I don’t remember a good ninety percent of my childhood but I do remember that horrible ten percent. It’s not normal to have this type of amnesia. Once I left my home at eighteen my behavior was erratic and violent and dangerous. I had no idea what was going on. I did know that something was wrong. When I got to be in my twenties I started having panic attacks so I went to therapy. It didn’t help. I went on living but radically isolated myself to only a few people.

I just wanted to be normal. I looked for that normalcy outside of myself for a long time. That didn’t work either.

That ninety percent of not remembering represented some serious trauma. I have always known it but it has taken many years and much searching to gradually feel the trauma in my body and in voices in my head that need to be heard.

I had to learn radical compassion for myself. I had to re-parent myself. I had to grieve what might have been. I had to twist myself into untying the knots of the invisible trauma caught in my body.

I am still working on myself because self-development is an ongoing process. I am now normal in my own way. I have learned to take care of myself like no one else can.

Isn’t that the way life is supposed to be? Having that fundamental fondness and friendship for yourself?

Never give up on yourself, keep trying to find a way to be your normal. You have every resource you need to blossom and it is never too late.

I believe you can do it because little old me did it. Never give up ………………ever.