Lisa is sick. I hope you get well soon, honey!
Man, oh, man, I was so glad to get back to work! I�d love to say that I love the Holidays�well, I love Christmas. But it doesn�t stop me from missing my mom and grandmother. Christmas is a double-edged sword for me. There is the shopping, giving, joy and togetherness and yet behind it all is a void where the dearly departed belongs.
Anyway.
I�m really okay. I�ve been taking the Prozac for 6 days and I�m starting to feel better already. It could be the �sugar-pill� effect, but at this point I really don�t care. I just feel better. I�m all about feeling better.
The panic is still there, simmering. Panic about the New Year and things that are going to be happening. But I cannot do anything about those situations at the moment so I need to let it go for now.
So, I had therapy Thursday. It was great. I am really feeling good about going. Who knew it would be such a great thing for me? I didn�t. I don�t know why exactly I feared going to a counselor. I mean, I feared it on the surface because of the possibility of being seen as a liability in my field, and certainly because I�m awful at following through with things I start.
But I feared counseling on a deeper level. I dare say it was molecular. It was in my very being that I fought doing this. I felt that I was more screwed up than I ever knew and once I found out just how screwed up I was there was no going back. The reality is, however, that I�m not screwed up and that who I am and what I deal with is normal.
Validation is a good thing.
We talked about some of the things I am doing for my mother. The things I�ve never done which now I�m considering doing. I�ve already created her web-page. There�s the little alter/remembrance table that I�m going to get together. There�s the acknowledgement of her on holidays. I am most excited because of the candlelight vigil.
On April 27th, I am hosting a candlelight vigil. I am going to invite all friends and family. There will be music that my mother liked (Elvis and Patsy Cline, plus a few of our favorites that remind us of her) and when the sun goes down we will light the candles.
It�s important to note that the week of April 27th is also my mother�s birthday week (May 3) and Victim�s Rights Week. Rodn*ey�s parole hearing is in April so this will be a great time for this.
I feel good about it.
There�s a person I want to write about�but I want to respect his privacy. So I think I�ll change his name to Zach.
Zach is a person who I�ve always enjoyed being around. He is a very nice person with a can do attitude. He�s just a real sweetheart.
Zach and I have known each other for 3 years or so. We chat occasionally about kids and other stuff. Nothing remarkable.
I have been dealing with the case actively since 2003. The first 8 months or so I pretty much kept it all to myself. There were a few interviews with Channel 5, but other than that I rarely talked with anyone at work about what was going on.
And then I had my mini-breakdown, and called my boss at work and told him the whole ugly story of why I was so tired and depressed and useless, and I felt better.
I still didn�t talk with any co-workers except Royce, who was my cube neighbor and friend.
I underwent some transformation of being a happy, contributing member of the workforce to someone who just came to work and sat all day in her cube. Often, I�d cry. Sometimes, Zach would walk by when I was sitting there staring at the screensaver sniffling. He�d ask if I was okay. I�d lie and say yes.
Things went on like that for a while, me lying.
And then it seemed like it was all over (even though my gut told me that it wasn�t the last I�d see of Rodn*ey). Life went back to normal in a way, but I never was the same.
Then in February of last year, it all started up again. The research being done on the case by that class at Mizz*ou. Then, in the summer, finding out the case was possibly going to be reopened. I went back into a tailspin.
The article was published in October. I�m guessing that Zach read it. I did talk to some people in the office about it, but I don�t think I�d talked to him. Obviously, he�d been following what was happening.
The following is a conversation we had last Friday.
�Is that a good book?� He asked, pointing to the copy of �Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma� that I�d borrowed from my therapist.
�It seems good so far. It basically says that there is a physiological response to trauma and that you store up those chemicals and endorphins in your central nervous system when you are not allowed to fully experience those sensations following that traumatic event.� I said.
�Oh, nothing I�ve ever read works for me,� He said. He looked around the nearly empty office. Shantell, my buddy, looked at him in puzzlement and asked, �Why, what happened to you?�
Zach took a deep breath, visibly steadied and centered himself, and said, �My sister was murdered on September 11th�.�
I felt like the wind was knocked out of me. I couldn�t breathe.
�The September 11th?� I asked. Murder is murder. But September 11th, 2001 is an awful, awful day anyway.
�Yes,� he replied. �Look�� and he held his right hand up. He was shaking. I looked at his face. He was very pale. I knew instantly that he hadn�t really talked about it with anyone in our office.
�Oh, Zach, I am so sorry,� I said. I stood up and gave him the biggest hug. He hugged me back. In that instant, I knew what it was like to meet someone like me working in this environment.
I also marveled at how very strong of him it was to say his sister was murdered on that horrible day. That�s what it was, murder.
She was on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon.
The few people left in the office that afternoon all gave him hugs. We talked about the fact that we never knew.
He said, �It�s not like I�ve had it put on a t-shirt,� and I had to think that I�d made that exact same statement. Sometimes, to save yourself the pain of telling the story, you wish you had a business card or a t-shirt for people to read to tell them what happened so that they will understand you.
You know, all people experience murder differently. It is still traumatic to that person no matter what the circumstances. I myself cannot imagine losing someone I love in those circumstances. Those were dark days for our country and darker days for someone that lost a loved on that horrible day.
I wish I would�ve known. I would�ve made an effort to be Zach�s friend. I have the opportunity now. I just don�t know how to go about it.
It�s so strange. Every time I meet someone like me, it�s like being reborn in a way. This sensation washes over me, and it is that I am not alone. Even though I may think I�m the only one who�s ever felt this way, I�m not.
I am not alone.
11:31 am - January 03, 2006
Recent entries:
What you missed - January 16, 2012
%%older_entries%%From hell - October 19, 2010
%%older_entries%%a rant from a few weeks ago - August 17, 2010
%%older_entries%%Tired - June 20, 2010
%%older_entries%%A beautiful lie - March 11, 2010
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