I'm a Fraud

I've laid here crying for three hours. So much emotion. 

To be fair, my husband suggested I call one of my trusted friends who know the score and talk through this. 

I can't. I'm absolutely too ashamed. I have children in my house and I couldn't protect them. They got hit and it reduced me to a pile. I thought my brother had stopped this, but I was wrong. So very wrong. He's a child abuser. Still. I completely misread him. I'm ashamed of it all. Hanging my head and embarrassed to admit it to anyone. 

My embarrassment doesn't stop there. I'm obviously not as healthy as I thought. One confrontation with my brother and I was thrown back to childhood. As my tears drenched my pillow, my body shook uncontrollably. A constant replay of so much trauma shot through my mind and body. 

Not since we moved have I had a PTSD episode quite as violent as this one. I had no control over any of it. I was stuck in a distant time and felt each blow. The really crappy part of PTSD is that I feel the physical pain for days. The memory is so strong that I will physically ache and even bruise in the areas coinciding with the memory. 

The mind is a powerful thing, but memories exercise the most control. 

I don't know how things will be once they leave. Right now they are tense. I don't know if the PTSD episodes will subside. I've not been triggered so heavily here. 

It's left me in a position where satan has won. 

All that I have felt and thought for the past few months has come full circle. 

All the lies have become truth. 

All the truth has now been questioned.

I'm not having a crisis of faith, but a crisis of life. 

For the first time in a long time, I don't feel worthy of the air I'm breathing. I failed. My house is no longer the safest place I know. It was. It was the only place I'd never been triggered and never seen any abuse. That's simply not true now.

Mostly, I feel like a fraud. I was getting ready to start school for counseling. A degree that would teach me the best ways to walk through trauma with others. 

I just can't. I can't adequately handle my own stuff, so I don't think I can handle others stuff. 

Either I read God wrong or satan has won this too. On Monday, one week before the start date, I'll be dropping all of my classes. 

If I can't keep children safe in my house, then I have no business walking with others. 

It's the end of a dream. Another way my past has rendered me useless. 

My dad told me not that long ago that he would always have control in my life. He was right, he does. As much as I've tried, I can't seem to live any other way.