O is for Oh, The Places You'll Go

This is the seventh installment in a series covering the issue nearest to my heart.  I want to share how I came to the passion that I spend much of my time and resources on.  Since this story is mine and mine alone to tell, there will be portions that are vague and I apologize in advance.  The road to healing is a personal one and it's not my place to tell the story for someone who may not be ready to have their part of it told.  Some material may be triggering.  Please read at your own discretion.

To read from the beginning, find part one here.

For this installment's entire quotation, click here.

"Congratulations! Today is your day.  You're off to Great Places! You're off and away"  ~ Dr. Seuss, Oh, The Places You'll Go


The book that is given to so many high school and college graduates.  I wanted that book to be given to me so badly.  I wanted to believe the things in the text.  That I was headed for wonderful things.  Instead, I felt like there should have been another book entitled:  "Oh, The Places You Would've Gone...if You Weren't Such a Complete Screw Up."

I've always been regarded as the "smart one" in my family.  In fact, when my little brother had to answer questions about his family for a project in school, one of the questions was: "Who in your family has the highest education?"  He put me, even though at that time, our older brother had his Masters and I hadn't even finished school.  I had straight A's up until high school.  Before that, I had never let my emotional issues become academic issues.  That all fell to crap my freshman year.  I skipped school all the time; I even failed PE for refusing to dress out.  Not only did I have all the mental and emotional and behavioral shit pulling me down, but I switched schools 6 times in the 3 years and some change that I was enrolled.  Only one of those was due to a military move.  The others were due to my mom sending me to different relatives because she was at a loss for what to do.  One of those situations was a positive one.  The others were not.  Regardless, when it came to my senior year and boyfriends and laziness were more important than school, I dropped out.  I found out that I would have had to complete an extra year of school because the requirements for graduation at the current school were different from the other schools I had gone to and I was short many credits.  So even if I had kept my nose clean and been a good girl, I still wouldn't have graduated until I was 19.  And that was WITH two summer school terms.  The lazy and rebellious chick in me said Hells No.  I ended up getting my GED really quickly after dropping out though.  That was the one good thing that I can say about it in my favor.  I can remember the words of certain family members and acquaintances:  "Well that's that.  You'll never do anything now."  I guessed the gift of Dr. Seuss was even further away.

I remember getting my scores from the GED and seeing that I had placed in the 99th percentile for Writing, 98th for Reading and English, 94th for Science, 93rd for Social Studies, and 90th for Math.  I even was awarded some sort of scholarship to a Junior College in the State due to my scores.  But we moved, so it didn't transfer.  But regardless of how awesome that is to me now, at that point I couldn't...wouldn't let myself be proud of those scores.  It was a GED for crying out loud, anyone should be able to pass with flying colors, and other disparaging remarks was what I told myself.  I look back and think, "what an accomplishment for a gal like me."  Because of all the skipping and moving and hospitalizations, I only had about an 8th grade formal education.  But I hated that piece of paper.  I hated even more that I started to believe what everyone was saying.  No Dr. Seuss in my future.

But there I was in the summer of 2001, getting ready to take an entrance exam for placement into a Junior College. And I, the "smart girl" was panicking.  I started to realize how limited in formal education I really was.  I started to second guess myself.  I started to feel stupid.  I took the test anyway.  (Well, full disclosure here:  I took the English, Writing, General Ed, and Basic Math portions of the test.  I opened the Algebra exam, looked at the first 3 questions and closed it back up, telling them to just start me from the lowest rack on the totem. Cause me and algebra do not hang as pals.)

I was in.  Me.  The tortured hypochondriac, emotional masochist, high school dropout was a registered junior college student.  The first semester I took one class.  I figured I needed to ease myself back into things.  I took Introduction to Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Procedures with Mr. Ball.  I don't know if that man will ever know what a hero he is to me.  I scored 100 on every quiz.  Every test.  Every project.  I stayed after class to talk to Mr. Ball about class material, which developed into just talking. He became a mentor for me.  He was like a grandfather figure.  He was warm and kind and listened to me about everything.  I told him timidly about my goals, which at that time were just pretty ideas to me...not anything I thought I could ever accomplish.  I told him about my emotional issues and how I felt I had hit a wall with progress since I wasn't really getting anything from my current therapist other than "Bless your heart."  He built me up, empowered me, and told me to find a new therapist.

So I did.

Enter Her.

I don't really like to use the phrase that "she saved my life."  She empowered me to breathe life back into my existence.  She led me down a path of discovery and helped me help myself.

When I first came to see her, I could barely leave my apartment. I was able to go to work and to school because they were both less than 4 miles away.  Anything over that and I got nervous.  Couldn't go shopping, couldn't hang out with friends unless it was at my apartment or they drove.  And even then I was anxious.  I came to her so severely broken that I was almost mute.  I was so ashamed of myself with the sleeping around and inability to do day to day things that "normal" people do.  I think for our first session I pretty much answered with 3 words or less to all of her questions.

Some time before this, I had discovered the music of Tori Amos.  It was like nothing I had ever heard before.  I felt like an artist was speaking to me.  Her music was my comfort and I immersed myself in everything Tori that I could possibly find.  Going back to school even gave me an excuse to Tori-fy all of my binders.  I started carrying one around with me wherever I went.  A blue binder with Tori pictures that inside, in carefully filled plastic protecting sheets, contained the lyrics to her entire catalog.  I brought that thing everywhere.  And I mean EVERYWHERE.  So naturally, I brought it to therapy sessions.

It was only a few sessions before she finally asked me what it was.  I hesitantly showed it to her.  She instantly said how neat that was and told me how she had seen Tori in concert in college and even had a "Waitress" necklace.  That was the coolest thing I had ever heard a professional psychologist say.  The next session, she had a binder that matched mine.  Instead of having me talk about my issues in the first person, she told me to flip to the song that matched what was on my mind that day.  I can't help but cry as I type this, remembering that day.  Just a little effort.  Thinking outside the box.  That's all it took for me to be comfortable with her.  And because of that, she was the FIRST person who got to hear The Stories.  It was time to break the first rule of Rape Club.

After hearing about my past and my present, she had me take a couple of tests.  Then I heard the words that would forever change the way that I dealt with and treated my illness:  "It's my opinion that you've been misdiagnosed this whole time.  I don't see any indication of Bipolar or Borderline Personality Disorder.  I think that you have Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder that's never been adequately treated."

Thank you.  A million times thank you.

After that, it was easy to talk to her.  We really got to the root of a lot of my issues.  She gave me references that I could go look up things that she thought might help me.  I learned relaxation techniques, I journaled, I wrote songs.  I started slowly, steadily, living in color.  Step by step shedding the darkened prison that had become my mind and my life.  I started to see dreams and pretty thoughts become more concrete and attainable.  Oh, the places I'd go.

And now I was on my way. Yes, Dr. Seuss, I would go places.  I would do things.  There would be a few more bumps in the road, some of them potholes.  But at least I was going.