Not Forgotten. But…Never Forget? 9/11 Twenty Years On...Pt 1

People mean well when they say, “Never forget,” but do they take into account those of us who cannot forget? We who live with the trauma of that morning every day.

Perhaps all my childhood trauma helped prepare me for 9/11. Every year further away from the actual event has been different. A year later it was all still happening. Two years. Five years. Ten years. My mind and soul still lived in a swirling dust cloud of collapsing buildings. I was serving New York City. Doing what I thought I could do to help heal open wounds as well as those deeply buried under tons of steel and rubble.

2008, we lost our father. 2014 our mother. I slowly began to wake up and wonder where my life had gone. It’s like I have forgotten everything that ever occured prior to September of 2001. Like my past all happened to someone else. But then I started to look ahead to the future. My future. What did I want? Where would I go? Who would I be? I had no answers. I did not think I deserved to see the future when so many could not.

I feel guilty wanting anything remotely resembling happiness. I feel guilty about surviving that day. I've gotten to know this as survivors’ guilt. And that I am fortunate to be alive to have it. And that some people can’t understand what this is. And it’s difficult to explain because it sounds like whining. But I have it. It kills the joy of loving life. And if there is one triumphant thing I can say twenty years on is that I love my life. I’m glad I did not die that day. I curse the malaise I was in for so long afterward that had me crippled to present moments with my family, friends and all the people, the amazingly good people, I was so fortunate to meet and love alongside these many years. Yet, for all my stress and pain, I see and know there are those who have it both physically and mentally so much worse.

For those of you who cannot understand what I am ranting about, I envy you. To those who know all too well the ravings of a tortured mind, bless you. I wish you and everyone peace.... Dealing with PTSD is a lifelong battle. The temptation to succumb to despair looms over everything like a vast emptiness that swallows all light. There is strange comfort in knowing I am not alone in facing that darkness.

Those who suffer along with me and those who may empathize with that conundrum...thank you all...and stay strong. Life is worth living.