Home

Home use to mean one thing to me and that was Oregon.  I actually was born in Tacoma, Washington, lived in Federal Way, Washington until I was 5 and then we moved to Aloha, Oregon.  Then I spent the next 37 years living in that area growing up, learning about love and life and raising my 3 wonderful, beautiful children.

In 2001 a devastating loss hit me and I fell apart, to put it mildly.  I hurt the ones that meant the most to me and that were my 3 children, especially my youngest.  It was a loss so great that I didn't know how to process it, I didn't know how to survive it and I went looking for acceptance and love from strangers.

I made many mistakes that year that followed, a serious suicide attempt in September 2001 and then another one in September 2002.  It was the second suicide attempt that gave me my diagnoses of Bi-Polar 1.  I have to admit that I was relieved, knowing that what I had been feeling and experience most of my life since my teen years had a name and that I could get help for it.  Did I?  Not really.  I thought I was, I took my meds did my due diligence, went to counseling, but nothing really clicked for me.

The traumas sustained to me during my childhood and the recent trauma in my life left me bound, gagged and tied up so tight that I felt that I couldn't break free.  I stumbled for years, made a drastic move to the East Coast to get a "fresh start" and it worked for awhile.  But, my old teen years of being promiscuous came back to haunt me and legal issues that I got myself into only made it worse.

I searched for acceptance and love still, but in all the wrong places.  I should of been looking within myself, but that never happened.  I was never taught how to love, never taught to value myself as a person, never allowed to show love in the proper way.  I was beaten in every way possible, but my emotional beatings took it's toll on me and thus here I am at 53 discovering myself for the first time and its damn....hard!

Where is home?  I still feel Oregon is my home.  It's my physical home and I miss it so very much.  I miss the familiarity, the smells, the rain, the radio station I always listened too.  I miss the well-known roads, my favorite restaurants and the people.  I left my family behind, closed the door and at first, never looked back.  But, now looking back, there are so many regrets.  So, many!

How I wish I had been strong to stand up and make a stand for myself, my rights, my worth; but I didn't know how.  I truly didn't.  I had spent my childhood and teen years being taught and told I was no good, I was worthless and thus resulted in no self-esteem, very little friends and a life full of pain and misery.

I was adopted at birth and always knew I was adopted, as it was told to me in every introduction...This is my daughter, BUT she's adopted.  So, my birth mom became my idol, my salvation, my hero.  She, someday, was going to save me from all of the pain and torture.  She, someday, would finally be my mom again and all would be great in my world.  Just someday....I'd find home!

That someday did come, I was 27 had 3 children and I remember going into work the Monday after we spoke on the phone for the first time telling my co-workers that it was the best weekend of my life.  Do tell, they said...Where did I even start?

 Our relationship was rocky, as I believe any reunion of this magnitude is.  We rocked our way through the storms, the rivers, the mountains and the sunsets.  Emotions high on both sides, guilt played a huge part in our beginning relationship.  How could it not?  It was all perfectly normal reactions, but I was impatient, needy and wanted more than what they were willing to give.  

I discovered I had 6 half-siblings and I was overjoyed.  3 on my mother's side and 3 of my fathers side.  The fateful news that my father had killed himself was a blow I wasn't prepared for and it hit my mother even harder.  Years past, visits happened and what I always thought would be a in the park, wasn't so easy.   This turned out not to be home either.  I didn't weather the road very well and rightly so, neither did they.

One day I was watching Opray Winfrey and she had a family on there that had been through an adoption and found each other.  They went through and "Adult Adoption", where the birth mother went to court and re claimed her legal rights as this woman's mother.  I was intrigued. Could I finally be home now?  

I mentioned this to my mother (birth mom) and she was just as intrigued and I believe she too was hoping for some peace in our relationship, closure, and safety.  So, we proceeded to go into this legal course for her to re-claim me as her daughter.  We did it!  I changed my middle name and took my father's last name as my new maiden name.  Finally, I was home!  Nope, didn't work out that way.  It did for awhile, but as a lot of things in my life, that too went sour.  

I was lost yet again, afraid, lonely and not knowing where my path was or which way to take.  I hadn't had any decent counseling to walk me through my trauma sustained during my early years to deal with all the emotions going through myself and my new wonderful family.  Oh, don't get me wrong...there were times we were all wonderful together.  Many happy memories flood my mind, when I allow it too.  But, I push them away as it's easier to forget than to work on.

Home was lost to me yet again and pretty much all my fault.  I am a definite self-sabotage type of person and I self-sabotage the relationships I have with anyone, especially those that I love the most and the ones I truly don't want to hurt.

I end up saying things I don't mean, speak out in anger before talking or thinking and then regretting things that can't be undone because bridges can only be burned so many times.

Those bridges that lead me home!  The tears well up inside of me way to often, the pain is still very raw and I'm the only one to blame for losing Home.  

However, lately I've learned to discover that I can't find Home, until I find myself.  It's a bit late to learn at 53, but is it really?  Am I able to heal the damage that I've caused?  I don't know.  I wish I had all the answers, but I've learned that for me to find home, I need to dig deep inside and find it within myself first and foremost.  Home is ME!  It doesn't matter where on the map I live, who I'm friends with or not.  Who I have a relationship with or not.  Who I've hurt or not, which is basically everyone that has ever truly mattered in my life.   

Home is simply a 4 letter word, that has grown to be a hinder in my life.   A stumbling block as it's meant so many different things throughout my life.  As my life gets older, my health dwindles and my heart continues to get broken by my own hands, I've learned that I need to take control of MY life, my destiny, MY HOME!  It all begins with ME!  I can't heal my broken relationships until I've gotten control of me.  

Yes, I can use all the excuses in the book that a lot of abused victims use.  Yes, I can blame so many people.  Yes, I can say it's all there fault. But, in truth we all need to take responsibility for our own destiny, our own path and take responsibility for what we want in our life and then make.it.happen!

For me, this means repairing relationships that might not be able to be repaired, and if they can't, then I need to be strong and be ok with that.  That I need to realize the these precious people that were in my life are still valued by me, still loved by me, but they have the right to say NO.  The pain I've caused is too great for them and there trust destroyed.  Somewhere I need to find peace and comfort in knowing that this has.to.be.OK.  

Home, for me is no longer Oregon.  It's no longer where I felt the safest, the happiest.  Home is ME!  Welcome to the new ME!  Welcome to my HOME!  Step inside, get to know me...you're welcome!  You're loved and treasured!  You are my new friends, my new hope and my new found freedom.

The memories are being bottled up and thrown in the ocean, sort of speaking.  Cast off to sea to another shore, or never to be found again.  Taken out of my mind, my heart and my life and allowing new, fresh, wonderful new memories to be built with or without the ones I love.  I'm learning how to be ok with that, it's not easy, totally not easy, but in order for me to find my HOME within myself it must be done.

I'd be lying if I said I was happy, I'm scared.  I'm afraid of failing again.  I'm afraid of letting people down and worse let, hurting people.  For the most part, I stay hidden away.  Afraid of hurting myself or anyone else, so I stay within my 4 walls of my home.  Not any longer!  I'm finding joys in my life I've never experienced.  Volunteering, church activity and making new friends that are healthy.  

Healthy?  A new word for myself as well.  I've turned my diet around, found peace in getting rid of panic attacks, seizures, migraines and other ailments that have plagued me for centuries.  I'm still afraid, but as I find myself saying to others....May you find joy in the sunset and peace in the sunrise.  I'm applying that to myself now.  A whole new me!  A whole new HOME!  

Much love to you my friend and if you need to find your HOME, give me a call, write to me and we'll help each other on our way!  

Debbie