Continuing The "SOFT PLACE To Fall"

I admit that I have spent some time wondering exactly what it is I have become by writing this blog so openly and in such an honest way. I have often felt that if I could share this deep, dark hurtful stuff that maybe a reader out there who has been holding on to their own hurt will figure "if he can do this, well maybe I can too".


All I know is I never sat around and thought about the implications of it. I just starting writing about my experience and what I wrote was what I wrote. I admit I've had second thoughts about sharing the intimate details of my life. Yes...it is embarrassing, humiliating and it would be much, much easier for me to just let that stuff go. Most of it is dealt with adequately enough and I no longer need to thrash out any more issues from it...the sole purpose in sharing this stuff now is for the potential benefit of other people.


I talk a great deal here on Shell Shock about living to serve others...I do my darnedest to make sure that is NOT just idle talk but is a living reality. Sharing those details here is one way I am giving a part of myself to others. And it is a sacrifice...it hurts me deeply to relive some of those events, even just by mentioning them. Yet at the very same time I realize there is an even HIGHER price to pay for holding it all in.


I also am quite aware that my sharing this information may also be embarrassing to my family and friends. I do think it bothers my son a great deal and I understand why he may feel that way. He is engaged and I'm sure he would rather his future wife and in-laws not know about my past. Unfortunately as I weigh these different options I have to make some decisions that often don't please everyone and the decision to keep sharing EVERYTHING of the SHOCK was one of those. In the realm of the big picture it was not a tough decision to make really. I have felt right from the start that it is something I must do...I feel compelled as if it is a sacred duty...not going for the drama here, it is really how I feel.


The feedback has proven it out time and again....that it is a worthwhile risk to share this stuff...to come clean as it were, people are reading it and my readership #'s continue to grow and grow. I have received some heartbreaking private messages from folks who have really been brutalized and had no one, sometimes for decades that they could turn to and share their deep, dark secrets, they had suppress them and hold them in. Then they are thanking me for providing a: "safe place to fall" as I like to call a loving, nurturing and listening oriented envirement.


So I have no current plans to change the basic way I post here on Shell Shock Serenade. I will continue to write as openly as humanely as possible and be available any way that I can. i will continue to strive to keep peeling back the "onion" skin layers of my emotional hardship to keep revealing those areas I HAVE to work on myself and share my progress as I am doing so.