this is very complex, axa. i need to use paramedic analogies because they're the closest parallel I can think of in terms of severity and complexity. Hope it doesn't gross you out, hope it helps.
you're recovering from the emotional equivalent of compound fractures and internal injuries. what is needed for one part to heal [like a blood thinner for a clot] may actually imperil another part [like bleeding elsewhere].
the best you can do, i think, is to realize that it's all pieces, but it's also all part of one thing underneath. Somehow, as the pieces heal, the whole heals too.
my suggestion: follow the pain. I don't mean revel in it, I mean - what hurts most? Why? Try to figure out what that specific pain is telling you and work there first. It's like first aid for the body, the worst injuries [that we can detect] are treated first and as they are stabilized it's possible to work on others.
The longing for revenge is perfectly human. it will pass! it will pass! but i think it may pass more quickly and permanently if it isn't spurned and shunned and shamed. accept it, sit with it, see it as a form of pain because it is - it's pain translated into anger and a desire to ACT - see what it tells you.
you will find - honest you will - that as you heal, the longing for revenge does dissipate.
but you will also find - and you will see evidence for this in the behavior of folks around you in realspace, if you know what to look for - that when you push that longing down, disown it, 'stuff' it just as we are trained to 'stuff' all of the other negative feelings abuse brings out of us - it does NOT go away. it comes back in quirky, often very destructive ways, often ways that we ourselves cannot see but anyone else within a five mile radius recognizes instantly [cringe].
you'll unaccountably hate someone, for instance, and it won't be because they're lousy rotten meanies, but because they are dealing openly with the feelings you can't face.
you'll find yourself 'setting up' whoever you want revenge on. Bad mouthing them in realspace to try to create consequences. You can end up so far down that path that only someone who has seen everything develop can tell who started as the N and who started as the target -- because your tactics against the N will become almost a carbon copy of the Ns tactics against you.
this is the greatest danger hidden in premature forgiveness. it isn't forgiveness at all, it's just concealment. healing doesn't work this way. if you close a wound before it heals cleanly, it can fester.
journaling helps. non-dominant hand art helps enormously. write letters you will never send, and burn them safely in your fireplace, if you have one, or tear them up and drown them and when they are good and mushy, put 'em down the toidy. Shoot, just write the N's name, or draw his portrait, and mush that up and flush it down. Use symbols to relieve some of the pressure. Use safe outlets. Exercise is great, it handles all the fight-flight chemicals. Doesn't have to be much, either - stretches will do in a pinch.
but keep the internal channels of communication open within yourself. don't wall off or deny - let the light in - accept what you feel - find ways to express it or channel the energy without 'acting out' against anyone* - and it WILL heal, you WILL be transformed this way, and it will happen much faster, in many areas, than you expect.
((((((((((axa))))))))))
*legal stuff excepted of course, when we're forced we're forced.
