Vulnerability.

I am vulnerable.

There, I said it.

Vulnerable is not a dirty word. It isn’t something of which I should be ashamed. And yet, here I am, writing this blog entry and trying to make sense of this feeling that is sticking to me like a grimy film that’s discoloring my entire world.

Many people make comments on the blog, or send me emails or text messages about how strong I am. My kneejerk reaction to every single one is to reject that. How can I be considered strong when I feel so, so, so weak?

I haven’t felt like myself lately. Well, in a really long time. Long before Cushing’s was even a word on my radar. Long before I even realized that I had a pituitary gland or knew what cortisol was.

I am going to share a huge chunk of my truth with you all, dipping my toe into a swimming pool sized sample of what really is a humongous ocean.

In 2005, I was raped. It sounds weird saying it, in large part because I’ve buried it and kept it hidden, for many reasons. The main reason is that I haven’t wanted to accept my status as a victim of a horrible crime, much less a survivor of one. Even twelve years later, I haven’t fully processed what happened to me. The second reason I haven’t talked about it is because of the initial reactions I received at the onset. A couple of people reacted the way I would expect someone to react to hearing the news that someone they love was raped. Those people – my then boyfriend and my best friend that I have known since I was 15 – were ready to kill for me. But the rest of thr reactions were “meh.” That’s the best way to describe it. Family, friends. Just “meh” and sweeping it under the rug.

So I went to therapy, I pushed through and didn’t process and then I put on a mask, pretending that I was okay and that my life hadn’t been altered forever. I didn’t talk about it again – or try – because I felt like the people I had tried to tell didn’t care or didn’t believe me. Hell, I could hardly believe it myself. Why would anyone else believe me? I fed into the self-blame and the responsibility that others had assigned to me, rather than the assholes that did it.

What followed was years of sadness, depression, and isolation. The mask worked for the most part. I behaved like a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a co-worker, or friend was supposed to behave. The mask was firmly in place. New people I met knew only the good stuff, not the bad. Life went on.

But then the mask started to peel away. The anger, the frustration, and the sadness poured out of me. I was so angry at so many people. I was mad at my parents for not caring enough, and dismissing me the few times I did try to bring it up. I was livid at the few friends that did know that blamed me for what happened. I was mad as hell at a world filled with politicians and selfish assholes who promulgated the belief that the victims are to blame and celebrated (and voted for) politicians that bragged about grabbing women by their genitals.

I unfriended and debated and excommunicated A LOT of people during this period, even though I didn’t understand the reasons behind it until recently.

I have been in therapy the past few months working on a lot of these issues. I am still very fed up with the people around me in general, but I am hoping for clarity as I delve deeper into my past. Some people still may be excommunicated because I literally do not have the strength or emotional capacity to have selfish people in my life that don’t take into consideration the lives of others.

So what does any of this have to do with Cushing’s, you ask? I have recently discovered, via therapy and reading materials related to my experience, that those that have experienced any kind of trauma, and haven’t processed it properly, can be exposed to higher levels of stress hormones! In technical terms, the amygdala (our fear center), receives feedback from the thalamus and interprets it to see if there is something that warrants a fight or flight response. If the answer is yes, as it almost always is in trauma, the amygdala will send signals to the hypothalamus to secrete hormones to get the fight or flight response started. The hypothalamus secretes CRH, which tells the pituitary to secrete ACTH, which tells the adrenal glands to secrete cortisol.

Once the threat has passed, the stress response should cease. In trauma patients it doesn’t, as the body is still registering something frightening. So the stress response remains elevated, continuing to fight a threat that no longer is there. And, as we all know, the longer you are exposed to high amounts of cortisol, the worse your health becomes.

I was raped in 2005. I started getting sick in 2007. I was diagnosed with Cushing’s in 2008. I am CONVINCED that my rape played a huge part in the deterioration of my health, both mentally and physically.

In summary, all of this has culminated in this huge onslaught of vulnerability. I am barely holding myself together right now and am grasping onto the few grounding techniques I have in my therapy arsenal. And I haven’t even gotten to the really hard parts yet.

I am shedding my skin, and I am feeling very exposed. But I know this is necessary and in the end, a new, better me will emerge from the ashes of my trauma.

Thanks for reading.

Rachel