My first one on one visit with James was great. He is everything a counselor needs to be and I never got from Aaron. I realized that it had been less then 4 years since I was in SOLE and part of me had already forgotten everything I learned and I had reverted back to some of my old ways. It was actually something Aaron kept telling me, but he never explained it and James did. I had little self worth, I didn't ever have a relationship with just me. My whole life was centered around my grandparents and pleasing them, then I moved out and I was starting to focus on me for once, then I got married and forgot about me again. James made me commit to doing something that I love doing that makes me, me. I thought about it and I decided on writing. Interestingly enough I love sharing all the stories and hardships of my life through writing. This book has been such a struggle because I will start to get really into it and work on it for a while, then I forget and it is months until I touch it again. So part of me becoming me is writing this book.
That day with James I realized a lot of things, it was a lot to take it all in. I started off by telling him about Jack. The week before I wrote it all out because that is how I organize all my thoughts. I had also had gone through the e-mails from Ted, at that time I read them again and started thinking it wasn't so bad, maybe I was overreacting to them. Then when James and I started talking about everything that had happened between Ted & I, I realized how extremely hurt I still was by it. He abandoned me, I forgave him, then he rejected me, I was more hurt by that then I thought.
It was also the first time that I told James about the cutting. Before then it was this huge shameful thing I had done. I had never forgiven myself for it. Everyone in my family made me feel so much more ashamed and horrible about it. They would tell me that I was crazy, evil, horrible, troubled person for having done that. Besides Brad, James was the first person that didn't think I was evil for doing it. He told me that many good, righteous people cut to deal with things. Every reason why I have heard that people cut has applied to me.
