Changed Forever ...

This is a photo that a friend posted on line and it kind of hit a nerve for me.

In my case it wasn't 'one person' - it was two persons, and in NO way did they intend to hurt me. Yet the greatest pain I have ever in the entirety of my life had to bear was the terrified voices of my two young daughters screaming. 

Helpless to reassure them at the moment, all I could do was run the other way, up a flight of stairs to a phone. Cut off before I could get the number dialed, I broke and ran up another flight of stairs, further away from the cries of my daughters, as far as I could, as fast as I could, to another telephone, where the three numbers did get dialed before he caught up with me again.

Changed forever?

Yes.

Why did I run away from my screaming daughters?

Because he wasn't through with me yet.

So I ran.

Away from them.

And he followed me.

Away from them.

After me.

And yes, I was changed forever. 

It wasn't him who brought about the change; it was the terror in the voices of my two little girls.

They say what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

Sometimes that's true.

Sometimes it's a lie.

Sometimes what doesn't kill you 'only' breaks you, or something inside of you, and sometimes you never do heal all the way because ... well ... because you can't make something not have happened.

You don't get to go back to 'before'.