Wow. Thank you, Misty; that must have been hard to write.

Ehh. Not sure how long I'll leave this one up. Having second thoughts, already. But, Thanks, Mark.

Once again I have to quote from Touched by an Angel. Great episode about a homeless man; Tess told Monica that he was her, "next assignment." She asked how she was going to help him; volunteer in a shelter or council the homeless, etc. Tess said, "The only way to share this man's pain, is to share his pain." At that moment, Monica temporarily ceased to be an angel and became as he was; cold, hungry and, alone. She literally felt his pain.

Misty, I'll never be able to fully understand what it was like for you. But sharing this as you have; it helps me better appreciate what you must have felt; what you still feel. Please forgive me, if I've said or done anything uncaring or unthoughtful. I never really understood until now; still don't fully but... you know. Thank you for having the courage to share your heart with us here. And thank you, for inspiring me once again with your strength; with your ability to look inside and face those things that most are too afraid to even think about.

Misty are you ok today? I ask because whenever this stuff gets churned up, there can be such a backlash.... I think your words are very clear and well said. We stand with you!! I wish you well today

..I'm losing control, again. Screwing up. But, that's what I do best. This isn't worth it. It's too much.

Mark, may I paraphrase you here?

Misty, what you're going through is a process that will have it's ups and downs. This is not a matter of, "fixing" you like you would grab a tool and fix a machine and it's done. It's more like healing a wound or an illness; it takes time and proper treatment. I'll share a little something embarrassing here. My teeth aren't exactly the greatest; in fact, they're pretty awful. My dentist must be a miracle worker to have fixed me up the way he has! Anyway, it comes from years of not brushing my teeth; guess I was a lazy kid, I don't know. Anyway, at some point along the way, I developed canker sores. This is a form of virus that comes and goes due to various triggers. If I keep everything clean and don't bite on the end of pens or hold guitar picks between my teeth while doing two-handed stuff on the neck, everything is pretty much okay. But, the guitar pick thing for example; that is such a natural thing for me that, I do it without thinking sometimes. And not long after, I'll often encounter a canker breakout which can last a week or two. Do I want the sores? No! Am I trying to do the right thing to keep them away? Absolutely. But my patterns of behavior in this case are often subconscious and only AFTER do I catch myself. Sometimes I do but, it takes a conscious effort to rewrite my programming, so to speak. I believe this is where you are now, re-writing the code in your mind and, your old patterns are resisting.

You have years and years of behavior and thoughts and patterns all working against you so, yeah, it's going to be tough and you're going to stumble every so often. But keep at it hun because, you WILL break it. The times between stumbles will increase. You really can't fail... unless you give up.

Strange analogy here but, did you see Forest Gump? The section where he was running across America - he started alone and as he ran, others came out to join him. Pretty soon, there were many all running with him. Picture that as you accumulating your various thoughts and actions over the years. You AND all those have all this momentum going and now, YOU are turning and running the other way; with everything else continuing on in the other direction. And it's knocking you down and making it very difficult. I'm going to send you a video link and you tell me if you can relate to it, even on a basic level. Not 1:1 but, in general.

Anyway, talk more soon. Big hug my friend.

you ok today, Misty?