✩｡:*•.───────── ❁ ♡Lyrics♡ ❁ ─────────.•*:｡✩
Well I've been down to Georgia
I've seen the streets in the West
I've driven down the 90, hell I've seen America's best
I've been through the Rockies, I've seen Saskatoon
I've driven down the Highway 1
Just hopin' that I'd see you soon...
✩｡:*•.───────── ❁ Thoughts ❁ ─────────.•*:｡✩
The One Where I Came Home...
I originally rezzed into this virtual hellscape (I mean, it's not always bad but let's be real, sometimes it is...) originally at the end of 2008, when I was 18. For those doing the math, that makes me 35 now... I pretty much grew up here.
I mean, I grew up in RL too, but I also grew up here.
And when you grow up in a world of... characters... like we have here on the grid, you learn a lot of lessons the hard way. Like 2x4 to the face kinda hard way, sometimes...
But the other part of growing up here was that the people who have been around me the longest have watched me learn and grow as a person. To become the person who simultaneously believes that people can change - because I have - but who also still believes, "A tiger doesn't change its stripes and neither does a weasel," because some folks haven't... and won't... change.
Amazing what a few diagnoses, therapy, and proper medication can do.
As I said to my chosen family here last week... four and a half years ago I was a fucking ticking time bomb that was not only unable to but unWILLING to emotionally regulate. I had none of the tools to do so, and that even implies that I had the presence of mind to realize that I was even wrong.
Because unfortunately most of the time, I never thought I was. I either was completely blind to it or I justified my volatile reactions by pointing to how upset the person had made me feel. They deserved it, right?
No, imy, not right. But you'll learn that eventually. *insert only-slightly-patronizing headpat*
While I've been digging in and doing the work in therapy this year, I've ~attempted to do the work multiple times. Most of the time I would start group therapy, get really excited about it, and then life circumstances would change and I would wind up being unable to make the one group session that was offered and I'd have to drop out.
I'd get six weeks in, tops, and while six weeks is better than nothing, one of the biggest components of the type of therapy I'm doing is that you have to be able to practice the skills you're learning on a regular basis. If you don't practice the skills outside of the situations in which you need them, then they don't become second-nature. If they're not second-nature, you're less likely to use them.
After all, these are coping mechanisms and skills that most people learn naturally, because they didn't grow up in their own personal Dante's Inferno and actually had parents who would teach them these things rather than perpetuating the personality disorder you were slowly developing because of the trauma.
But this time, I'm almost through one full round of therapy. They recommend you take all the modules at least twice, and my personal opinion (and experience) is that it's because the first time you take them, you're learning new skills. It unlocks doors inside you and opens you up to revelations and realizations about yourself and others that you might need some time to process.
By the time you go through the modules a second time, it's re-enforcing the things you learned the first time. You're doing less of the initial emotional labor and more of the digging deeper and practicing and integrating them more fully into your personal toolbox of skills. If you got stuck on the details during the first round, you can look more at the bigger picture the second time around, and vice versa: if you could only see the big picture because the concept was completely foreign and new to you, then you can hone in one the details of the 'how' when you go through it again.
As a result of various starts and stops and being able to go through almost a full first round this time, I'm finding myself in a much better place now than I was four and a half years ago. So six months ago when I returned and started to slowly try to re-integrate and make amends not only with words but with displayed action and change... it was about showing up as my best self (so far).
I never really knew how much a simple set of flexi angel wings would mean to be, but it's not really about the wings. It's about what they represent.
I'm happy to be home - and as I said last week, I'm very glad to be in a place to be able to appreciate how wonderful home is.
✩｡:*•.───────── ❁ Credits♡ ❁ ─────────.•*:｡✩
---» Shape: Personal
---» Ears: Pixie Gauged s for lel EvoX Ears (f) - Swallow
---» Body: Reborn Body - Ebody
---» Skin: Annie Skin (L005) - Glam Affair @ The Fifty
---» Eyes: Magicnight Eyes - Avi-Glam
---» Tattoo: Blysse Tattoo (I survived) - BeMia
---» Hair: Bebe Hair - Doux
---» Top: Rosalie Crop Top - Everfaery
---» Earrings: Ear 74 (Swallow Pixie Female) - FaeTal
---» Nosechain: Nose to Ear Piercing (Gold) - Difference
---» Collar: I'm Yours Collar - Bunk
---» Necklace: Cherished Photo Locket - Yummy Accessories
---» Backdrop: Enchanted Book Hall - Everfaery
✩｡:*•.───────── ❁ Location ❁ ─────────.•*:｡✩
Private Parcel
✩｡:*•.───────── ❁ Tuneage♡ ❁ ─────────.•*:｡✩
---» Tuneage: "Comin Home" - City and Colour
✩｡:*•.───────────────────────────.•*:｡✩
