"In a land far far away, there was a huge black tree, and the spirit living there, was as vile as a hangry wolverine"

As a child I used to withdraw in my writing and drawing. I was good at it, I thought, despite the toxic comments my mother and brother would rain down on me whenever I finished some project. They accused me of living in a fantasy world, of not being able to live a normal life, of losing touch with what is real. I guess they were right, it just took me a couple more years to realise that what I was doing, was indeed escaping my life.

My stories, they were kind of a safe haven, a place where I could be me, and no one would judge me. My father loved it. He donated me his own typewriting machine, which I used until the S and the E no longer would do what they wanted to do. By that time, my father had bought a computer, an Atari, which I was allowed to use to write my stories.

My father was the one who had given me The Lord of the Rings when I was 12, because the books in the children's library were all read and returned. I needed new fuel for my ever expanding creative and highly imaginatively brain. And so dad borrowed The Lord of the Rings on his library card and handed it to me to read. It was not an option as such. He really thought I should read it. He loved reading himself, not the classical works in Flemish literature a Stijn Streuvels and Hendrik Conscience, but the science fiction of Tom Clancy and the fantasy of Roger Zelazny. 

Aside from the sketching art course he coaxed me on taking - against mother's will - handing me The Lord of the Rings was the best thing he ever did for me. Because after reading Tolkien, I was very much hooked and it was that book that drew me into creating the worlds I would use to flee in.

In the worlds I created, peopled with mages, dwarves, dragons, elves and whatnot, I could talk like I wanted, be who I wanted to be, decide whichever way to go, eat and buy and sleep on my terms. I could fall in love and the other person would love me back. I could have parents who cared - like the ones I invented as a ritual role-play before bed time, the parents who would come and save me. I was five or six when I first created them and I held on to that soothing ritual till I was about 12, when my brother caught me and made a fool of me. I never knew if he told my parents. In my stories I would have siblings who got my back and helped me deal with difficult situations. If I start a story with "In a land far far away, there was a huge black tree, and the spirit living there, was as vile as a hangry wolverine", I can choose if my hero will venture there or not. It is up to me to make it a horror story, Dean Koontz like, or a comical one in Terry Pratchett's style. I may add werecats, or green moons, or storms that rain flower petals. I am the one in control, and that means I can add to my Healing. 

✸ Aside from the sketching art course he coaxed me on taking - against mother's will - handing me The Lord of the Rings was the best thing he ever did for me. 

My drawing knew a similar course: Before the typewriter, I used to devour comic books and create my own comics, apart from drawing everything I liked or wanted to be or do, such as figure skating, ballet, princesses, green landscapes and huge suns shining. Faeries I drew most of all. I loved their beauty and their connection to nature and all creatures living there. I loved the idea of medicinal stones and herbs, and the weaving of spells to make things better. My faeries would be very cliché though, tall and slender, with wings and long dresses the way Walhalla strutted around in the Asterix and Obelix stories. When I started my own writing, I would add sketches to the story. Sometimes I would draw a scene merely to help me visualize it, so I could weave it into words. That, too, proved some kind of escape and a more direct one to be frank, because the sketch would draw me straight into the story, and I would sense my surroundings as if I was really there. I found, while writing Isangraille, the final part of my epic fantasy series Zerían's Curse, which was published in 2012, that this drawing out also put me on the path of Healing - the visualizing could detach me from the pain and the sadness, and help me focus on milder, lighter feelings that come with creating these scenes. (Because yes, despite my absurdly low self-esteem, I would feel proud of what I was able to do, even though it was pride wrapped in immense guilt.)

Up to this day, my creative mind has been saving me time and again from the feelings of despair that well up from the past. I am nowhere near the Healing end spot, but my Little Boat of Healing is getting me there. The time my laptop needs to actually get ready for writing, I fill with drawing little sketches of wisdom I would share with people in similar situations, i.e. dealing with trauma due to narcissistic abuse, and worsened by both toxic choices based on trauma and chronic illness. I weave in the wisdom I pick up from meditating, from Rumi, from Tara Brach, as well as the gentleness I receive from friends as Birgit and Ilse. The lovingkindness of good/best friends is an immeasurable necessity to rediscover your core, to re-see the golden and beautiful you that you have held imprisoned out of protective needs all those long years. And they are not to be taken lightly, because it truly takes special friends to keep supporting you, as trauma will pull you back in the trance of Fears and Darkness, for whatever reason. As I experience ever so often, I will get overwhelmed by grief and hold myself in trance, unable to step out of it. And even though these moments grow fewer as time passes, they do not lose their weight. Their heaviness is a huge burden on who I am trying to become - milder, kinder, more patient, less judgemental, and above all, more loving towards myself. I realize like no other the burden I pose to those few caring souls, willing to sacrifice their time and energy to help me see the light again, that fragile silver lining that, sometimes, I am too scared to see.

#gingerkittysketch
#littleboatofhealing

 

#blackkittysketch

The feeling of being a tremendous burden, that is absolutely trauma triggered, and that I am fighting every day. And I know I could not do this without the friends I came to know and re-know in these past few years. Of course, many left as well. Friends that were the loudest to yell they would stay forever and not be like those 'ignorants who are not willing to invest in you', as one of those put it. Trusting that not everyone is like this, proved to be the first important hurdle for me to take in re-connecting. Sketching my Black Kitty Sketch helped me a great deal, because those seemingly innocent and deeply recognisable illustrations proved to be a grateful medium to start discussions about friendship, caring, trauma and all those things that make us who we are today.

It is a great asset when you can add writing - if only a diary or a notebook for thoughts that linger - to the understanding and love that your friends give to you. Because your mind is in dire need for new pathways. New roads that lead to soft and kind destinations. And you deserve to be at peace. You deserve to have a mind that's bathing in light and warmth. It is also for that reason that I created the Black Kitty Sketch line, as well as the Ginger Kitty Sketch. Both are immerse deeply in a #littleboatofhealing vibe, each in their own way. But I feel they help me, even long after I created them, and so I am hesitantly convinced they may help others. Hesitantly, because I feel it is not my place to decide what helps another and what not. It's up to whatever you choose or feel you need. You are the one in charge for and of every aspect in your mental well-being. You just have to trust that deepest of the deep inside you, that spark of gold waiting to be re-discovered.