voice of trauma

It's been 4 days since I caught one of the air conditioner installation guys going through my dresser drawers. I would have thought that by now I would feel all better and this would be behind me. I can't say I've found that to be true though. At first I just felt really yucky. It felt yucky knowing he touched my belongings and my personal items. It felt awful to know he looked at personal pictures that only my husband and I shared together from our honeymoon. None were naked, just personal/intimate. I thought he had taken one of those personal photos until I found it yesterday down behind my jewelry box. He left another photo sitting on top of my dresser (maybe he planned to take it?) as well as a bunch of photos out on my nightstand. He moved stuff around, knocked off some books but whether he took anything I wouldn't know. My dressers are way too messy on top to even tell. Same with  my jewelry box. The necklace I suspect he took could be just misplaced somewhere.
Those aren't the things that are bothering me though. It's how I feel. I feel violated. I feel yucky. I can see his face in my mind and can replay the encounter we had. It wasn't pleasant.
The night after I had nightmares throughout the night. I woke feeling vulnerable and insecure. I'm very thankful for a friend who went with me the next morning to press charges. I wouldn't have followed through I don't think had she not went with me. I am still debating whether pressing charges was the right thing to do. Part of me feels maybe it's not worth the uncomfortable feelings it gave me to have a police man come to my home and question me, nor would I look forward to going to court if they actually decided to follow through with the charge. But there's a big part of me that remembers this from when I was raped as a young teen and for this reason I had to....
When my parents pressed charges and we got further in that process we found out that the man that had raped me had previously raped another person. He had broken into a family's apartment and raped an 18 year old girl. They pressed charges but a couple days before the court trial they moved away without notice and didn't follow through with the charges. For that reason he wasn't convicted, he didn't have consequences, and he definitely wasn't discouraged from doing it again. I wondered if they had done the right thing if it maybe would have prevented me being raped, or at least it would have been a felony and would have been able to be used in our court trial.
Multiple people have reminded me that we don't know this guys motives.... he could have just been looking for cash, he could have been into porn, he could have been scoping out a victim... who knows. I at least feel like I took it seriously and did what I could.
After waking that next morning and having had nightmares I knew that the nightmares weren't from that guy going through my belongings.. they were a result of past trauma. Trauma that has been healed in huge deep great big ways from my Jesus, but trauma that has a voice still at times and when things like this touch on similar feelings, the voice of trauma gets stirred up. I was very grateful thought that Jesus was very close and tenderly reminded me that though I speak from trauma at times, He is speaking too, and He speaks from love and healing and peace. And His voice has the final say. In the midst of ouch feelings Jesus gave me peace and also gave me the ability to give myself space to feel and grace and know I was ok.
Saturday was a wonderful day and I felt great. Last night for some reason I had a lot of nightmares again and woke feeling really tender and vulnerable. Haven't really been able to shake those feelings today. I feel quite silly reacting so strongly when the guy never touched me or anything... but yet when I'm honest and allow myself I know it's really because I'm feeling similar feelings of violation and hurt and it feels out of control and unpleasant. I'm trying to allow myself to feel instead of stuffing the feelings down or getting mad at myself for feeling this way. I know it's much healthier to ask Jesus to put His finger on what He wants to do in me and be with Him on this. I'm trying. I'm grateful that He is compassionate, that He knows the voice of pain and He is gentle and loving.