Strike First (Contains graphic material. Read at your own risk).

At times today there's some focus. On the other hand, lots of emptiness. You scream to get
anger out so you don't get eaten alive by it. You don't want to black out and then wonder
where you are and what did you do.

All of our sources say this is perfectly normal. You're not psycotic. You're not going to have a nervous breakdown. All of this has to come out.

You fight to not dissociate or disappear in flashbacks. What's real and what isn't? You try to ground yourself with solid things. Despite that, it doesn't always help. What do you do then?

At times, you feel like you have to shock yourself into some sense of balance. If you don't, you feel empty and ask, what's the point? You don't want to give them the satisfaction by offing yourself. You have to fight to keep some sense of balance. Not perfection. Just balance.

Feeling cheated is a common thing for survivors. Have some positive things happened? Yes. However, it's really tough at times to hold onto those as you feel like you're bombarded with horrible stuff. You feel like you're going to scream and literally snap in two.

Yet, this is perfectly normal.

At night, we're totally wiped out. We're also many times scared to go to sleep. Will we have to fight off lucid dreams? The psycho pedophile tries to pin us down as he laughs as then tries to rape us. We fight him off, and then kill him before he kills us. We don't have a choice. We have to strike first.

Now, fight this off a hundred times a day. And, do everything else you have to do as well. No one will save you. No one will protect you. Nobody will listen.

What choice do you have?

It's true. You can't make people understand about trauma. On the other hand, you can protect yourself. Because nobody else will.