Happy Erin's Independence Day

A few weeks ago I realized I was about to have an anniversary of sorts for myself. It is the anniversary of the end of a period of my life that most people will never truly understand or even know much about. It was the day I got out of an abusive relationship. It unfortunately also coincides with the anniversary of the death of a good friend of mine, and as a result it is hard for me to seperate the two events in my head. I wonder what my friend would have said to me or thought of me if he had ever seen me in an abusive relationship. I wonder if I would have ended up in that same situation if my friend hadn't died.
But this isn't meant to be a sad blog post today. It is a happy one. It has been two years since I got out, made changes, and moved on. It is my personal Independence Day, and I couldn't be happier. Last year when I marked just one year out, I was still shaky and scared that I could lose it all again. Now I know how to stand on my own two feet and know if it all falls apart again, I know how to put it back together. I haven't had an anxiety attack over nothing in over a year. For someone getting out of an abusive relationship, that is huge. I'm not scared anymore. I'm happy. That is the bottom line of all of it. I'm happy. I haven't fallen back into another abusive relationship. I didn't leave one for another, like too many people do. I'm safe. I'm good. I'm happy. I survived.


Oddly, history is repeating itself in a different way today as well. Go back and see my first ever blog post at http://erinannie.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_erinannie_archive.html . Two years later my parents are out of town, I'm watching my brother and sister for the weekend, there's a roast in the crockpot, and well, it is all repeating itself again. (except this time I took the bullion cubes out of the wrappers first.) We were late for Church, only 2/3 of us made it to Church. And now both siblings are asleep on the couch because I didn't get them to bed early enough last night. Come to think of it, a Sunday nap sounds really nice...