Usually, people take time when making a huge decision like moving away.

While leaving my family and moving away was something I had been envisioning for quite some time, it went from vision to action in less than three months.  Before then, my over-analytic nature got the best of me.  I couldn’t just act on impulse; I had to plan everything out first and make sure everything fell into place just right before I could make a move.  Of course, that never happened.

The closest I had come to moving out was several years ago.  I had a few thousand dollars saved, bought the most essential things I needed and started storing them for the day I would finally move.  I was looking at apartments on Craigslist and checking out whatever places wouldn’t make me go broke within a few months.  It was around Christmastime, and since I had all of my money saved, I didn’t buy any gifts for anyone.  Somehow my mother found out my plans and flipped on me that Christmas day.  She flew into a rage, throwing everything within her reach, calling me ungrateful, a horrible person, uncaring, a selfish bitch.  After a few minutes of her rage, my mind just went off to another place – a coping mechanism I have been utilizing since childhood.  Needless to say, I did not move.  For years after, I could not even think of trying it again.  She instilled a great amount of fear in me, and I did not want to experience her wrath again.

In November 2014, I was hospitalized in the behavioral health unit for two weeks – it would have been longer, but insurance would not cover any more time.  It was my first hospitalization, though I admit it is not the first time I needed inpatient treatment.  I won’t go into details in this post, but the social worker, knowing not even half of what my reality at home was like, wanted to send me to a supervised living facility.  She knew it wasn’t safe for me at home, but there wasn’t much help for adult victims of their own parents; even getting me into supervised living would have been difficult.  I declined.  I didn’t want that life, either.  I wanted to be in control.  She gave me six months to get my life together and get out; if I was hospitalized after that, it would no longer be my choice.

I started weighing all of my options.  I had some money in savings, but not enough to live on for long, especially where I am living.  I thought about moving down south, where it is much cheaper to live.  A big change like that came with huge complications.  I would have no health coverage, no job, no one close by to lean on, and most of all, no way to even get myself and my things down there.  I was close to just giving up and letting them put me in a home.

In April, I reluctantly attended a retreat offered through my support group.  I say reluctantly because I ultimately ended up going after close friends and my aunt encouraged me to go – I would not have gone if left to my own indecisiveness.  The experience ended up being life-changing for me.  It was the push I needed to get myself out of my situation.

Within a week of coming back home, I started looking for apartments or rooms.  Not down south, and not where I was living then. Just far enough to be out of my family’s reach, but close enough to have access to people I cared for.  It took two months, around 12 hours of traveling back and forth, and a miracle before I finally found a place.  Three days later, I put down a security deposit, paid rent, and starting packing a bag.  Ten days later, on that fateful Friday, I moved out of prison and into an apartment.  Now I am here, in a town completely unfamiliar to me, with a roommate who just met me, having no idea what the future holds.  I took a leap of faith.  I can only hope this leads me in the right direction.