Monica was amazing while I was going to Sarah for
therapy. She gave of her time and love
and friendship unstintingly. She supported me and loved me even when I
presented with the effects of therapy on me like bouts of sadness, periods of
intense anger, frustration and insecurity.
Our relationship was complex and stormy. Having been
sexually abused by both men and women as a child, I found myself struggling
with a confusing sexual response to Monica. It was a time when I selfishly
needed to use people to help me and support me.
Despite the great cost to her personally, she remained my
friend, my confidant and my fellow companion on the rough, rocky road of facing
the demons of my past. She stood by me as I experienced a series of breakdowns
for which I had to be hospitalized. Many times the intense trauma I experienced
facing the harsh reality of the horrors of my past, caused me to breakdown
physically, emotionally and mentally. I was hospitalized several times and
began treatment under a Psychiatrist, Rick Sharp. I experienced periods of
depression so deep and all encompassing that for weeks I would be unable to
function at all.
I wouldn’t bath or change my clothes for days. I struggled
to get through the day, painful hour by painful hour. I went through a period
where I would allow no visitors to enter – periods of total seclusion while I
tried to process all that I was dealing with.
The depression I suffered from was totally debilitating. It
was an effort to bath and change. It was too much of an effort to read. I tried
to break up the hours into twenty minute periods. I would struggle to get
through the twenty minutes. I spent a lot of time just lying on my bed. I
couldn't function as a person. I felt overwhelmingly sad. I felt there was no
hope. I managed to read short passages of encouraging words dropped off by friends.
The days were very long. It took six weeks for the anti depressants to start
working. Slowly I came out of this deep depression.
Many times, after uncovering yet another painful memory,
Sarah would seem to think that was the end of it. All was laid bare and now I could move out
from under the dark clouds of the past. Monica, too, warned against wallowing
in self pity and the dangers of becoming too introspective and too focused on
myself, my past hurt and my pain. Both tried, during that three year period of
therapy, to help me overcome my past rather than allow myself to be overcome by
it but the effect on me of my past was just too overwhelmingly traumatic.
