Reverting

Moving Backwards

I had a setback today. It was something I did not expect, but maybe, if I’m honest with myself, somewhere in the quiet corners of my mind, I did. Maybe it lived there like a shadow I refused to look directly at. Therapy has been going great. I’ve been doing very, very well. There has been progress, real progress, the kind you can feel in your chest when you wake up and the weight isn’t quite as crushing as it used to be.

And then today happened.

Today, a Sheriff’s deputy showed up at my house.

My reaction was immediate. There was no time to think, no time to reason with myself. My body decided before my mind could catch up. I began to tremble. Not just a slight shake, my entire body trembled. It moved through me like electricity, uncontrollable, relentless. I could not stop it, no matter how hard I tried. I tried. I told myself to breathe, to stand still, to be calm, but my body refused to listen.

I grabbed my phone. Instinct. Survival. Documentation. I hit record. Of course, it only recorded before and after, missing the middle, missing the part that mattered most. Which felt… convenient. Too convenient.

I opened the door just slightly. Not enough to feel exposed, just enough to create a barrier between me and whatever was about to happen. I asked the deputy if I could help them.

They asked me if I was who I am.

I asked again if I could help them.

There was an attitude in the response, sharp, dismissive. “Can’t you just talk to me?”

My chest tightened, but I held my ground. I responded, “Do you have a warrant?”

The answer: “No, I do not.”

And in that moment, something inside me, shaking, terrified, but still present, stood up just enough to protect me.

“Then please remove yourself from my property.”

He said okay.

And he left.

It should have ended there. It didn’t.

He went right down to my grandmother’s house. Where my former aunt was. Nine minutes. Not random. Not accidental. And nine minutes after that, he left that property too.

Earlier in the week, maybe the end of last week, I can’t even remember because everything is starting to blur, I know I wrote it down, Sheriff’s deputies were at my grandmother’s house again. I contacted my lawyer. I told him what was happening. Because now, every time they show up somewhere, it feels like something is being built behind my back.

And I need to know what.

I need the police report. I need to see what I am being blamed for now.

I just finished emailing my attorney, telling him everything that happened today. Adding one more incident to a list that keeps growing. Asking, again, for documentation. For truth. For something concrete in a situation that feels like it’s slipping further and further out of my control.

I was shaking for over an hour.

Not just during the encounter… but after. Long after. The kind of shaking that drains you, that leaves your muscles sore, your chest tight, your mind exhausted.

I only had one dog to groom today. Just one. Something simple. Something routine.

I shook the entire time.

Even when I sat back afterward, trying to relax, waiting for his parents to come pick him up, I was still trembling. My body refused to return to baseline, as if it believed the danger was still standing right outside the door.

Then I went to my friend’s house to help her put a shed together.

And that’s when I noticed it.

My eyes.

Constantly searching. Scanning. Moving. Never settling. Every sound, every movement, every passing car, my brain treated it like a potential threat. I assumed I was being followed. I assumed everything I said was being recorded. I couldn’t turn it off.

Even in a safe place, with someone I trust, my mind refused to believe I was safe.

When I returned home, it hit me harder.

The house didn’t feel like a home, it felt like a watchtower. Like a place I had to defend. I found myself constantly looking out the windows. Watching. Waiting. Anticipating something that hadn’t happened yet but felt inevitable.

Because of everything going on with my son, I realized something painful in that moment: I need to try harder. I need to open the shades. I need to let light in. I need to create a brighter, happier space.

But today… I didn’t.

Instead, I stood behind the blinds. Peering through them. Watching the outside world like it was closing in. My dogs barked, and every bark sent a shock through my system. I would shake again, instantly, like my body had been reset into panic mode.

And then the realization came.

Today is the one-year anniversary.

One year since I was released from jail. Three days. Two nights. Arrested for something I did not do.

And today, of all days, this happened.

It didn’t just affect me. It reactivated everything. Every memory. Every fear. Every moment of helplessness. My body went straight back into fight-or-flight, like no time had passed at all.

I do not feel safe in my home.

And if I’m honest… I haven’t felt safe for over a year. Not since I first learned I was going to be arrested for something I didn’t do.

But recently, before today, I was starting to feel something shift.

A little more confidence. A little more stability. I was finishing my report. I had evidence lined up. Real evidence. Proof that they are lying. For the first time, I could see a path forward. I wasn’t fully safe, but I was safer. I was starting to exist in my own space again.

And then this happened.

And it feels like everything I built over the past year just collapsed.

I still understand why I react the way I do. I still understand the trauma, the patterns, the triggers. But understanding it doesn’t stop it from happening.

This feels like a setback.

A real one.

And with everything going on with my son… with the things I’ve heard they’ve been saying… it adds another layer I don’t even know how to carry.

They think I coerced my grandmother into signing papers.

Or worse, that I forged them.

They think I am a criminal.

They think I am a thief.

They think I would steal from an elderly woman, her, the one person in this world I would protect above anyone else.

I am not a thief.

And I would never do anything like that to her.

But they have already decided. They believe I am guilty. They have tunnel vision, and nothing I say seems to matter.

I don’t care if they read this.

Because this is the truth.

And ironically, a lot of the proof is in the very discovery they sent.

And still… none of it seems to stop what’s happening.

I feel like my world is collapsing.

Like I am being pulled back to where I was a year ago, my lowest point.

I know I didn’t do what they’re accusing me of. I was there. I lived it. I know the truth.

But these constant accusations… the persistence… the way that family will do anything to have me thrown in prison for their crimes…

There aren’t words strong enough to describe what that feels like.

I could try.

But it would never be enough.

And now, after today, I feel like I’m reaching a breaking point.

I feel like I might have a nervous breakdown.

I am constantly working on this. Constantly trying to hold myself together, to make sense of it, to stay grounded.

But I don’t know if I’m the only one who can see the truth.

Or if I’m just the only one holding onto it.

I don’t know how else to interpret what’s happening.

All I know is this…

I feel like I have no safe place.

No safe haven.

My mind feels overloaded, unable to organize any of this, like everything is blending together into one overwhelming, indistinguishable mass.

And even now, as I sit here writing this…

I’m trembling.

Like I’m reliving it.

Not just today, but the past year and a half, all at once, compressed into a single moment that won’t let go.

And I’m alone.

Completely alone.

My son is gone. He wants nothing to do with me, because of their lies.

And so I sit here…

And I don’t know what to do.