The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and JOY in each other’s lives. - Richard Bach
The struggle is real. It’s time to truly address a toxic life and find reason in what seems most to be unreasonable.
I am not sure of the timing but reality tells me to start the journey so what’s left behind is the words in my point of view so others who follow can choose to criticize, make light of, or find reason. It is because being able to explain myself has been taken away.
Just before the pandemic of 2020 I found myself in need of therapy. I was offered “Trauma Therapy” as I had been down this path before and the Doctor felt an intensive look at my life was warranted to maybe bring some enlightenment to help me become a better version of myself.
For just over 6 months I spent time weekly going over almost 60 years of my life to try and understand why I was the way I was. You see, for me, everyone seems to have had an opinion of my toxicity and as hard as I had tried to find the ways to fit into my family it seemed every effort I made was wrong. I knew if I could just find peace, maybe then it would work.
We started. With my early years and the pecking order of the Lloyd family. I came out on the losing end of that battle. Being the youngest girl meant I spent most of my childhood being called names and being incredibly bullied. It radiated to all aspects of my life throughout those years and with added circumstances i exited those years with serious OCD.
I learned that most of what I saw in myself was from those experiences and that unlearning them would be the only way I could overcome my incessant need to apologize for everything. Here is where, because of those issues I became an easy target to anyone in need of controlling a broken soul.
Twenty Three years later I choose to live and find purpose. It was, to that moment the bravest thing I had ever done. I found myself full throttle to serving a divorce and in the best of heart protecting my children and myself from any further harm.
In the end of the therapy I learned about toxic relationships and changing them. About boundaries that self protect and those who find it hard to see you any differently and those who will refuse to see you or even accept change and then those who will refuse to forgive.
After the end of my sessions I found courage where I thought none existed and peace, real soul satisfying peace and yet at times, I found it hard when others demanded the old me. It’s here when I distanced myself. Others have called it shutting out but for me. I had to salvage what’s left of my life to only demand peace. It has been so hard, continues to be hard but I know at some point, maybe years from now, those people will understand.
It was the summer of 2023 when the doctors finally found reason for my health problems. I remember sitting in the doctor’s office and his desk covered in books and images. I had a procedure that looked at my stomach and they found that it was damaged in a way that diagnosed Gastric Paresis. He continued that due to other known ailments such as brain lesions, heart problems and neuropathy of my feet and hands that I was close to an Autonomic Neuropathy diagnosis which would then give me a time line.
Six months later I got Covid and that changed everything. In just over six months my stomach paralysis went from 21% to 81% and I entered the final stage.
This is where I am now. Pain is my nemesis. I suffer every time I eat, if I can eat, and in any movements of my bowels or colon it brings agony. The kicker of this condition is pain meds only make it worse. This is the reality of my day to day now. I am slowly losing and gaining weight until there won’t be any more weight to loss (they tell me it was good to be obese to start, it gives me more time) and my mental health is taking a toll as I navigate the daily pain I face.
It’s for this reason I need to start writing again. I need to have a voice in who I am/was and why I do the things I do and most importantly FEEL.
Hopefully it will help explain and maybe offer me hope at forgiveness and understanding and that those that can find reason will not suffer as deeply as I have had to.
Sandi
