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Emerging from Broken ~ The Greatest Adventure is Healing

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Healing from child abuse

freedom ~ my grown son T.

I was not always who I am today. I was not strong. I was not independent. I was not an individual. I was not often happy. I was not a voice in the darkness and although I always had a desire to advocate for others, I was not effective.

I had to become effective in my own life before I was effective in the lives of others.

I was a victim. Some would rather I say that I was a survivor but in truth when I started this process I was still a victim. I was still a victim because I was still oppressed. I was still under the law of other people. I was still compliant and obedient. I was still defined by those other people and my true identity was suppressed.

I was lost, withdrawn and depressed. I was owned by many and disrespected by most.  I had three kids and when my oldest, who was 12 at the time started to treat me like I was ‘crazy’ and started using my depression as proof that I was crazy ~  just like his father (my husband) did, I knew that I had reached the end of what I could cope with. I was giving up on the fight for my life. The only decision that I had to make was how I was going to end it. I had to decide if I was going to escape, or if I was going to fight to find the solution one last time.

At first I had decided to leave my family. I thought that my husband and my three kids would be better off without me because I believed that I was the problem. I believed it deep down in my heart and soul because that was the message that I had always been given, all of my life and I never thought not to accept that message anymore.  The truth had been distorted for me since the beginning. I didn’t even question the truth as I knew it.  I believed the problem was “me” and I really believed that if I left my family, their lives would be so much easier; so much better.  I decided out of love for them that I should quietly go. But something nagged at me and today I know it was a glimmer of “the truth”.  It was NOT best for anyone if I were to just go.

I realized that for a very long time I learned to do what others wanted because I had been so totally convinced that what they wanted for me was ‘right’ because I had been so manipulated all my life. This was part of taking my life back from my oppressors. I started to look at what might be right for me. I started to think about what I might want and what was ‘best’ for me. I learned that most times “best” is best for everyone and not just best for me; it always comes down to the motive. What had happened to me most of my life was never best for me; it was just what someone else selfishly wanted.

As I started to look at HOW I had come to believe that the problem was me, I began to realize that I had been controlled and manipulated all my life by people who asked me to “try harder”. Trying harder was a default mode for me. As long as I believed I was the one that had to “try harder” I accepted that success in relationship and whether or not I was loved was all up to me.   

I write about “Emerging from Broken” from real experience. I lived functioning at a fraction of the level that I function at today. I survived living under the oppression and suppression of others. I survived by believing that if I did what “they” want and if I am who “they” want me to be, I would be loved. I was so brainwashed in victim mentality (that if I did what they wanted they would love me) that I could not see a solution other than leaving the world that I lived in.

I found a way to leave the world that I lived in by facing the damage that had been caused to me. I didn’t have to “go” anywhere. I literally stepped out of it by seeing how dysfunctional and harmful that it had been and still was.  I learned to validate my pain and declare that I had a right to my feelings, I had a right to my voice, I had been wronged and it WAS NOT my fault.   I finally owned my truth and discarded the lies that I had been encouraged to believe my entire life by realizing exactly what those lies were and how those lies were all designed by others who wanted to keep and maintain control over me. I learned to take care of myself emotionally.  I learned to love myself. And through all of this, I found myself. I found the original me and I embraced myself. I welcomed myself into a whole new world and a whole new existence.

I stayed with my husband and my children and we rebuilt our lives. I took the lead even though it was a fight for the first two years. No one in our home wanted anything to change but I wanted healing and I was willing to risk everything in order to obtain it. In my victim mentality I had actually taught my husband and kids to disregard my needs and even my opinions by disregarding them myself. They didn’t trust that I could model “emotional health”.

My husband had to do his own healing work and he did; I finally embraced the truth that it takes two to have a relationship and I was finally able to communicate that to him. I was no longer willing to carry the burden of relationship all by myself. We repaired the damage that had been done to us all of our lives and that we had in turn passed on by accepting and living in those false definitions of love. When our individual healing work was underway, we worked really hard to repair the damage and dysfunction in our marriage relationship and then in the relationships that we had with our three children.

Years have passed since I made the decision to face the pain and take my life back from the people who stole it from me. I live, really live each day now. Our three children have flourished living in the truth and without the oppression of the lies that we all used to live buried under.

Welcome to Emerging from Broken; the greatest and most rewarding adventure of my life. I look forward to meeting you on the journey from surviving to thriving.  

This article has been an emotional one for me to write. Tears sprang to my eyes several times; my determination to face the pain, acknowledge the damage, heal and take my life back surprised even me. I did not know that I had this amount of strength and persistence when I started this journey but today that is how I know that you can do it too.

As always, please share your thoughts.

There is freedom on the other side of broken,

Darlene Ouimet


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