid, unable to sleep until the morning. My body felt invaded…my thigh muscles would not relax. I was scared. Then I began to dissociate a lot. I wandered for hours around the mall in a daze. I couldn’t find the store I was looking for and my mind would keep going until I’d find myself on the other side of the mall. This happened again and again that afternoon. I confronted my abusers, and if ever I thought I was crazy, my grandmother actually broke and apologized to me for abusing me. I did not accept.
Now, nearly a year later. I am no contact with all of my family. They all say I am a liar and mentally ill. I still have bad dreams that make me afraid and drenched in sweat. I still find it hard to believe I did not realize what had happened. All the signs were there. I Dont blame myself- Just find it hard to understand.
Like you, I grieve time. And I grieve for the lost little girl that knew unequivocally that she needed to escape. I grieve for the pregnant 19 year old that had to lean heavily on her family in her time of need. I grieve for the 29 year old who woke up one day and resigned from her mental health job that she had just been promoted to, and became a stripper instead. Because in a strange way, all of those phases of my life have symbolized time. Borrowed time. Borrowed lives.
Thank you for sharing this painful story Ambrosia. My trauma came back in a similar way. I completely understand your grief. I really get it. Sending love and light to you.
I am still stuck in the mire… grieving for the parents that I didn’t have. Grieving for the mother that I loved who betrayed me. I am trying to stay out of grieving, but it seems to be a part of every day. It can come as quickly as a fleeting thought… the mom that I miss appears and then I try to move onto the rest of my day. I wish that my heart wasn’t so broken and I could just move on.
I am so sorry Beth. I know it is so difficult to feel this way. But try to give yourself some space to let your heart be broken. The more you wish otherwise, the more you will feel stuck in it. It is when we give ourselves permission to be broken through deep self acceptance and compassion that we can start to move out of it just a little.
You are so right about this grieving time. More so than anything that has happened to me, perhaps robbing me of my time on earth is amongst the worse.
We all have our processes for how we deal with trauma. I have had most of my memories my entire life, but my system of parts that came from the trauma has struggled to move on. I feel closer to that place, but I also feel as though I have wasted most of my life. I have had moments of big accomplishment and of barely functioning. I am still raising my kids and I hope they turn out ok so I can feel good about that. Other stuff I wonder if I will ever get over and just need to accept this is the way it is and just go on with what little life I have left.
Thanks for this blog post today. It hit the perfect spot for me.