by Jess Kolbe
Joy bounces around my heart and I can feel Sam’s heart also bounce to our beat and like that, we sleep.
Since our night of heart connection as we have called it, we have been blissfully ordinary. I am more myself and less in my head about us. Sam and I have continued to talk about what we need and what is happening. We have practiced a lot of compassion towards each other, in that we both don’t have to be on the same page, nor do we need to have the answers for one another. It is very freeing to remove the expectations from each other beyond friendship. I’m actively trusting Sam, actively loving him, not just expecting it to happen on its own. I trust Sam implicitly and I know he does me too.
A few days later, Sam is driving us up north to a famous beach spot. I have a picnic organised and I’m ready. I’m emotionally fierce. I’m unafraid of my history.
I’m prepared to free us both from my traumas. I’m not sure he knows what’s coming, although he seems to know me better than I do sometimes. I’m nervous, which he notices. He holds my hand or has been stroking my thigh on the drive, always within touch, and the occasional kiss on the back of my hand. We have grown so close and shared so much. Our naked heart cuddling, holding our love in a space, were we actually spent time receiving each other’s love, has become one of Sam’s favourites and part of our daily routine. I think it’s because we get our needs met in raw love and trust. He clearly understands my body, plus it keeps me ‘out of my head,’ as Sam puts it.
I feel loved every day. I give love every day to my man. All in the doing of ‘loving’, we can just stay in our bodies, avoiding crazy thinking. Although I have a little problem with fear thinking… We have a way of loving each other now. I learnt that I don’t have to tell Sam what happened to me. It’s something that happened to me, it is not who I am. Sam helped me to realise this and that I can be loved. I can love. We are not perfect and that’s why I am comfortable and ready to tell Sam. The ‘how’ to tell Sam, is the difficulty. It is not something that can described in words. Horrors are horrors and words are not enough nor am I able to put a voice to indescribable things, while Sam’s eyes are on me.
It is important for me to tell Sam and be free, not have anything controlling me. I don’t believe I can look at this man while telling him. It’s so hard to look at anyone and tell my story. Our kind of love and this story should never be in the same lifetime so I will tell him what happened to me and leave it at the beach. It no longer has a place in me. The final step to freeing myself, so I’m going to face the ocean, tell my Mother Nature, let her cleanse us both of my story with the ocean while Sam sits by my side, steadying me. Just as I did with him, that day on the beach.
A voice to it means there is no longer any secrets or anything between us, it’s the final act of releasing myself from the past and completely stepping into our life together. We arrive at the beach, driving along the sand until I let Sam know that I want to stop. He trusts me and allows me to take the lead, knowing I need to. He must feel something different about today. I swim first while Sam sets up our spot for the day.
The ocean feels cool with a tiny swell. I kneel in the shallows and send a little prayer out to bring forth the strength of the ocean within me, to allow each word to unhook me from the pain, the monsters released from my heart, entirely. I picture the water unhooking me, removing the claws from under my skin, thanking them and gifting my pain to the ocean, to dissolve, picturing each hook coming out of my skin, out of my body, out of my heart. I no longer belong to you. I belong to me.
I stand and walk into her, submerging myself in the cleansing waves, feeling the ocean healing my skin, nurturing my heart, loving my body.
After the swim and with the courage of Mother Nature, beating throughout my body, I sit next to my love. “Sam, I’m ready for you to hear what happened to me…”
I’ve prepared him as best as I can. I let him know I want him to hear my story by way of me sharing it with Mother Nature, and if he could remember that I’m healed by love. I, of course, can’t help but give him a few pointers, that he might feel angry, or hurt and all of that is okay. I am strong for a reason and I have fought hard battles, and this is a final battle to share my story with my love for the first and final time. I ask him to please, understand, I need him to steady me, hold my hand and after today for me, it is gone.
Sam is ever the man I dreamt of patient, loving, kind. I can see it’s hard, the struggle in him, our pains in hearing the story aloud. The pain in telling it. As he listens, I am stripping away my armour, peeling off my scars, baring them to the shine of the sun, feeling my hurts while my pains are carried away by Mother Nature who tenderly absorbs them with each wave. Swallowing them, removing them to the depths, never to be found again. I run out of words, of sobs, steadied by a beautiful man. We sit in silence, Sam holding my hand to his heart. Emotionally bare.
ABOUT AUTHOR
Jess Kolbe was born and raised on the outskirts of Melbourne, Australia and has lived abroad in the UK and Ireland. She resides on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland and runs a successful Counselling practice. Jess has always loved writing and writes to make a difference in people’s lives. She is passionate about helping others understand and relate to their emotional experiences and guides people to have accepted relationships with themselves.
This is her second book, The Naughty Therapist was published in 2015, reflections from a trauma therapist.
The Naughty Therapist 2015 ©