vaccine

  My Great-great grandma survived polio. She was lucky she didn't end up in an iron lung. Back then fear was rampant. No on new how it was transmitted. My mother remembers her mother carefully pealing every last sting off the banana's because they though polio could be caught from banana "strings." 

When the polio vaccine came out, it was no different than it is now. People were afraid. Very afraid. 

 But they did it. 

They did it to protect their children and everyone else's child.

My oldest memory is sitting on my mother's lap watching as thick grape syrup was poured on a sugar cube, and then popped into my mouth. I bet my mother was nervous knowing that her little one was getting live polio vaccine...having watched her grandmother live with the aftermath of polio her whole life.

But she did it.

That picture is of  me. I am 6 months old and failing to thrive. I am in a doll dress tied up in the back because back in 1966 there wasn't any clothes that fit me. That is my small pox vaccine scab there on my wee little six-month-old arm.

Last time my people and the government and small pox came up together in the same conversation it was to give infected blankets to those on the reservations to kill them.

Yeah. there was zero trust, but everyone did it anyway.

2020, locked down rolled in....and issued in a hell I hope to never have to visit again. Watching the elderly in my care mentally stew in anguish ..."My daughter doesn't come visit me anymore...is she mad at me?" breaks into sobs. 

Me unable to hug her and comfort her crying behind my mask. Night after night, turning into weeks after weeks, until it was too late and she went to her grave thinking her loving daughter abandoned her.

Watching my own child plunge into a depression as the isolation physically separated her from her mates.  Online schooling and therapy were a poor substitute.  But at least she was in a safe place. She had a home, food and an abuse free environment.  The huge decrease of reported cases of child abuse...tells me many children gained the title of survivor.

I took that covid vaccine for my residents so they could have those unreplaceable moments with their families again. I took it so my children could once again go out and get on with life. I took it for those children who NEED to get out of their houses and into school where they have a chance to report what is happening to them. 

I did it...for all of us.

Seen *Trigger warning*

 Whoa its been a hot minute since I've blogged. Menopause is evidentially kryptonite for my writers muse.

Common cough up something old woman.

***************trigger warning - abuse aftermath discussion*********************

Twice recently I was pointed out and honored for the work I do in my job.

My soul glitches a bit, like a dog petted the wrong way when the spot light swivels and catches me.

I like to be invisible. A quite person gliding through life unnoticed.

Why? 

That easy.

My past has left permanently scarred.  If I was seen...I was visible and the abusers could find me and hurt me. School hood bullies couldn't torment me if I was inviable in the shadows. 

Being invisible was a coping skill.  Imagine being in chronic mental pain from abuse and no one seeing you.

no one seeing the pain that you were in...

No one stopping to notice the blood weeping from the cuts on your arms. All those little red mouths in your skin screaming and no one hearing anything...

lost and alone, while everyone around you not seeing you ...ignored you, until they had need of your body.

It doesn't start as a coping skill. It starts as a wickedly painful realization. No one can see the pain your in....and worse no one is going to come to help you or save you.

no one cares your soul is fracturing and dying agonizing deaths.

oh make no mistake we want to be seen. We want to be helped, we want to be saved, We want the danger to away. To have the free floating feeling leave our hearts, we want to be grounded and planted and be accepted as a member of the human race.

and when we try to be we are savagely brutalized, and used like trash.

Abuse victims just come to the understanding.. we are invisible. This brings a calmness to the chaos.

If we are invisible, people are suppose to ignore us, not see us, leave us alone.

as simple as that, our young brains add order WHERE NONE SHOULD BE. 

I know for me I skirted and dodged recognition like a gold medalist. In the years Richard and I worked together a frequent thing I heard him say was, "Paja, you are the hardest person to give a complement too." 

I was too. I didn't like how it made me feel.

It made me feel ....seen.

It was disturbing to suddenly materialize in the sunny world from my dark shadowed world.

We never dissected that and look at it deeper, he and I had more pressing things to do. Like keep me alive.

I would work on that later on the message boards, and in helping others with the same issue, I learned why it ruffled me so.

At the very, very primal level, being complemented pinged the hidden part of me that claimed I was invisible. A bright blazing light screaming down into my soul burning that thought from my head; and replacing it with a new one:

You are not invisible ...you never were, people saw what was going on and they CHOOSE TO DO NOTHING.

This is why I would cringe and skirt complements/acknowledgement. Shrug them off and refuse to accept them.

you're telling me the sky is blue after I spent my whole life thinking it was green? 

I can't breath in this world where I am seen.

I. 

can't .

breath.

no one is coming for me...I am left here to linger in this dark place ...they are looking riiiiiight at me and choosing not to see me.

Iz onwee four.  to widdle to safe my selfs. Weft in the darness wif no lanturn.

Weeve us be. weeve us unseen...it hurts less.

But no.

Life continues to see me. Occasionally, quietly laying awards and recognition at my feet.

I no longer flinch away or feel that lost ancient pain.

It was a quietly understanding one day not long ago.

That the people honoring me....were a different bunch. These amazing people with the brilliant hearts and their kind words...they belonged to the tribe of people WHO WOULD HAVE CHOOSEN TO DO SOMETHING. 

Seeing me now, validates me all the way through my system to the blubbery-sobby-snot nosed messed up little one at my core.

And I perk up rather than cringe away... taking another step on my healing journey.