It's been three months since I've consistently worn the hijab. Five and a half months since I was raped. A month and a half since I've worn the hijab at all. Three months since I've known for sure I wasn't pregnant. Two months since I've felt all the coping mechanisms were gone. And two weeks since I've felt they're coming back. These days I measure everything--it's one of those coping mechanisms you don't realize you have until you've been doing it a long, long time. The more time passes, the more I think I'm immune to what happened to me.
But as I put my trauma behind me and start to re-discover emotion, I realize what the last months of trauma have done to me. It's like I'm waking up after being asleep for a very long time. My relationships are broken, neglected for months as I was controlled, and hiding. People are confused at who I've become, who I was and now who I am. It's slow work to rebuild these relationships. Some I know are lost to me forever.
The reconnection is painful and hard yet comforting. These people are a link to the better, normal days of my past. Yet it feels like I can never be who I used to be before this. It feels like I can't live up to their expectations of who Brisa used to be. But these are the few people--those who stood with me through all of it--so I must fight every day not to shut down to them.
So I slip a little. I dress different. Desperately want some semblance of normality. I fight the checking mechanisms, fight the counting, fight the sorting.
Rubbing the necklace was a quick fix. It doesn't fight the overwhelming tension inside of me anymore. So it's little things at first. Eating less. Picking off nail polish. And I'm thinking about putting on the hijab again. But almost like an addict in whatever anonymous, my 45 days without the image is the most tangible sign of recovery I have. The most tangible marker. So here's to hoping that I take one day at a time, here's to hoping I don't wear the hijab again out of fear, and here's to hoping--that I won't put it on tomorrow.
