In my mind I have had two distinct lives and homes. The place/s I lived in during the life I was forced to live when I was a child and the place/s I have lived in my adult life where I have control over my surroundings.
"Home" is not tied to the physical structure itself for me, it's the emotional pulse inside the walls that define home for me. Home has to do with my respect for, deep appreciation of, and bond to my husband.
My childhood home was a place I avoided as much as I could. It was cold (temperaturewise), irrational, immoral, hypocritical, dangerous, explosive, and created torturous levels of anxiety. Even prior to walking in the door I'd be on hypevigilant alert. I walked on eggshells 24/7/365 so as not to disturb or otherwise draw the attention of the beast... that made the stress of even the "calm/quiet" moments crushingly drainingly.
My adult home is the complete opposite. It is my sanctuary. It contains my Buddha tempermented husband who even had to educate me on what "peace/calm" even looks like. For instance, he asks me to "go up and ask the kids to come down, please don't yell across the house for them..." My husband is "Grace under fire" and even though he's not perfect in other ways he is perfect in this way, and that is the way I care about MOST. He would never throw anything, break anything, or put his fist through anything out of anger. He would never be violent. He is very strong minded but barely ever even raises his voice to get his way. There is nothing to fear in my home and other than typical teen issues, it is calm and warm and safe. There are no eggshells to walk on. I even took out the landline so I didn't have to deal with the stress of receiving or responding to phone calls.
I'd say it took a good 10 years of decompression to psychologically make the transition. Every so often over that first decade I would just start crying uncontrollably for no apparent reason and if my husband was home, he would just hold me and let me cry untill I had physically exhausted myself. I couldn't pinpoint what I was crying about but he never asked anyway so we just fit. He used to observe "you can't be alone with your thoughts in peace" and I guess he just kinda instinctively knew the crying was a generalized process of draining away my old life and he was endlessly patient allowing the healing to have the time and space it required to run its course. Then one day I recall it popped into my head that I "used" to cry like that... and that was the day I realized how far I'd come.
