The benefits of being bad at things

So, a little earlier than planned, but here is the next post. I have now seen her psychological report/risk assesment, and also a typed account of events that happened when she was gang raped written by her. To say the least it is hard hitting.I think the line about a gun being cocked is probably the most unnerving. The title of this post may sound confusing, but please let me explain: At school i was terrible at art and drawing, I dont think I am a very creative person. Right now I am so relieved about that, because when I hear her speak and see her words my brain desperately tries to put an image do it, desperately tries to imagine her in that position. I don't want it to, it just does. Like when you read a book and you picture it? Fortunately I can't picture it, or I'm sure it would drive me mad with I don't even know what. I can't picture her lying there almost like a lifeless doll while these men have their way, can't imagine the vacant stare and hollow eyes, bruised and blackened from the beatings. I'm glad I cant see her like that, glad I've never seen her cry or seen her scared. She says I make her happy, but it doesn't feel like enough, I want to take it away, want to make it all better, want to do the next thing for her which will improve her life. Right now I don't know, I can't take it away, i know that. Maybe I will just be destined to make it all a distant memory. To be a dose of normality for her. Will she have a normal life? Who knows. Will getting engaged, getting married, having kids one day, will any of that trigger a relapse? Who knows. I guess I shouldn't batter myself about it, but i'm sure any guys reading this will probably say that it niggles, its eats away, and i must find a way to stop it becuase it's a path to nothing. I can't take it away.I can't "unmake" it happen. I told her I loved her. She seemed pleased with that,very pleased. I knew before I said it she won't say it back, not for a long time. Trust doesn't rebuild that easily. But I will wait, I know she is worth waiting for. I know that one day she can beat this, and I will definitely be around to see it.

It all comes out

Well, there we were, me and W in the car, driving back from a family visit in the lashing rain and wind.Speeds were slow and the journey was long, so we talked. We always do this, we are very rarely silent unless someone is asleep. We talked about what we wanted to do in the bedroom later, we like winding each other up like that, and we wondered if there was anything the other wanted to try. This led to the conversation steering toward what she was and wasn't ok with. I gently probed for more infomration, as of course it could be easy to what might be a bit of fun to turn into a trigger. So she told me everything, and I mean everything, so I will re-tell it here as much for my own therapy in this situation. I have to vent it or it will consume me. So it started with her first boyfriend. He was nice enough to start but turned nasty. He blamed her for his family splitting up (she never met them) and basically destroyed her mental resolve (but then hitting people in the head with a hockey stick will soon bring them to your way of thinking, however crazy). This made her depressed and turn to drinking (I guess she was 15 around this time). The drinking turned to drugs, the drugs turned to her getting in with the wrong crowd. She owed money she couldn't pay, she then says they made her into a "sex slave", they would lock her into a room with men and she would have to perform or i assume be beaten or worse. This carried on for a few months and then the gang rape with the 4 or 5 guys happened as she returned from a night out. It is from one of these events the baby was concieved, however through drink and drugs she lost it, probably on purpose, as by now her mind was destroyed. I believe a deliberate miscarriage is probably understandable, others may not but thats their opinion, it is mine. She was sectioned ( to all intents and purposes) around a month afrer all this, and that probably saved her life. While in hospital they couldn't find her, and she could begin to recover. After around a year in and out of hospital she began to have something of a more normal life, the physical wounds of self harm and self blame frustration had healed, and she was seeing a guy. She felt she could trust this guy and opened up just a few of the things that had happened to her in the hope it would help her begin to heal the mental scars. That person then raped her as well. So while i didnt even have a girlfriend until I was 18 sh'd been through a whole lifetimes worth of men and drinks and drugs and all sorts. I knew there was soemthing when I started dating her. I didn't believe her casual line about the wrist scars being cat scratches. And now we begin the healing process. Will she ever recover? I don't know. Will she ever be free of flashbacks and nightmares? Who knows. The trouble is of course life throws up all sorts of unique events, births, deaths, and any of these could trigger her. Maybe if things work out for us we will start a family? Could being pregnant be a trigger to bring it all back? Getting married? Losing a relative? I don't know. All i know is I love her, and she doesn't know it yet, now is not the time to tell her. She has all she needs from me right now, and that's fine. I will be there for her, i will stand by her. Next update may well be come November 14th, for that is a big appointment for her, and she wants me to come. I think now i know enough I can come, and I can finally start to work with people that know about these things, as I will freely admit I know nothing of the underworld of drinking and drugs. My upbringing was so far removed form it all I can barely believe this happens. But I will not cave in, I will be a rock for her, and I will do my best for her as long as she will let me.

Restful nights playful days

Or not. So W had a nightmare last night. This never bodes well. Of course she will never let on with what it was about, and perhaps I worry too much about these things anyway (which may or may not help) but it does cause me a slight dilemna.Can you have too much of a good thing? My meaning is, am I doing more harm than good being there a lot? Does she have 3 or 4 nights in a row with me where she feels safe (say, Fri,Sat,Sun) and then the monday night away is hard because there's no-one there? How on earth do I solve this one. Do I not spend as muhc time with the girl I am dying to tell I am head over heels in love with, or just go with it and see how she goes? Tricky, very tricky. Orherwise all seems to be going well, she is thinking about how she can be weaned off the drugs as she will want to start a family soon, and it could take years apparently, reducing the dose by a few micrograms a month or something,maybe someone knows better than me. this is encouraging, both for our future and for her state of min, it must be good if she doesn't want it. Sorry its a short infrequent one, but I want to run throught the downsides, and so far not been so many, they will come I am sure, but I will be ready for them.

Post 5, steady times

So as the title suggests, currently all is quiet on the southern front. Things have been ticking over and we've been going out and doing a few of these normal things we never seem to get round to, like a trip to a museum. That would explain the lack of postings recently, I haven't needed the therapy. Bit nerovus for the upcoming weeks though, W is struggling to sleep now, seems to be getting more and more work while the public sector pay freeze means she has an ever increasing work load with little prospect of the deserved rewards coming. This is causuing a lack of sleep. For now this is the only thing, that and perhaps a fraction less sense of humour than before. But i do worry. Extreme stress can trigger the flashbacks, and flashbacks are when it all goes a bit wrong. So far as a write this there have been precisely 33 page views.Most of those search engines, so I know my voice is like space, no-one can hear you scream, however I would say on record it has changed my opinion totally on mental health. I, like i'm sure at least someone else must think, had the view that as there were no physical issues there was nothing wrong that a stern resolve couldn't beat. I know this not to be the case. W has shown me that, given she is even more cycnical of it than me! She hates it because it has no logic, no A+B=C, like a big whack on the arm=broken arm. And credit to her for being so strong and so stubborn in her refusla to let it beat her, and not only that but even when she has a "bad" day, she is still concenred for my day, concerned for what i percieve to be a problem. I think I am falling in love with her, and I couldn't be happier about it.

Post four, apologies for the broken promise

I start with an apology, I was meant to write more about the past as detailed in post 3, however a few events have come to light since then which have pushed it from my mind. As i said I write this to vent what I feel so sometime emotions run high. Right now things are a bit tricky. Events have conspired against W once again. It feels like since I knew her it has always been a case of just as she thinks she's got thourgh something, a hurdle comes up. It began last week with windows. You'd think it was fairly simple to get new windows considering how terrible the current ones are, all steamed up in between the panels and rotting wooden frames but no. Its one of those joint ownership things, so depsite the fact that when they shut you can see daylight in the gap and they darken the room where they've steamed up the housing assoctiation want letters from everyone to say its ok to do and £100 for the priviledge of saying it's ok. GREAT! Just what she needs. To make matters worse one of her kittens has gone missing, and despite my best assurances that cats do this and being sure she'll come back W cannot help but blame herself. It doesn't help no cat she has ever had has done this before. She is staying at mine tonight. Normally we see each other weekends and wednesdays, but I worry about her mental state. Stress and anxiety can trigger the flashbacks so I'd rather she's with me where she feels safe, and is away form anything sharp, in case it all gets too much. On the upside, she did talk about her visions of the little girl recently. On Friday me and my housemate had a bit of a lads evening watching films,eating and drinking, and she came over as we were winding up. She was very sleepy and started to talk to him about her visions of the girl in the corner. A bit unexpected, as far as I know she doesn't discuss this with many people, but maybe thats progress? I don't know. I hope so. It is frustrating I can't just "cure it" like i can cure a sticky door lock or a blown light bulb, but then, she is much more complex than one of those, and the experts have all failed so far, apart from one who is brilliant. I will write more in the next few days to see how the cat saga progresses. I hope she comes back, even I liked the cat and I am cycnical of them as pets, you don't buy a cat you rent it in the hope it stays....

Blog 3, dealing with the flashbacks

So I mentioned in a previous blog about the flashbacks. This is perhaps where I can make the most difference (I hope). One day when looking to buy her first house W came home to discover the washing machine at home had been damaged. Upon reporting this due to the way her family works it wound up being her fault (despite the fact she was entirely innocent, as she had been with me for a few days). She naturally protested her innocence and an argument ensued. Her mother then stated that she was pulling the sum of money lent to her to fund her first home. 3 days before it was due to go to the back so she could get the keys. Now W's flashbacks have "triggers", these triggers are situations of extreme stress, anxiety or fear for example. Now pulling the plug on someone’s money 3 days before it is due is pretty stressful, and I received a somewhat tearful phone call asking if she could stay with me. This evening would turn out to be one of the most poignant evenings in our relationship, and perhaps the most difficult times i have experienced to date. I will recount as best i can here in the hope i can be sure for myself that I'm doing the right thing dating her, as for me if I can't cope with this, it's unfair of me to go on. W came in looking a bit vacant and already apologising for what may happen next. They've given her drugs, mood stabilisers and the like and some pretty industrial strength sleeping tablets. She got there late so we went straight to bed, or at least, I tried to. As soon as she laid down she curled up into the foetal position and help on to me so tight it almost hurt. then she stopped answering her name. then she started shaking and whimpering. it looked and sounded for all the world like a baby having a nightmare. As i am first aid trained i checked all the obvious, breathing, heartbeat, calling her name checking for a response. Vital signs all normal but no response. Terrifying beyond measure if you've never had it before. This lasted around 15 minutes, and when she "came back" it was obvious she had just relived all the rapes of the past again. Much like once you see something you can't "stop" yourself thinking of it, its easy to put a though in your head, impossible to remove it. This went on through the night until she finally dropped off to sleep, whether through drugs or exhaustion I do not know. I will write more on this later, if anyone wants me to, now I must get back to the grind! Ok so back from the grind, so I'm going to add to my tome. Ok so the night that night was hard. I spent a long time awake thinking, as I'm sure anyone would: "this is how it could be, this is how it'll be if you argue, if you fall out, if you do anything to upset her, if anyone does, if anything does..." That was a tricky one, because I have to be there for her if that happens, and I have to support her if that happens, and I cant have a "bad" day when that happens. but then, its not all doom and gloom, and at the end of the night I decided I will do this, I can be there and I can look after her. Putting it into practice on the other hand, is somewhat more challenging!! I will write more of our exploits together probably Wednesday evening, if I get any comments I can answer questions, if not I will write a little more about the past (yes I know this is in no particular order, I write this to get things off my mind so it doesn't always go in the right order!!) and I will write about an interesting shopping trip recently....

The difficult second posting

Ok so post one may have been dramatic. It certainly was for me to find it all out. Perhaps to put it into perspective I should give you some background. Howe we met etc. and later on I'll highlight a few more of the interesting things that W's mind can do. Yes I did say interesting, call it perverse but we both find her brain pretty fascinating. So, how did we meet? Well, we me online weirdly enough, one of those freebie dating sites that you can get. I'd already met a few people off there, but couldn't find anyone I really liked. Then one day a message popped up from a girl with quite a funny name. the name made me smile, but the message she'd sent immediately sparked with me. See, thing is I mentioned quite a lot on my profile (yes I talk too much, sorry!!) but the main gist of it was the journey can be worth the destination. Let me explain: You want to go camping, you go and it rains every day. Do you sit back and bemoan camping as being rubbish in the rain, or do you take a few cans and have a good time despite the weather? I know lots of people do the former and more power to you, camping can be miserable when it rains, but you'll develop a bond if you stick with it, some kind of weird feeling of glowing pride and triumph over adversity. W's message basically said she was that kind of person, and I liked that. So we chatted. Lots. She talks a lot and so do I, so meeting up was easy, it went fine. She's nothing like what I thought was my type, but she spoke to well and so much that I was attracted to her anyway, and meeting her in the flesh blew all my previous opinions away. I'd always preferred the fleshier (?!?!) girls, size 12-14, but yet here was this stunning size 10 little blonde thing making me very quickly change my perspective. Suffice it to say, she's hot, and quite a few people thing way out of my league, and I'd agree!! Hopefully from the above you can see that on the surface she's totally normal. She has a normal job, a house, a car and pets. All normal. In fact, I still can't quite believe that all what has happened to her is true, given how she is now. I write this blog mainly so I can vent my feelings about things to someone (anyone!) about how I feel, because I have to be strong for W, I can't have an off day if she is having a bad day, her off days would make anyone else never have a bad day again. But you know what's great? in the last week a relative of mine was rushed to hospital, far form where I live. Not only did W come to visit with me, but waited in the car while I went in for over an hour and was as solid a rock for me then as anyone could wish for. That to me is mind blowing. Here is a girl who must have all those images in her head all the time, the hooded members of the gang who raped her, who held her own despite her struggles and screams, the friend who betrayed her and raped her knowing her past, the family that can't cope with her. How can anyone's head deal with all that!! Mine barely can and it didn't even happen to me!! I think that's all I want to write for today, there is lots more I can tell but I want to put a bit every day. I also don't want it to be too long, you'll all fall asleep! But please, comments and questions are welcome, and I will post more, if not tomorrow then Monday night. Thanks for reading.