Nobody's Girl: An Incredible Story About Finding Freedom

By Sybil Paige

Nobodys Girl is a work of hope. The author writes in such a way that you resonate on a primordial level. Whether you have experienced trauma or addiction issues or know someone who has. The book speaks to all of us. And we all have experienced painful situations at some point or another. While it deals with some difficult topics the books story is written to engage and focus on the positive outcome profited from doing the hard but necessary work to get to the other side of any painful issues. After a lifetime of hiding behind multiple facades, personalities, careers, sex, money, drugs, alcohol, and false bravado. Her survivor tools fail her. She is faced with having to talk about the truth or die.

Her ability to speak from a recovery standpoint is not only profound for a newbie in the recovery process but for a survivor of traumatic abuse it is remarkable. Without having to engage in the hard explicit detail, by detail scenarios, we are able see the application of her newfound tools at work on the PTSD, her addition and how she found and used the tools to freedom. The book takes us through the process needed for her to find freedom and self-realization in a genuine real sense, that if we talk about it, do the work we can heal and in that process regain hope. Hope is the message. There is relief. Beautifully written and spiritually uplifting.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 18, 2016
• ISBN: 9781514489338

Sybil Paige

Sybil Paige (Paige DePonte) is an awarded photographer, writer, publisher and filmmaker. Her career as a high fashion photographer took her to Europe and New York. From there Paige traveled the globe extensively creating two fine art coffee table books on bio-diverse hotspots and tribes in danger of loosing their cultural diversity. One of which was nominated twice and won a publishing award for spirituality. Paige’s films helped bring awareness of cultural issues and one, won an award as best documentary. She has exhibited her fine art work in Europe, New York, California and Hawaii. Today with her children, she owns and operates a small all natural cattle ranch with trail rides and a burger joint. Paige created a small gallery space at the ranch and exhibits her work there. She spends a lot of time in the peaceful quiet of the remote location painting and continuing her writing. Having found a peace in her soul; this very special place is where she enjoys life in recovery; sharing her time with her family and grandchildren. She loves the ocean, surfing and riding horses. Paige continues to develop her artistry and writing and hopes to release another book about living in ongoing recovery.

Book preview

Nobody’s Girl

An Incredible Story About

Finding Freedom

Sybil Paige

Copyright © 2016 by Paige Deponte.

Cover Design: Prontosaurus

Cover Art: Paige Deponte

Editor : Karen Chernyaev

Library of Congress Control Number:      2016906998

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-5144-8935-2

      Softcover      978-1-5144-8934-5

      eBook      978-1-5144-8933-8

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted

in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,

without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 06/16/2016

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

731533

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 The Beginning of the End

Chapter 2 Where Do All the Nobody’s Come From

Chapter 3 Broken Little Girls

Chapter 4 Lock Down

Chapter 5 How Did I Get Here

Chapter 6 When no one is paying attention

Chapter 7 Pattern Making

Chapter 8 Isn’t this what they call love?

Chapter 9 White Picket Fences - No such thing

Chapter 10 Everyone has a Story

Chapter 11 On the Road Again

Chapter 12 The Subconscious is Always At Work

Chapter 13 When we just can’t hear the message

Chapter 14 It will be different this time

Chapter 15 Fighting for your life

Chapter 16 Realizations

Chapter 17 Somebody save me

Chapter 18 Love is real

Chapter 19 Epiphany

Chapter 20 Living a brand new life

A VERY SPECIAL THANK YOU

To my beautiful children for whom without you I would surly have perished.

You taught me everything I know about love, patience, understanding, and faith; you are my angels.

Zachery, Mauirissa, Michella, and Mahina

To my little spirit guides, you came along and lifted my wings when I could not fly because you still believe in miracles, magic, and play.

Kahealani, Izaiah, Kupono, Kaylaya, Kamali’i, Zayden.

To my sisters who have loved and supported me on this journey.

My mother for the life she sacrificed in order to bring me here.

My husband, I wish we could have learned what we did in the end, earlier.

Love is complicated, and addiction destroys. You were a great love.

To all the loving human beings—you know who you are—who brought me to my highest good and for all the ways it all happened.

It has been a wild ride.

To Music Cares for the support during this project.

https://www.grammy.org/musicares

A loving Higher Power, always there.

One day at a time.

My sincere love and gratitude to all the individuals who took a leap of faith and preordered the book on my Idiegogo campaign!

Thank you for your generosity and for making this project come to life. Each one of you stepped up to the plate to help put an end to the silence that destroys lives.

Michelle Astley

Marcene Melliza

Marjolijn DeGroot

Sacha Riviere

Jake Jewsiak

Vicky Hamiltion

Stephanie Costantino,

Barbara George

Donna Sterling

Randee Beiler

Karen Mulder

Leslie Gaessner

Annelise Trezza

Arthur Ober

Fara Stafford

Symone Miguel

Camille Taylor

Daniel Mauer

Mark Izbicki

Elana Greene

Lydia Liffick

Chris Galligan

Ellen Feig

Tim McKenna

Michael Rovnyak

Samantha Evans

Lorena Aviles- Galberth

Emily Grace-Steppes

Jeannie Wenger

Jules Wood

Michelle Geft

Christina Marks

Michael Kastenbaum

Till Paris

Kiko Ellsworth

John Grover

Nancy Marcucella

Susan Hopkins

Danika Fields

Johnathon Lee

Mia Klein

Hollis Taylor

Anthony Fernandez

Joseph Ganci

Jack Grace

Laurie Scully

Dawit Kebede

Guy Holmes

Stacie Rose

INTRODUCTION

Sitting on a plane thirty thousand miles up doing a review of this manuscript, I’m asking myself a serious question. Why did I write it? Seems a silly thing to ask now that it’s done and about to go out into the world—but a fair question. I want to be very sure.

I heard someone’s story. It changed my life.

Over the years, many people have exclaimed, Oh, you’ve had such a fascinating life. You’ve been all over the world, survived near death experiences, and accomplished so many amazing things! You have to write a book about your life.

It sounded like a cool idea. But I just couldn’t do it. Why? It would not be the truth, the whole truth.

Who I was or rather who I pretended to be or who I would become in order to impress or get what I wanted was not the truth. Who I really I was.

Then one day, I sat down at the keyboard, and this is what came forth. The truth. My truth. In recovery, one just can’t hide anymore, which saved my life. Sounds very dramatic, but the truth is the only thing that saved my life.

That and finding my voice.

This is the book I felt needed to be written. Yes, I am an addict telling another story about how I survived an unthinkable childhood, ravaged through my life assailing it. Then I found recovery and now have a wildly amazing life. Yes, it is true; but then again, it is my story. It might just be the story someone needs to hear.

Could be just one human out there needing to hear this story. That is enough for me—one person who resonates with any one part of the story, or all of it and begins their own journey to freedom.

In the beginning, I came into a twelve-step program to support someone else who needed help.

I had no idea at the time I might have a problem. I listened to people tell their stories, and one day I heard mine. Not exactly my life; in fact, we had different lives completely, yet I heard my story. We hear this a lot in the rooms. The moment I connected to the pain of addiction and the joy of that person’s freedom via finding recovery.

I was so tired of being something, someone I thought everyone would love and accept. I was tired of feeling like a fraud. I felt that way for as far back as I could remember.

As time went on, I began to hear a lot of stories in the rooms. A common thread began to show through. That feeling of not being good enough, feeling like a nobody, unworthy.

Then I heard magnificent stories of transformation. Those same people who had felt the deepest darkness of their souls now had hope, and they found it by first telling their story—to help another person using their story to save a life.

I was told by a literary agent when I put the book out, there are too many of these types of books. I could have quit right then, but I remembered my reason for writing it. Somewhere out there is someone, maybe just one someone who needs to hear this story.

So I wrote—not the story people wanted. I’m not a famous celebrity. I’m one human being who felt like I was unimportant no matter how much I achieved, with a sinking feeling of being a faux human, that followed me everywhere. And to shut off that feeling I got loaded.

Funny thing was, I was regarded as someone who had it all going on. That was the goal and the problem, but underneath it all deeply rooted in my being was this constant desire to self-destruct to the point of almost fulfilling my prophecy. I landed by accident in a place where I heard someone tell my story. Then I heard hundreds. And I thought how many of us are there out there? Millions.

I have circumnavigated the globe a few times. I have been arrested in foreign lands trying to save them; hung out with some of the world’s most remote and amazing tribes; flown in private jets, the concord; dated the wealthy and even slept with a rock star; almost married a prince; and made a few of those top models famous. I won awards for my creative accomplishments. But through it all, I felt like this huge fake.

If they just knew who I really was, everyone would surely reject me.

I am capable of incredible feats if I can stay clean for any length of time. In fact, I could do that and did that, yet I could not see that when I did; my life got better. So I always went back to what I knew—comfortable chaos.

There was always this other me inside me who kept getting in the way. Everywhere I went, she went too. Ultimately, she would take over, and everything I had accomplished became unimportant. She seemed set on that mission to self-destruct, and for the life of me, I could not see it or have any power to stop it.

Why? Well, I have to start with some sort of explanation.

I am an addict. I was born one. And my story like millions out there, was that my life was also touched by abuse. Traumatic events that not only drastically changed my personality but the lives of those around me, because of it.

This book focuses on the trauma related to child abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, the subsequent posttraumatic stress disorder; and the resulting self-abuse via addiction. Seems a common dominator today, right? I use the term addiction because it really does not matter what I am using: drugs, alcohol, food, sex, money, work, and oh yes, my favorite—fantasy. Anything to change me and how I felt.

To feel different than really I felt; unhappy at my core. Nothing, I mean nothing was ever enough to take that feeling away, except the numbness. Shutting down, out, and off.

This book is about finding a voice, a voice that was silenced, stuffed deep down, buried. A life—no, a soul buried, clawing its way out from under layers and layers of denial only to hit the light and be stuffed back down again. By me.

This is a story I hope will relate to any individual who became the result of addiction and/or an abusive action, as every action has a reaction, a consequence. Being born an addict, raised within the walls of dysfunction, I went straight into my destiny head-on.

In sharing this story, my hope is to reach that deep, hidden part of you, to engage you, whether you have experienced or are experiencing abuse, know someone being abused, have been the abuser, are the result of trauma. It doesn’t matter what it was really because trauma is trauma. It needs healing. If not, we remain locked in addictions, alcoholism, or any method of self-sabotage to self-medicate it.

In order to thrive while growing up in a traumatic environment, my individual personality split into two distinctive entities as a child. Not multiple personality disorder in the clinical sense but to a remarkable degree in any case. I was Nobody—the little girl who had no voice and the ugly, unwanted child who hid inside herself from the pain her world dished out. And I was also Sybil—a warrior, a protector who wasn’t afraid of anything or anybody. Sybil is my addict. She came about to help me—Nobody—survive my world.

The world the Nobody lived in that appeared normal to her and everyone in her life. Her caretakers—her family—behaved in a way that told her that the events that happened to her and forced her to change were normal. This happens more than we can imagine—people seemingly living normal lives to everyone around them. But inside, pain, insanity, and chaos thrive.

The part of her that could not fully accept her circumstances—we always know when something is not quite right—but who had no choice, no voice, created Sybil to survive because she was a child, and these events and her life were out of her control and out of control. They say that often alters are created to express impulses perceived as forbidden or destructive by an abused child, such as anger, rage, hatred, and defiance. At the tender age of six, therapy might have helped; but of course, at that time, it was not an option.

The degree to which the transition of personalities took place was so subtle no one noticed until it was too late. Not that anyone was actually paying attention. They were deep in their own disease.

It is a fact that we all dissociate to some degree, or we would not be able to watch the news or witness death and move on. Dissociation, however mild, is a survival mechanism the experts have been studying for eons—how people survive unthinkable catastrophes and manage to go on with life. And thank God.

True, some do not.

But Nobody did, and this is her story—and Sybil’s. I call her Sybil because of the infamous film; I remember watching it and thinking at my tender age. Wow, that is me! I resonated deeply with the story of pain and becoming someone else to handle it. The film was controversial later, but at that time, I felt as if I, for a moment, wasn’t alone in my thinking.

Reading this story, you might think, How could I not see that things were going wrong again? That the things that were done to me were terrible? How could I not be aware that I was in danger? Why didn’t I stop it from happening again and again? Why did I keep repeating the same situations?

You will have a million questions and judgments. Stay with it; there is a purpose to telling the full story, a story of hope.

The reality of things was, for me, I thought my life and my behavior and, most important, their behavior was normal.

People endure what becomes the norm for them because they never learned there was an option. Take a dog whose owner over time becomes tired of and irritated with the pet. The owner beats it, starves it, ignores it, and then blames the pet for whining until eventually the pet withdraws and begins a slow death from neglect. The dog believes this is normal behavior and continues to endure the abuse until it eventually dies. It doesn’t fight back because it is all the dog has ever known. It endures because it is normal—and because it has no other choice.

Now take the same dog and remove it from the horrible owner and the abuse and watch that same dog cower from love and affection because it does not trust it. It’s a very slow process to get the dog to learn a new way of being treated—to learn to be loved. The dog has no idea that there is another way and actually feels strange in any situation that does not involve abuse. But it can recover.

In the case of humans, who are supposed to be more evolved than dogs, the person will either recreate the abuse or will run to find abuse because that’s where the abused feels safe. Insane—yes, but for Nobody, it was her reality. Nobody knew chaos, abuse, pain, and insanity; and without these in her life, it seemed off and boring. She actually would seek it out.

So for the most part, Nobody’s entire life was action or reaction, fight or flight. I wasn’t living; I was surviving, moment to moment. I had a twisted and selective belief system and thought process. To survive, I (Nobody) put my alter ego at the helm. For years, Sybil occupied the driver’s seat.

She is my addict and ally. She made the world less painful because I truly believed that I was, at the depths of my being, crazy, dirty, bad, ugly, stupid, unlovable, unworthy, untalented, and that everything and everyone was completely untrustworthy. And I was filled with shame because of those beliefs.

Yes, when Nobody was very young and her world became too painful, she withdrew; and the stronger, tougher part of her emerged—her warrior, dragon slayer, front girl, fighter and her addict—Sybil—these two entities survived inside one person.

Sybil, the protector, hid Nobody from the bogeyman who came into her room at night when she was a child. Sybil was there when Nobody was stalked, harassed, and ridiculed by the evil queen. Sybil took over when the many fears that lurked in every corner of Nobody’s mind surfaced and stuffed them away neat and tidy; so over the years, when they tried to surface, she just pushed them back down. Sybil killed the pain, anyway she saw fit, snuffed out the feelings, including the good ones like joy and being loved.

Sybil kept Nobody happy down there by creating a fantasy world where Nobody could thrive, a silent world where bad things just went away if you believed they weren’t true and never, never talked about them.

Sybil the warrior, while a tough act, lived in constant doubt, fear, pain, and anger. She reacted in ways she thought would protect Nobody from you.

Every one of you.

After a lifetime of reacting to every situation, eventually the warrior became exhausted, beaten, worn thin. In that exhaustion, Sybil surrendered. She admitted that running and fighting were not the solution. Her cure, her protection, was actually killing Nobody.

This is the story of waking up, letting go, and learning to live.

Emerging. Finding a voice. It’s an incredible journey.

To feel safe and whole in the world as one complete individual. To be present, free of the painful past, and open to the limitless possibilities that were always meant to be hers, that were rightfully hers (and that are open to everyone else); to be loved and to love; to be happy and create happiness, to feel good about herself and make others feel good.

If you are like Nobody, someone who experienced a traumatic life event where the pain associated with it was too much for you, stick around. I think we all have at some point in time and never learn to really let them go. This journey is hers, but is shared for you or perhaps someone you know and for anyone who is locked in denial, self-abuse, isolation, and/or addiction.

Whoever needs to hear this message will, I hope, find some hope here. I found that by being open to the possibility, even minutely, that there was a different way to live, was the key. I was at the end of my proverbial road when I was ready. And waiting for me was an open door, all I had to do was walk through it.

What it took for me, my story? I had to become willing. Willingness was essential. Willing to surrender. It did not come easily for me. If you’re reading this, you are already a little bit willing to see if there is another way. That is enough to start.

My hope is that you’ll be inspired to reach out and reach within yourself to find help and be open to it because no one has to live life locked in silent self-destruction. Alone.

Humans need one another. We can heal one another.

It took me, Nobody and Sybil, a long time to realize that we were a somebody worth saving, and that’s okay. We are exactly where we are supposed to be.

I believe today that every person who passes through our life has something to offer us, and we them. Today I am forever grateful for love found in all forms. Sometimes the most painful and the most joyous events are the ones that often teach us the most important lessons. I resonate with that statement.

A friend once told me the following: Those who hurt us the most actually loved us the most. They came into this life to purposely push us past our limits in order for us to attain the knowledge that we (souls) might otherwise never seek. To guide us in whatever manner worked to find the courage to fight for our right path, to teach us specific lessons, to find our souls direction and purpose. They do all this knowing beforehand that they will most assuredly risk and forfeit our love in the process, as it was the only way to get our souls to evolve on our journey.

This philosophy works for me, for I would not be who I am today if not for all the events of my life.

It takes what it takes.

The responsibility then is to pass on that precious gift of knowledge in hopeful positive ways to help others in the service of giving back. This book is my way of living up to my responsibility.

Seek and you shall find.

Please don’t give up on yourself in the process. It is a process. Sybil used to think that clichés were ridiculous, but today Nobody is Somebody, and her favorite one is …

Don’t give up before the miracle.

Chapter One

THE BEGINNING OF THE END

My name is Sybil, and this is my story. It is also Nobody’s story—the Nobody who became Somebody.

This day like many others, no different than the past 50 odd years preceding, I woke up and looked over at yet another beautiful naked man sprawled across my bed in a coma, tendrils of long blond hair strewn across his chiseled face.

My bags were packed, and I was headed out the door for who knows where. Anywhere but there.

This is what I did.

I ran. I didn’t call it running. I preferred to call it going to a job interview out of state, to see a friend in need, to set up an art show, or to meet a producer for a new film— always very far away, another country, whatever felt right at the time it fell from my mouth. It was always important and always hundreds or thousands of miles away from where I was at that moment. And I had to go right now. And, I simply never looked back. Much easier that way. Distance, I like to distance myself. From far away; things just fade away—like they never happened.

In the case of this recent blond musician guy, I needed to leave, and I needed to do it now.

I stared at him and thought, Why? Why can’t he just learn to use like me—responsibly?

I hated having to cut him loose, especially this one. I mean, I really was in love this time. Kicking him to the curb, as I liked to call it, was going to be harder than I thought, but it was getting ugly. And you know what? It always did.

What happened? Or rather, what happened this time three years ago?

This is as good a place as any to start our story because it was that day three years ago that my life, as I knew it, changed. Not changed for the usual thirty-day restore, revive and cleansing session but irrevocably changed. Changed because I made a decision. A decision to stop living the way I had been living my life.

This particular day, I heard that I had a choice. Before this day, I never knew I had a choice.

For some reason, those words stood out to me at that given moment in time, and I had an aha moment.

I had never considered I had a choice because I was never given one to begin with, and subsequently everything I did thereafter was a consequence, not a choice.

I was to learn a lot that day and every day thereafter. It was time. I’m sure it was mentioned by someone somewhere that there was another way, but I just didn’t listen. I just couldn’t hear. I didn’t trust anyone. I didn’t believe that I could live any other way. For me, there was only this way. My way.

Sure, you’re thinking. I’m an addict, and an addict can never claim, I’ve changed. Or, I’ll never use again. And you’re right. I can’t say that either in its entirety, as changing, after all, is a lifelong process. And staying clean is a day-to-day process. But it’s a start. I cannot claim I will never drink or use again; I can say not today and one day at a time. The minute I even think the thought of possibly never drinking or using, my addict revolts. I can only stay in the present moment.

What I can say is something in me changed that day and has stayed changed every day since. On a daily basis, sometimes a minute-to-minute basis. In that aha