The Never Ending Story

You know what? -As my friend Sue-Sue always used to say, as if asking permission to speak- I am tired of dreaming about my stepfather. One would think, that after forty-something years of healing and recovery (hahaha!) I would stop being haunted by him.

I've dreamed of him several times in the past few days. Once, when I was at Gatorbone, he came into my dreams and I got witnesses to his foulness and I called the police.
Last night, I dreamed he walked into a room where I was and he was wearing a beige suit coat (I do not like beige. I always say life is too short for beige) and someone said, "Oh, you look nice in that suit," and I wanted to kill them both.
If you're new to this world of mine and you have the desire to know who my stepfather is, go click on that subject label childhood sexual abuse. You'll discover more than you want to know, I'm sure.
I can figure out the dream I had at Gatorbone. I'm still trying to make him accountable for his deeds and sometimes in my dreams, I confront him and scream at him and sometimes I've even hit him.
But what was the deal with the beige suit coat? The compliment? Was that my mother, always trying to bring to my attention how lucky we were to have this man in our lives? Handsome, tall, smart, willing to take on the responsibility of two step-children?
I don't know.
All I know is that I wish that by now I was done with all of this and yet, I doubt I ever will be. Not entirely.
And if he only haunted my dreams it would be okay, but I know in my heart that what happened to me as a child affects me to this day in more ways than I even realize and in many ways that I do realize and I hate that. Hate it, hate it, hate it.
I have peeled away so many layers of this onion and yet, there are always more, it would seem. I have been peeling away since I was a child, trying to get to the heart of what is me and what is the me which was created when that man came into my life and changed me into someone I wish I had never become.
I think I fear more because of him, I do not trust goodness unless it is proven beyond a doubt, I feel safest when alone, which isolates me, and I do not trust my own instincts, my own love for others.
Because I loved him.
And he said he loved me.
And then...he damaged me.

Mr. Moon has been the stalwart and faithful soul who has stood by me, suffering for the sins of that man and there have been times when he was so weary of suffering for the sins of another that I am sure he contemplated leaving. How could he have not?
But in staying, in giving his love, he has given me the space and the place to do more healing than I ever could have imagined.
Having my babies the way I did and loving them the way I did gave me back my body in ways that I never would have been able to reclaim it as mine, to learn to respect it, to realize its power, its ability to give life.
I had a counselor who was not afraid to hold me and cry with me and she did more for me than she will ever know.
I've had friends who have listened to my stories and nodded and held me and let me go on in my ranting, my tears.
I've been given this life that provides me all the space and time one could want to peel away more and more layers as I become aware of them, as I have strength to do.

And yet, here he comes back into my dreams and that makes me so sad. Because I have made so many wrong choices because of what happened to me in his home. I have spent so many years trying to shed those layers, trying to get back to the me I would have been, could have been.

I recognize and respect the fact that I am who I am with some strengths and some awarenesses I never would have had if I had not gone through that. I have more compassion, I have more sensitivity. I know that.

But you know what?- as Sue-Sue would have said- I would gladly have given all of that up not to have been abused. I would gladly not be as compassionate, as sensitive if I never had to dream of him again.

I'm tired of having to defend myself over and over and over in that dream world. I visualize that whole story as a pebble in my brain that the waves of my psyche bump up against, even now, and I wish it had been worn away by the years and years of the tides of my emotions, my actions, my reading, my writing, my receiving counseling, the love in my life, my life itself.
And I keep thinking there must be something I can do to let it all go, to finally dissolve that rough place, to prevent him from showing up, unannounced and most definitely unwelcome, a dream reminder that his influence seems eternally upon me, and that I will never get to the last layer of the onion, no matter what.