I spend a lot of time thinking. Who doesn’t(and can you tell me how)? One of the things I think about is why I am exposing myself like this to any of my friends or family that might read this. Mostly I’m inspired by a need to get the stuff inside out. I spent too long keeping it all locked up and feeling bad. Nothing is simple though, so I think deeper. My self loathing insists I am after attention and because I believe that I am allowed to feel bad. I don’t have to believe that though.

There’s a trick to believing in myself that I haven’t mastered. Basically I just don’t dismiss the positive thoughts out of hand. They still flutter away faster than I can feel them more often than not, but good thoughts happen and I’m allowed to feel good. Maybe I am talking and writing about the most traumatic thing that ever happened to me for attention because who doesn’t love a wreck? But I’m also hoping that maybe I can help people by showing that it’s okay to say what happened to you or what you struggle with. Feeling alone sucks.

I would much rather that no one ever felt like they heard their pain echoed in mine or that my story inspired their own painful journey of healing. I wish no one ever felt assaulted by their brain or haunted by their past. I wish the world wasn’t what it is. I wish I was writing fiction. But if a single solitary being on this planet ever finds some hope that they can keep going because of this then I have done a great thing.

Some one told me the other day that a life of happiness isn’t as good for the spirit as a life of meaning. I think that’s a pretty smart thought. I can put some meaning in my life faster than I can figure out happiness. There are still more days that I would rather be nothing(I’m not suicidal just impatient), but today I bamboozled a young person to rise to an occasion and accomplish a goal they never imagined they would be able to. They did all the work, but I helped and if I don’t show up tomorrow who will be there for that child and all the others?

So that’s it then, delusions of altruism and pathetic cries for attention drive me to expose all my worst and all my best to all the people. I don’t think that’s all there is though. The way my brain work allows me to observe things intellectually but separately from my feelings. I’ve been getting some therapy to help me deal with the horror that is body memory. Basically that therapy involves feeling the feelings and thinking the thoughts and letting my grownup brain process what my child brain could not. It’s been helping but the process is not within my control so my autistic super powers are being bombarded with feelings. I don’t like all the feelings, it’s too much and it’s too fast.

It’s clear that I need help. I need to have more tools and more support and more objective clarity. I have been creating barriers to make finding a therapist impossible. I need to overcome those barriers and I know I can because they are manufactured by my neurology. I am writing about it because I don’t want to hide anymore. I don’t want to surrender my hope to my fears. I am using this blog to create a sort of digital accountability. Eventually I will get sick of writing in circles and actually get the help. You will know when that happens because I’ll write about it.

I’ll write about how scared I am, still, to acknowledge that what happened is what happened. I’ll explain, or fail to explain, that I have to rebuild my entire identity and that sounds like a lot of work. I don’t want to go back to being who I was but I’m scared to move forward. Fear is the mind killer. I will embrace my fear and find only myself. I will, just not yet.

So where does that leave me? A gaping wound exposed to the light for all to see. A shattered human unsure of what pieces to pick up first. I am at the starting line. Each morning is another  mountain to overcome. This morning I am refusing to ignore what I need to do. This morning I am demanding that my best self take charge. I wish I was nothing, but I’m here still and I’m not going away.