Day 2

Day 2: September 30, 2021 (Pine Valley, CA to Brawley, CA)

As for the ride, it was a tough day.  A good bit of climbing and strong head wind most of the day.  I rode about 85 miles, and it took almost 8 hours.  I had planned on the ride taking less than 6 hours.  Also, my GPS taking system didn’t capture the entire ride.  Part of it was due to me; I forgot to turn it back on for one stretch and the rest was due to loss of connection with the satellites.

It’s a bit disappointing to ride that much and not have an accurate record.  The rest of the day, however, was not disappointing.  I started near Pine Valley at 7 AM with a good climb.  On this part of the ride, it hit me that I’m actually riding my bicycle across the country for child abuse prevention.  It’s no longer an idea; it’s no long something in the planning stages; and I’m no longer training for the ride.  I’m doing it.

As I thought about my childhood abuse, the damage it did to me, and where I’m at now, I become emotional.  I am grateful for the life I have now and that I’m able to embark on such a journey.  I am not a worthless, ugly, stupid piece of shit that can’t do anything right, and deserving of bad things that happened to me, as I was conditioned to believe about myself.  

That’s what abuse does, it makes a person feel bad about himself/herself, which leads to a drug abuse, alcoholism, eating disorders, depression, anxiety, panic attacks, fear, and a whole host of other psychological and physical ailments.  

Then I started thinking about therapy and what Dr V. (my current therapist) has shared about her work.  She doesn’t heal people; she helps them heal themselves.  I know that’s the case for me.

This led me to thinking about abusers need to stop abusing and that this is really a mental health issue, not a legal issue.  I don’t believe stronger laws against child abuse will reduce the rate of child abuse, so I’ve never considered legislative changes as a solution. 

My epiphany for the day is that legislative change is a big part of the solution.  We need legislative changes to promote mental health, to provide sufficient mental health care for all who need it; and to support mental health care professionals.  For mental health, I mean helping people feel better about themselves; not medicate them so they don’t feel.

Image if the US made a 50-year commitment to helping people feel better about themselves.  How much less child abuse would there be?  How much less drug abuse would there be? How much less alcoholism would there be?   How much less obesity would there be?  And so on.

I need to run the numbers on this, but I believe the savings from less child abuse, drug abuse, alcoholism, obesity, and so on would more than pay for the mental health programs.

I didn’t know what to expect from the ride, I just knew it was something that I needed to do.  I think this was the first of many revelations.