Truth

[meoww]

Acting out of convenience, doing what's familiar, living to minimize fear

 

My biggest downfall

 

Definitely fear

 

I was just so damaged and ignorant I knew I couldn't fake it with the people I wanted to know. I knew they would know immediately I wasn't one of them.

 

That fact still remains true but I don't know why I didn't try!! Its not like i couldnt have eventually learned how to be. Why did I decide that if I couldn't have what I truly wanted, I'd pretend to be somebody else? Where did false self come from?

 

Why was my method of coping to fracture my identity and to suppress everything to the point that it all seems like a disturbing dream?

 

That's why I kept perpetuating the cycle of abuse. For almost my whole life I believed I could never be normal because only normal people receive parental love and I had never had that. My self esteem was like so low it was like inverted. My self concept was literally non existent. Hard to believe that now

[meoww]

I resisted it so much at first

The thought of having to have a self that wasn't parasitic on someone else literally made me so anxious I would cry. And I did cry every night for about a year and a half.

 

And then I slowly realized having a self was like being a kid in a candy store 24/7

You could have all these different kinds of thoughts

Do whatever you want

Be happy just living a normal life

It seemed so daring

 

Like no one had ever done it before, except me

 

I felt like some kind of pioneer of selfhood.

I don't think that was correct but I don't even know anymore

If what goes on in my head is approximate to what goes on in others

[meoww]

now I'm at that place where it's like I have to let go of more baggage to get to my destination

 

I have to travel light if I want to get to where I want to be.

 

It's like sometimes after a big natural disaster you realize you have the luxury of not being bound to your past or your memories. All your memory aids, furniture, photographs, streets, it all gets washed away in the deluge. it can be so invigorating, paving the way for something so good everyone ends up wanting it and we forget there was a time that it didnt exist and we lived differently.

 

My peace has been hard won

But I can't help but be attached to my sadness for the sake of wanting to feel like my individual experience means something.

 

But I don't think it does tho

 

Sometimes mistakes, even when repeated again and again are just more and more mistakes and not some way of enlightening yourself.

 

So in the forest of my calm

The clearing of my light and clarity

The beautiful new horizons

That were always there beckoning towards me

I have to hang my head in shame for my mistakes because I have made more than most. It doesn't matter how self aware I am

A mistake is still a mistake

My life could have always been going in this positive direction

I have been the cause of my suffering all along

I was never petty

Just had to say that because I hate it when people say it's petty to blame your parents when they don't even know of the harm any toxic person including parents can bring to their intimates and dependents

But...

 

Who cares about those people even? Let them be reactionary

 

I just want to be happy more than anything in the entire world

To taste that which I have never tasted

It's just time for me

The horrible things and memories

The memories are my actions

My stupidity and fear

I have to forgive myself

There is nothing inherently wrong about stupidity or ignorance

That doesn't make me a bad person

 

It's okay to grow and change through out your life and end up in a better place than where you started

 

In fact that is the natural course of like everyone's life.

Ohhh

That actually makes sense

[meoww]

It's weird how if you're Amish or hasidic or something it's very clear your identity is different from the mainstream

So you kind of have to comes to terms with difference in a way. Or choose to be traditional or not, at least that thought might cross your mind explicitly. That's not really true though is it because then I think of people who are ashamed of their own race and haven't come to terms with that.

 

It seems more insidious when you grow up believing that you have everything a person should want (even if that is a lie) then it takes longer to realize that not only are there other ways to think all around you literally and almost endless sea of different mindsets leading to different outcomes and that you might have randomly generated one that kind of sucks. So then you have kids, and then you keep on building your little sand castle and then you die. I wonder if my generation will suffer from a generation gap as well, is it inevitable

 

But I literally can't be everyone

I have to be satisfied with my one body and my limited experience

But it's comforting in a way knowing that everyone is actually unique. It makes me want to view people more compassionately

 

The way I might have as a child

But kids are so judgmental obviously

I can't really remember

[meoww]

Sometimes I literally feel like I am my mother like that she has replicated through me and that im just pretty much her half clone and that I can't do anything about it and the way I chew food is like her or if I make a weird face in the mirror then I'm a monster just like her

 

And I can't think about my dad because ill just get too depressed.

 

And then I feel like she is in my head, trying to possess my body so that she can get out of living her own life

 

And then I feel like we are connected forever and forever and I feel so overwhelmed sexually violated and regularly violated and grossed out by my identity

Have no idea what it means

 

But in the past writing down the worst stuff helped me forget so I hope I can forget this

 

I don't want her DNA

I want it out of me

There has got to be a way

 

Then I won't be responsible for her well being

Then I can forget about whose loins lol I sprang from and I'll feel like I deserve to have a good life...

[meoww]

My mother always used to say, ill never be the kind of mother you want me to be. One thing I realized I never asked her, was why? Nothing I wanted from her at the time required much effort, time, certainly not any amount of money. I just wanted a peaceful, mutually supportive relationship. Why was the thought of that so disturbing to her?

 

Anyway I should have at least countered with a why just to watch her scramble for some thoughtless words. She usually said it at the end of one of the fights she instigated after all the crying was done, usually after her insincere apologies. I'm an idiot for not taking this to a therapist because it was just so over the top dramatic and stressful all the time, clearly she was mentally ill to the point that she'd change her memories at will, her justifications would morph into whatever she needed them to be at the moment. That's how she lives, in a moment to moment reality where her justifications and memories can literally change from one sentence to the next. Like she'd insult me in one sentence and then i would be like why did you say that, and then she'd be like I never said that. Insanity

[meoww]

Hey friend, In some ways I wonder if the true test of your character is now. You've made this huge decision to have a kid, with a slightly older guy. You are basically stuck now with the decision you made. I wonder if you'll have more compassion for your kids since you didnt really have it for your friends.

 

I wonder if you'll ever be jealous of your children or try to subtly undermine them

 

You used to do that to me. You wouldn't let me things on purpose, you wanted people to think you were cooler and therefore more valuable.

 

I wonder if you can let all of that go so that you can be a mother. I don't know

Part of me hopes you fail but part of me hopes that you become a compassionate and loving person.

 

I wonder if you really love him too. I wonder if that was the life you really wanted or if you were held back by fear.

[meoww]

Poison....I'm like filled with poison. Why do I think about people I will never see again in my life?!?! Why am I so hung up on evil people from my past?

I don't understand why I'm just an idiot.

 

I think I'm scared everyone is evil like them..,

[meoww]

Right now i keep people at arms length

It's easy to be positive when you don't hold grudges have no expectations

Just enjoy people's company for a bit

 

But I need more satisfying relationships. I'm just scared I'm going to not like what I find or that I'm just so cursed and unlucky that only the worst people will let me in

[meoww]

I'm seriously so scared of people. I don't trust anyone.

[meoww]

My life feels like it's like a popular tv series that has jumped the shark. Like the plot was simple and cool at the beginning but now everything is so weird that you just can't really watch anymore. I think that probably happens to everyone though as experiences pile up. Yeah and then it's like a new series comes out and you look at the old show like, I used to be obsessed with that?

[meoww]

Growing even stronger in my convictions

 

Learning not to believe those that will screw you over with a smile and act like everything is ok just because they wronged you in a cheerful way. Integrity and self awareness are key to my personal happiness

 

It's okay sometimes, to reserve some degree of judgement for people just to protect yourself from harm

It doesn't have to make you arrogant

[meoww]

Have you ever truly forgiven? I dont know if I have ever truly forgotten anything from a slight to a malicious attack. I wonder if I'd be happief if I just forgot all of it, just everything. More than wanting justice, I want to be happy. Justice is an impossible thing. The only true justice is preventing bad things from happening to do you. The only justice is being safe from harm and never having to be a victim.

 

Being a victim is something that is becoming less and less taboo. Most of the sting of being a victim of an underreported and taboo crime comes from the feeling of isolation. You know people don't want to talk about it, ever. So you never get the comfort and love you need to overcome the crime in the first place. You know people will label you as damaged goods or just less of a human somehow, so you feel angry, like what the hell did I ever to do you to make you treat me this way? Why do you think you're any better just because you had much better luck? But now people know that people are not perfect nor do they always have the best intentions.

 

And it seems like, not to make any assumptions, but the world is becoming a more peaceful place where those values of tolerane and understandimg flourish.

 

Unfortunately and in some cases, fortunately people are wildcards and you can't always predict how someone is going to be from their environment and upbringing.

[meoww]

I was reading the strong vs weak people thread and a lot of people mentioned being a victim who blames their environment as a sign of weakness. But when I started thinking about it, examining my own weaknesses and other's weaknesses, I think a lot of it boils down to internal conflict. Sometimes it is because who you are in your head doesn't match up to who you are in real life, in many different ways. Sometimes you just don't have the strength to recover from your mistakes when you make really big ones.

 

In my experience I really only know a handful of weak people who want to view themselves as victims. In those cases, those people were quite insecure, and identified with the victim role in order to compensate for something. Sometimes it was to compensate for a lack of love in their life, sometimes to cover up guilt and self hatred. As much as I have despised those people in the past, especially when their out of control actions affected my life in negative ways, I'm beginning to realize I have both the strength and the desire to actually deal with their issues directly instead of labeling them as weak, pathetic or evil. Weak they may be, but sometimes self identified victims can be dangerous, in a number of ways, so we have to deal with them as a society in order to stop perptuating the cycle of trauma for all. Even if their problems aren't our problems, they are just like physically disabled people in that they need special treat,emt and extra compassion. If only they were as easy to identify! Then there wouldnt be such a debate over who is weak/sick/deficient and who isn't.

 

In my life, I have been a victim affected by my parent's abusive parenting and their mental issues, but the majority of my anger about that stemmed from lack of compassion from others, not necessarily the situation itself. Obviously, it's not an easy thing to overcome but I don't think most victims view their issues as insurmountable. They just want to be truly accepted instead of being subtly or overtly shamed, valued instead of trivialized and immediately blamed for their situation.

 

Kind of went off on a tangent but that really helped me!

I need to do my part to untangle the mess our emotions are in. I feel so good.

I just need to be braver!

 

But i think about those repeat offenders like murderers and then i have to wonder

If it is them inherently or if the treatment was inadaquate

Or if there weere clear signs that person wasnt stable enough to get out of prison that were ignored.

K this is enough!

But this is good for me, i feel more stable

[meoww]

Oh and i was originally planning to write this. I think people often disagree about strategies for helping damaged people become functional, even if they agree on the causes of why certain people become dysfunctional. Currently i'd say our society at large uses shame to control unwanted behavior. It's effective because it doesn't seem to cost anything in terms of social services, etc, and is ultimately intended to encourage people to be self motivated. Its been the biggest motivator ive seen in people in my life, although i honestly see that changing more and more. Some people think we need to believe people have free will because we know change can only come from within. Personally, i healed from dysfunction without the aid of any compassionate people but i wonder how my path would have been if things had been different.

 

If given the choice to be healthy, i think most people who act like victims would choose to transplant their unhealthy minset for a healthy one, they are so dysfunctional that they can't help themselves. This is where some people throw up their hands and say well if we believe they can't control themselves then we can't help them. We just need to hold everyone accountable because of the principle

 

Not to mention that mental health or health in generall can't really be measured quantitatively. But i know from experience what it is like to be so damaged that your brain cant turn off the negatvity, and how most people don't see their own limitations let alone allow others to be vulnerable. your mindset literally colors your world differently from others, your emotions are largely responsible for food tastes good, what textures and textiles feel good or look beautiful to you, values determine how we see race even. So our brains obviously arent like, complete in and of themselves.

 

Sometimes people who are playing victim roles sincerely don't know any bettter. I've played passive roles in my life if not assuming a victim role, but looking back at my progress, I realize most of the good things that have come out of my healing were kind of random and that I just got lucky a lot of time because I was looking in every direction to find relief from my suffering. I look back now and realize almost everyday that there are new ways that I didnt even know I was maladaptive cant think of a better word right now?

 

Having the strength, wisdom and clarity to know which people are not in control of their emotions and which are is probably my answer so far. Ive been strong in my life without even knowing it, by society standards, but internally i was just about to come crashing down. Having crashed and burned, without support, ive been able to observe things on both sides of the spectrum and come to conclusions about how i can build a stronger foundation for myself.

[meoww]

And ive definitely seen strong people questiom themselves or belittle themselves for having opinions that differ from the norm. If they were able to present their opinions in an attractive way, then their suffering would be greatly diminished and they wouldnt feel isolated simply because of how they perceive themselves to hold unpopular opinions. I wish that undercurrent of societal bullying would stop.

 

Im going to do my part though. By being strong without being abrasive, which is definitely key.

[meoww]

Natural sleep cycles are supposed to be pretty different from how we currently get our sleep. I think in the future we'll tailor our work more and more towards maximum productivity with broader insight into our health. Same with values, trauma is ultimately unproductive. Negativity and being close minded doesnt really yield good resuls, thank god for that because otherwise people wouldnt really be motivated to be more positive.

 

We live in a society of convenience and funny ideas about superiority. like some really old school people who would rather put in an so called honest days work under fluorescent lights, wasting time, not working on acquiring new skills, and repeating the same tasks over and over again. I think that will be dead in my lifetime though. Thank god i realized i dont have to be ashamed for not being to accept that sentence in my life.

 

Shame to me, works like this. Shutting down your mind, you become closed to the future, closed off to others you might learn from, you start to ossify, your progress is much slower than if you arent steeped in rigid ideas about how things should be,

 

Focusing and channeling your mind toward your goals is definitely key

I see that now

Even though im technically wasting sooooooooooooo much time its not even funny

This foundation of morality i have now is a good thing that i never had before. And this site has given me so many tools to cope with all kinds of obstacles that have come my way.

[meoww]

This is the most important thing I might ever say on this site.

 

Systematic abusers should not be labeled as evil or cast out of society, but their destructive and malicious actions need to be addressed. It's as simple as that. If you are friends with someone who has been accused of abuse, especially by their own children, then stand by them by encouraging them to seek help, not by refusing to believe the victim who has made the allegation. 99% of abuse allegations are not made lightly, people almost never lie about these things. You can still be friends with, and even support an abusive person but please don't tolerate abuse or perpetuate violence both verbally and physically toward a victim by being hostile toward them and supporting the abuser. True friends encourage people to be their best and to seek out true happiness. No abuser is truly happy.

 

If someone ever alleges that someone you know or thought highly (or not so highly) of is systematically abusive, never dismiss it out of hand because you believe they are a good person, they have demonstrated goodness in the past, or because they don't strike you as being dangerous. Be brave enough to inquire into the situation more deeply, and realize the victim is going to have a really hard time opening up and most of the time they aren't even going to know how to express how bad it was until they have a significant healing period. This is because abuse often happens when we are disarmed and not expecting it, it catches you so off guard you don't even realize you have been violated until it's too late. Then, a victim may try to reach out and get dismissed as contributing to the problem and this adds fuel to the fire like nothing else. Imagine having a problem that is so taboo that no one will even admit it exists.

 

Victims have had to be patient with outsiders acting like domestic violence doesn't happen, isn't a crime, or can only be perpetuated by two equal parties hurting each other or that 'real' abuse only results in broken bones, or that 'real' abuse is carried out by a deranged person clearly off balance and easy to identify. Victims have had to deal with people wanting to wash their hands of them because the situation is just simply put, depressing, a downer when all they ever wanted was someone to come forward of their own free will and lend them their support and love.

 

Abuse is not embarrassing, it is violence. Violence is never something we should turn the other cheek to. It may be hard to understand why things have gotten so bad, but remember that systematic abuse is often dealt out to those who are in weaker positions, such as children and the elderly. Power imbalances of any kind, such as in age or status, also lend themselves to becoming abusive. So if you question the credibility of the victim because they are weak, remember that is often why they have been targeted in the first place. Please have as much compassion for the victim as you do the so called misunderstood abuser. Abusers are often excused for their behavior because they are viewed as damaged people, yet victims are expected to be model citiczens who are often not allowed to demonstrate almost any weaknesses at all. Any flaw or vulnerablility they have is scrutinized or up for attack.

 

I'm closing this journal too because it's served it's purpose but i really hope that has helped other victims find a voie and a way to express themselves to get people to actually listen instead of point fingers at them.

So much love to all the abuse survivors who have had to walk this path alone and find their peace in a difficult world. Forgiveness of those who didn't help us is the only way we can integrate into normal society and put this behind us. This journal entry really helped me outline my values and organize my thoughts so that I can communicate with people on this issue in the future. Hugs to anyone who has read this! Thank you so much.