What I left unsaid

I wrote a longer post earlier.  I realized much later that I left out something so important that I can't believe it didn't come more easily.

That previous post describes the happiest times of my life to date.  They also describe a strong (physically and emotionally), confident, fun young woman.  I thought I knew who that young woman was going to be and I wanted to be her.  Instead she's only a part of my past, a part that changed so rapidly that one year later she was gone forever  and 5 years later she was unrecognizable as my past. 

I've spent so much of this last year trying to learn to live with the part of my past that I still picture as a tiny, curly-haired preschooler/toddler/infant who was hurt so terribly and then grew to be a little girl and teenager who lived through a lot more pain.  I suppose I have succeeded in that I do have the ability to see those parts of my life as that, not as something so awful that it must be hidden from even me.

It just makes me sad.  Thus, depression.  Oddly I'm not sure I've ever thought deeply about all of this.  I've talked many times with Dr. Mind about that time in my life and the truly happy memories it left.  Like so many things I've never left the sadness in. And now it got me.

Yet if I think much about it I realize that I would not go back to that time and tell myself what was to come, so enjoy. I wouldn't not have those memories and I wouldn't be who I am without them. That time in my life made me a better person, gave me a purpose in life and made up for some of my missed childhood. The practical jokes, the adventures, the things I cannot believe I did in defiance of my lifelong fear of heights, the precious quiet times and the places I found to sneak away to have those, even the sunburns, scars, and memories of injuries (I was bitten badly by kids several times on top of bruises, bites, poison ivy, scrapes, etc.), those are precious memories and it is good to know that I only got a small shot at those things but I did have them once. They say that I should appreciate these things more. I'm not sure about that as I don't know how to judge what I would think if there hadn't been bipolar but I do know that I had a good thing once.