Today was productive. That is more than I can say for myself for weeks on end. I have been continuing to come out of a delusional place that I was thrust into deeply for most of the summer and have been healing from since September. However, since Thursday, it is like my brain has become increasingly clearer, and today I feel I am finally home. I have felt this clarity the last couple of days, but still was plagued with exhaustion. As I may have mentioned recently, I have been flowing back and forth from being here and not being here, and every time I re-enter what we can call reality or home, it is painful to let my comfortable delusions fade. But now it seems it does not hurt anymore. I am at peace. I am reminded how much I love my partner, and I feel present with my surroundings.

I heard a saying recently, if you survived the trauma, you will survive the recovery. This journey I have been on since mid-July has been very much about reliving and processing trauma that I experienced in my late teens and early twenties, as well as throughout my life because of my illness. I spent days lying in bed in tears, paralyzed by what had come over my mind and body. Not all of what I experienced was psychotic, so we are not referring to this most recent course of events as a psychotic break. I have been able to keep up with my medications and appointments successfully, while remaining coherent and lucid. Though, there was a part of me that was just gone. It is hard to explain. This is the first time I have experienced a time such as this in the twenty years I have spent with schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type. I also examined my sexuality and gender as well as some of my fundamental beliefs.

But it is true. Recovery is survivable, and though the trauma may live in our bodies and be hidden away deep in our minds and undetected for many years, soon it becomes unavoidable, and we must deal with. And the recovery is challenging for lack of better description. But I have arrived on the other side of a dual dose of recovery with a clear mind and heart, and I am so ever grateful for this moment in which I am now existing. I have seen and felt many things these last few months. I have come out as trans, I have questioned my marriage of twenty years, I have relived rape and assault. I am healed now. Not by some almighty power, though God has helped much in this process of recovery, but by dutiful days spent lying in my bed, meditating in my yard, going for walks, feeling it all and hoping that someday I may return to my previous self and reality; and by staying open and having patience. But I am changed. I am healed and I have evolved. There is no returning, there is just moving forward. I know there is more healing to be had, but for now I have reached that oasis in the large desert I have been lost in, searching and thirsty.

So, as the rain begins to patter outside my window after a 10 day long stretch of October sun and mist, I look over at Steve who is watching the world series quietly on a lap top I very nearly destroyed in 2016 during my last psychotic break where I avoided a fourth hospitalization. The lap top still works. So does this body that has seen so much trauma. But I survived it and I am surviving now, the recovery, that was only made possible by years of settling into my pain, writing, and praying very hard. I am here as a testament to say that recovery is possible. Don’t give up hope. Allow your body, mind and emotions to breathe out the patterns that they need to that are buried very deep. You will find them on your journey. And if you have not yet begun, it is never too late.