Chapter 31
thirty-one
. . .
Tenacious
Seven years ago
desiree
twenty-three years old
When I began therapy three years after that horrific night, it was with reluctance. My mom was sick again, the cancer had returned and spread to other parts of her body. A backache one day, then a headache. I was in the grueling early stages of med school, thankfully back in Ohio and close to home, and had been thrown the curve ball of her illness.
It was Dylan who prompted me to start therapy. My big brother, living his dream as a football star, and he said they had counseling services that he himself had found helpful. When the big brother you idolize makes a suggestion like that, you listen.
When I started therapy, I thought I was going to talk about my current situation. Stresses of an ailing parent, the rigorous world of med school, that kind of thing. Clearly, that’s what was wrong with me, right? That’s why I was depressed. That’s why I couldn’t remember the last time I had genuinely laughed out loud at something. Obviously, a young woman navigating a rigorous educational path with an ailing mother was the thing causing my depression. The thing causing my inability to taste food or get out of bed on days I didn’t have to. My incessant feelings of wondering what exactly is life all about, and what are we all doing here? What was the point of it all? The thoughts that tormented me and kept me in a haze.
But it was the events of three years ago that ended up being the topic that resulted in me convulsing on the couch in front of a strange woman that I had never even met before.
Her name was Ruth, which sounded like an old woman’s name, but, really, she was probably about mid-thirties. With gentle prodding, she helped me unearth some haunting negative thought patterns that had become the soundtrack of my life.
I am insignificant.
I am incapable.
I am inadequate.
I am not safe.
“When is another time you remember feeling this way?” she asked one day a couple weeks into our sessions. “Try and close your eyes. Focus on your breath for a few moments.”
I took one last glance at the beams of light pouring in through her windows. The yellow glow that made the golden seat of her chair create the essence of an angel. I reluctantly closed my eyes, feeling vulnerable, and I focused on the feel of the fabric beneath my hands of my own seat. It was difficult to concentrate at first, but eventually an image popped in my mind, and I shared it.
“I remember being a kid, and my brother Dylan got his first football trophy. I think it was his first one, I’m not sure,” I said, opening my eyes to look at Ruth and clarify, lest I be sitting here lying.
She smiled at me. “It’s okay, just follow what your mind is telling you. Whether or not it was his first trophy or fifth doesn’t matter. What matters is that it sticks out to you.”
I nodded and closed my eyes once more. “I remember my parents doing a big dinner celebration for him at a restaurant. We didn’t often go out to dinner at that point, it was before they came into real steady success, so it felt exciting.
“But also sad in a way.”
I heard her voice, soft as she prompted me further. “What was sad about it?”
“It all was special, but it was for him. I had never done anything to get a trophy. I got good grades, but you don’t get trophies for that kind of thing. I remember seeing the reflection of light off of this gold and maroon monstrosity and thinking I wanted something like that. Some physical thing to prove to the world that I’m significant too. That there’s something special about me.”
There was guilt as I made the confession, because Dylan was my big brother and had always been someone to look out for me. He would include me when his friends were over, letting me play video games with them, or “referee” and keep score when they were playing whatever game outside. Having him be the main focus of what should have been a positive memory, which was now feeling very depressing, felt like a betrayal to him. I shared that with Ruth.
“It’s alright, Desiree. You can love and appreciate your brother, but also envy some of his achievements.”
I considered that. I hated the sound of the word “envy,” it seemed too harsh or selfish or something. But I couldn’t deny it was accurate.
We went on to process my sexual assault, armed with the new understanding that I lean towards an underlying pull to be significant in some way. I not only felt unsafe that evening, but insignificant as well. Nobody special, nobody worth treating well. Just a body to be used. Nobody whose story is worth fully believing. My mistrust in the victim advocate kindly smiling at me, assuring me she was there to help me, and me feeling insignificant, then too. No real concern for me, just concern in trying to get evidence to help a case.
In the work that followed with Ruth, I reprocessed that entire evening.
It was in a specific session prepared for revisiting the memory, meant to aid in desensitizing me to the painful images that remained burned in my brain, in my night terrors, in the flashbacks that haunted me.
We started slowly, me just holding the image of the experience of being pressed against a wall. I was to view it as if I were watching it on a movie screen, not like I was reliving it.
As I let my mind wander to that image, my body shook, hands and shoulders trembling as I braved the exercise. While I knew what I was experiencing was visible, I still verbalized it to Ruth.
“I feel my body shaking. I feel unsteady.”
She prompted me to describe the emotions and the thought patterns associated with them. “I’m helpless. I don’t matter,” I said, my convulsions becoming stronger. I sat with them and allowed my body to tremble as I faced the visions of that night. I could do this.
I powered through.
I described to her what I saw, how I imagined seeing myself in that back alley, but there were no buildings around, just darkness. Ruth urged me to continue. I was still trembling and felt the threat of tears, but none came at that point. In fact, as uncomfortable as it all was, it also felt good to finally allow myself to face this thing. Little by little, the image became less disturbing. My trembling slowly subsided.
Eventually, the image of me in the alley started changing. I saw my body growing larger, like an unearthly entity, towering above the guy. I was transforming like some goddess in a Greek mythology story. I looked beautiful and strong and powerful. My trembling stopped, though tears were now pouring down my face.
I am significant, I repeated silently to myself.
I imagined him bowing down to me, begging for mercy while I continued to slowly grow in size and rise above, my dress erupting into a golden gown, with layers of fabric that covered him up. Then the lump of his body beneath the fabric disappeared.
I am significant.
I am powerful and in control.
Taven appeared in my vision. He held my hand, growing beside me. Dressed in armor like a Viking ready for war.
I remember being surprised that Taven appeared in this bizarre process. I hadn’t talked to him in over two years, by that point. But there he was, holding my hand, strong and powerful and by my side while the world around us morphed from a dark back alley to a city rooftop, and we were looking out at the glowing stars in the night sky above us. They were as clear as if we were in the country, only we were overlooking some city night skyline. I could see the old country club perched there in the city, like that’s where it always was. The dots of lights from windows. So many beautiful glittering lights, all around us, perfectly punctuating the darkness.
I am perfectly me.
I am safe.
I am significant.
And then a final thought.
I matter.